What You Need to Know About TikTok before you Dismiss It

What You Need to Know About TikTok before you Dismiss It

There has been a lot of talk about TikTok by many social media experts such as Hubspot since it was launched in 2018. We thought it would be worth looking further into this to see what all the fuss is about. This article summarises our findings and should help you to easily determine if TikTok is a good match for your business or something you can afford not to worry about for the time being.

Background

TikTok has a huge fanbase among Generation Z and has reportedly reached over 800 million active users worldwide. The parent company for TikTok is ByteDance who purchased a lip-syncing app called musical.ly. They merged the 100 million active users for Musical.ly with TikTok in 2018. By October 2019, TikTok was the top free app in the entertainment section of the Apple App Store and available in 155 countries worldwide.

“TikTok has a huge fanbase among Generation Z and has reportedly reached over 800 million active users worldwide”

TikTok seems to have replaced the hole left from Vine and the most popular accounts appear to be influencers, comedians, meme creators and brands. The most followed account on the app is a comedian and influencer named Loren Gray. She has 40 million followers. Rapper Lil Nas X released the song “Old Town Road” on TikTok. The song reached number one on the Billboards charts shortly after it was released. TikTok has been credited with a lot of the success for this song. Here is an example of the lip-syncing videos unloaded for the song on the platform.

“Videos are usually between 15 seconds to 60 seconds in duration”

How TikTok Works

TikTok is a very fast paced app. When you log in you will see a video at the top of a feed that is algorithmically curated around your interests. Users can follow, comment and like content directly from the video post on their feed. There is an endless stream of videos on the news feed which are mostly comedic or lip-syncing.

The majority of people using the app create short lip-syncing, comedy and talent show videos. These videos are usually between 15 seconds to 60 seconds in duration. The app is so popular because it is designed to suit people looking for quick entertainment while commuting or when they are bored.

The biggest audience for TikTok is in China where it is called Donyin. Around 500 million active users on TikTok are Chinese. About 26% of the audience for the app are between 18 and 24 with males making up around 56% of users and females making up 44%.

“About 26% of the audience for the app are between 18 and 24 with males making up around 56% of users and females making up 44%”

Contact our Digital Marketing Manager Jonathan if you would like any further tips and advice on how to develop a social media marketing strategy for your business. We would be happy to meet for a coffee and help you get the very most from you digital marketing efforts.

Contact Jonathan