Week 9 Part A: What is TikTok All About

    Throughout the platform's existence, TikTok has taken social media by storm. The growth and popularity have skyrocketed leading not only aspiring content creators but also established businesses to venture in and invest in TikTok advertising. With that being said, I have had a lot of past experience from both a creator and viewer standpoint and can confidently say that TikTok is absolutely a valuable and necessary platform for business promotion and growth.

    Besides potentially YouTube shorts and Instagram reels, TikTok has mostly dominated short-form content. This is arguably the most dominant social media advertisement strategy as it doesn't require a long attention span and can be very entrancing if well-suited to promoting in an entertaining, useful, and/or creative manner. Although I deleted TikTok when I recognized how addicting it was to scroll through short and catchy videos, I re-downloaded it to evaluate content from different sized creators and their typical outreach and engagement. I ultimately found that since the TikTok audience is so large and the algorithm definitely pushes more videos/creators to popularity, there was not much of a difference between larger established businesses to smaller content creators, as long as they were able to generate entertaining output. Ultimately, with the way TikTok pushes content as well as the large and active consumers, the platform exhibits a rather "easier access" to fame and recognition.

    About one year ago, I started a TikTok account with the sole purpose of garnering a separate/larger viewer base by re-posting my YouTube shorts. Almost instantly, I found success, as my content reached a relatively stable audience, and some posts even blew up in popularity. Comparing this to my YouTube experience, it took me over three years before I was able to achieve any form of notoriety, which just goes to show the difference in algorithm competition between these two platforms. One thing I will also point out is the important factors of luck and consistency. Luck can definitely play a factor in the up-rise or even downfall of a channel and content, while consistency is what minimizes and stabilizes the luck factor. Even if you don't find success at the start while others do, posting often with consistent improvements in quality will eventually prevail as social media can often be a marathon, not a race.

    Additionally, since TikTok is dominated by a younger, larger, and highly active community, this could help greatly with reach. For example, since I run a (fictitious) Asian Cuisine, being able to share this with a younger, curious generation can be great for business. To do this, I would definitely need to build a brand personality by connecting with my audience and theming the likes of humorous and wholesome posts to drive traffic. One gripe I've always had with other business promotions on these social media apps was their lack of risk. Besides some blue moons, such as Duolingo's pages, I would mostly see companies center around the same style without changing it up despite their constant flops in engagement. I will be sure to test many styles of content and look for the bread and butter constantly as social media platforms such as TikTok can be huge for advertisement and financial success. 

    In conclusion, I definitely think TikTok would work well not only for my business, but all businesses in general. It may take some creativity at times, but I can guarantee from ample experience on a multitude of platforms that no matter the field you're in, there are definitely ways to both monetize and fittingly promote through TikTok!