NO. 1
FACEBOOK
YOUTUBESKYPEINSTAGRAMWHATSAPP
TWITTER
FACEBOOK
MESSENGER
VIBERLINECURRENTSNO. 1
TIKTOK
INSTAGRAMFACEBOOKWHATSAPPTELEGRAM
SNAPCHAT
FACEBOOK
MESSENGER
CAPCUTMX TAKATAKPICSART2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021RANKING OF TOP SOCIAL AND ENTERTAINMENT APP DOWNLOADS WORLDWIDEDOWNLOADS BASED ON COMBINED IOS APP STORE AND GOOGLE PLAY. CHINA IS IOS ONLY. INCLUDES SOCIAL, PHOTO, AND VIDEO ENTERTAINMENT; AND EXCLUDES GAMES AND DATING APPS. SOURCE: APP ANNIE INTELLIGENCEedly exposed to a singular viewpoint
or style of content. So it deliberately
mixes things up. “The algorithm is
watching my behavior, and occasion-
ally, it’s serving me something that I
hadn’t identified with,” he says. “And
I go, ‘Oh, that science experiment is
kind of clever, and now my interest in
science becomes part of my profile.’ ”
The TikTok algorithm’s proficiency
makes Facebook and Instagram seem
like social media 1.0 in compari-
son. On those platforms, user feeds
are largely linear and incremental.
YouTube, meanwhile, is more search-
oriented. Befitting Google’s outlook,
it offers recommendations, but users
mainly search for videos and choose
what to watch next. TikTok’s “For You”
feed tends to be more explosive. It’s
an auto-discovery engine serving up a
dopamine hit with every swipe.
In 2020, TikTok opened a virtual
Transparency and Accountability
Center to educate those curious about
its data practices and the inner-work-
ings of its algorithm. In a nutshell, it
serves new users a tranche of videos
and monitors user behavior, includ-
ing whether they watch to the end.
Machine learning technology analyzes
those actions to recommend subse-
quent videos from similar buckets,
and the process continues. Because
it’s rare to encounter a video with only
a handful or even a few dozen views,
speculation has it that every piece of
content is sent to a minimum number
of users, let’s say 100. If it performs
to certain benchmarks, the video is
promoted more broadly, to 1,000
TikTokers, and then 10,000, then
100,000, and so on. On the social
graph, engagement, whether that
means views, likes, or clicks, tends
to correspond to the size of a user’s
following. But a brand-new TikToker
can hit a million views on her first
video without having a single follow-
er. For content creators, this dynamic
makes every creation a lottery ticket:
It’s their shot at 15 minutes of fame
in exchange for perhaps 15 seconds of
ingenuity. Which makes them want to
make more, more, more.
Musical.ly, TikTok’s predeces-sor, was populated mainly by goofy
lip-sync videos. The platform has
evolved since being acquired by the
Chinese company ByteDance, but
music and dance still permeate.
Positivity, laughter, and of course
youth largely rule the day—making
for a nearly irresistible combination
to marketers. (And a challenge, when
content takes a wrong turn into
something darker.) TikTok says that
the number of companies running
ads on its platform jumped 500% in
2020, and that it’s currently working
with “hundreds of thousands” of ad-
vertisers. “If you look at the top 500
brands, 70% are on the platform,”
Chandlee says. “And when brands do
it right, it moves product.”
The surge in brand activity is tur-
bocharging TikTok’s sales. According
to the Wall Street Journal, TikTok
parent ByteDance, which is privately
held, grew its revenue more than
100% in its most recent fiscal year
and saw profits soar 93% to more
than $19 billion.
Brands show up on TikTok in aTHE TIKTOK ECONOMY