TikTok has been one of the most talked-about #social media apps of recent times and became the topic of conversation for both good and bad reasons alike. For those of you living under a rock, TikTok is a social media app that enables its users to create short videos ranging from lip-syncing to comedies to talent videos, etc. Chinese developer, ByteDance launched the app in 2017 primarily for markets and regions outside of China. TikTok is available both on iOS and Android. As per the app, ‘Our mission is to inspire creativity and bring joy.’
TikTok boasts of a whopping 500 million active users worldwide, making it 9th with respect to other social network sites, such as LinkedIn, Snapchat, Twitter, and Pinterest. TikTok had approximately 13.2 million new users in the United States alone during Q1 2019, an increase of 181% year-over-year, or 2.8 times the 4.7 million installs it had there in Q1 2018. The growth of the app has been accredited largely to India. An estimated 88.6 million users joined the app in Q1 19. This was 8.2 times more the number in Q1 18 and was largely from Android, with Google Play responsible for almost 99 percent of downloads.
TikTok: The Next Big Social Media App
Since its launch in 2016, the app has experienced massive growth. TikTok, also known as Douyin in China now, was actually launched as A.me back in the year 2016. Douyin had approx. 100 million users, and daily 1 billion video views within only just 1 year of its launch. It was only renamed TikTok, when it was launched internationally in September 2017. However, the game for TikTok changed when it acquired the famous video app called Musical.ly in Dec 2017 and once Musical.ly’s users were completely shifted to TikTok is when the actual impact of TikTok began, especially in the international market.
TikTok recorded 600 million downloads worldwide, in 2018 and became the fourth most downloaded app in the world, next to WhatsApp, Messenger, and Facebook. TikTok became the most downloaded app throughout the entire year and became popular in the top three mobile markets in the world- China, USA and India.
How TikTok is evolving an important #marketing tool
Like any social media app, TikTok has become important for #marketing and brand opportunities. The app focuses on putting video first, and hence becomes an important tool to use especially to cater to the younger target audiences.
One of the major #marketing opportunities on TikTok comes with influencer #marketing. From makeup to fashion, to tutorials, to cooking, and to baking, TikTok has a large number of influencers focusing in this space and hence is important for brands to target especially for product placement. Some of these TikTok influencers have millions of followers and that becomes your exact target group.
Another important aspect of #marketing on this app is to create your own channel and post original content. This will keep the entire control of your content in your hands, and you can post original videos the way your brand wants. However, it is important to ensure the content is suited to the tool and is viral.
Conclusion
While the app is growing massively, there are some speculations that the growth may die down as it did for vines in the past. However, since vines were only vaguely similar to TikTok it is impossible to predict. However, we know one thing for sure, despite the controversies and the negative air around the app, the app will continue to grow and will become more popular in the future. The fact that influencers, brands, and celebrities are also now using this app makes it evident that the app is here to stay.

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