TikTok- A Post Ban Winner?
Did the ban on TikTok affect its popularity? Find out!
TikTok is one wave that has caught everyone up in a frenzy. Every second person I see walking around me is lip-syncing to songs, dialogues or quotes. There have been times when I stop what I am doing and just put all my focus on the over-enthusiastic bunch of its users. I feel a cocktail of emotions, where a mix of astonishment and annoyance hits me the same second.
Having said that, the popularity of this ByteDance owned company is simply impossible to ignore. We all know that it is no ordinary destination for short-form videos. It is raw, real and without any boundaries. Would you believe it to have around 500 million users globally, where India alone has about 88 million active users?
I feel that the momentary ban on this app in the country has in fact increased TikTok’s popularity by leaps and bounds. People who once lived in an oblivion are now significantly aware of it. This particularly makes me inquisitive to understand what marketers think the post ban scenario. Does TikTok still hold the same reputation or is it now plummeting badly? Let’s find out..
Decoding TikTok as a Marketing Platform
Each day, we see TikTok becoming more and more interesting. One is getting to see more Vine-style type content. I feel it is a great platform to promote your brand-awareness campaigns. There have been plenty of brands that have experimented with running influencer marketing campaigns. For the most part, such campaigns are orchestrated by brands collaborating with influencer marketing companies rather than TikTok being involved and taking a big share of their revenue. To collaborate officially with TikTok, there is a huge gap between the amount a brand is willing to spend and the cost that this platform demands, making way for such influencer marketing companies.
Ashutosh Harbola, Co-founder of Buzzoka has worked closely with brands such as SBI YONO and HDFC Life for their influencer marketing campaigns on TikTok. He says, “TikTok is one platform which is beautifully reaching out to the people in metros and top 6 Tier 1 cities. The content is majorly produced by the users there as well as people from Tier 2 & 3 cities. It has become a multi-billion dollar company today.”
Talking about our campaign for SBI YONO, the results made a lot of sense to SBI. They were the early adopters of this new platform. Nearly 15 million views were generated. We have seen the numbers to be 10x low on platforms like Instagram, whereas it was 10x high on TikTok. It was a completely influencer-driven campaign without anything paid.”
TikTok also brings along a new level of engagement. From the age-old methods of getting likes, comments and shares on your content, TikTok actually turns someone into a brand ambassador to start a conversation for your brand. Videos are any day more engaging and better responsive. This definitely gives an edge to TikTok even more!
Adding to this, several brands have carried out challenges and contests to get users to generate brand-related content. Brands are also leveraging hashtags, in a more or less similar fashion as on other social media platforms, to promote their Tik Tok marketing campaigns.
It wouldn’t be wrong to call TikTok as the next favorite platform for the unique advantages it offers!
What Do Marketers Think of the Ban?
It was sad to see the ban that was imposed. Citing that the app encourages pornography and that children were at risk of being targeted by sexual predators, it came across as a more placed agenda than anything else.
Shubho Sengupta, Brand Marketer, shares his views on the same. He believes, “The ban was crazy and so one-sided. I mean Facebook, Twitter keep getting away with everything… the ban looked very fishy and good it’s been overturned. The government should support Tiktok instead of attacking.”
The ban was deemed to be lifted because it ultimately encompassed all user-generated content. In no way did I see TikTok harming the freedom of speech or expression of our country. Till the time a user adheres to the policies of TikTok, it shouldn’t be a problem. In the battle of imposing such bans, we simply lose on great content.
Amit Sethia, Marketing Head at Syska also speaks on the occasion. He says, “TikTok Ban has indeed seen an outrage in a lot of people, especially the influencer community who had direct monetary losses and impact. Moral Policing being seen by them as primarily discriminating towards a larger social goal and freedom. A lot of young blood had their lively hood at stake.
The Hon. Court did notice loopholes on part of the app maker where moderation of content did not exist as per required laws, giving freedom to a handful of miscreants to post content, not in its true spirit of Social Media. This court order ensured that such moderation was brought in place and contrary to most other ban’s that exist in our country, in a short time the ban was lifted basis the assurance.”
Should Advertisers be Affected by the Ban?
TikTok definitely opens doors to creativity and is potentially a great platform for monetizing. It has mostly witnessed users from tier 3 and 4 cities. The reason for its high creation and consumption level in such cities is because these people have time.
Sethia adds here, “As a brand, we keep a close watch on the outcome and the moderation process of TikTok. The platform has a larger number of users, however, Syska has not entered the advertising space yet on TikTok. We keep a close watch on its future before we plan any investment decisions.”
From the lens of a brand, TikTok allows paid content on its platform, in addition to tie-ups ups for specific campaigns. If advertisers know that people are on this platform, they will come back again. In fact, the ban has made people more inquisitive. When a brand sees potential (in terms of user base), which TikTok has, they will definitely return no matter what. I don’t see the ban backfiring the popularity of the app at all and advertisers are expected to collaborate with TikTok in future too.
In a nutshell, TikTok is going to be the next big thing for brands. It is fun, entertaining and addictive. It has the potential to become the next big marketing and social networking platform. All eyes on TikTok!
