TikTok’s Rapid Popularity: Just the Facts

Perhaps Vine’s successor, TikTok is taking teens and adults by storm, surging to the second ranking in top app download charts in the U.S. and third worldwide, according to eMarketer.

What is TikTok?      

A popular app for short, mobile-formatted videos, TikTok allows users to edit footage with a multitude of filters. From fast-forwarded footage to music overlays, TikTok is a channel that showcases today’s originality, allowing everyone and anyone to be a creator.

TikTok users can record 15-second videos in the app and share them with followers via groups and general feeds. TikTok also allows users to react to friends’ videos, a feature that was undoubtedly influenced by Facebook’s Reacts concept, the feature that allows users to like, love, laugh, cry or be angry at posts in feeds.

How Much Has TikTok Grown?

TikTok, the international version of Douyin, a Chinese video app, grew by 30 million U.S. users after its parent company ByteDance bought Musical.ly and incorporated it into TikTok this past August. eMarketer noted downloads were up 25% in the U.S. during the period immediately after the merger.

Some consumers are skeptical of the app’s popularity, believing much of TikTok’s success is due to Musical.ly users who were switched over to TikTok as part of the merger. But the app has naturally grown in popularity, partly thanks to Jimmy Fallon, who encouraged fans to use the app for viewer challenges.

Where Is the Monetization in TikTok?

While Douyin encourages paid video ads, TikTok doesn’t yet allow advertisers on the app. But TikTok does currently allow for in-app spending, where users can buy emoji packs and other digital features. eMarketer reported spending within the TikTok app amounted to $3.5 million between October 2017 and October 2018. While TikTok doesn’t leverage any in-app advertising, the nature of TikTok encourages influencers to showcase brands’ products for payment, a different revenue stream.

In November 2018, TikTok surpassed downloads for Messenger, Facebook and Instagram but stayed trailing behind WhatsApp. While consumers seem to love TikTok right now, we wonder if their adoration will stay consistent, or if TikTok, like Vine, will be kicked aside for the next video app.

Click here to read more about 2019 digital marketing trends.

Reimagining Your Social Media Marketing Win?

Contact Digital Media Solutions today.

About the Author

Victoria Pallien is a Marketing Communications Writer at Digital Media Solutions (DMS), the fastest-growing independent digital performance marketing company. DMS helps its clients accelerate growth by deploying diversified and data-driven customer acquisition solutions that deliver scalable, sustainable and measurable marketing results. DMS performance marketing solutions connect the right consumers with the right offers at the right time to achieve the marketing objectives of our clients. DMS is continually innovating to provide new and emerging media and technology solutions that minimize waste and maximize results across the most competitive industries. Since its inception, DMS has demonstrated incredible year-over-year growth which has earned recognition on the Inc. 5000 list in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018.

More Content by Victoria Pallien