With the impending demise of TikTok, one of the most popular social media apps in the US, marketers, agencies and creators are not entirely certain that TikTok will actually leave the US this month. If not, they are competing to adopt alternatives. .
Marketers are moving money to Instagram and amending contracts with social media stars who will have to pay for sponsored TikTok posts when they're not on the app. Creators are imploring fans to follow them elsewhere, collecting email addresses to connect to other platforms. And talent agents are telling TikTok stars to pause on home and car purchases for now.
Joe Mele, a 26-year-old TikTok star from Long Island, started posting jokes during his freshman year of college. “It's a little scary.”
TikTok, owned by Chinese company ByteDance, is trying to overturn the law signed by President Biden in April. The agreement states that ByteDance will be banned in the United States on January 25 unless it sells the app to companies outside China. 19. TikTok challenged the law as unconstitutional, arguing that sales were impossible. After losing in lower courts, the case is scheduled to hear its final legal arguments in the Supreme Court on Friday.
TikTok's demise will upend the social media and marketing landscape, funneling billions of dollars in ad dollars to rival platforms like Meta's Instagram and Google's YouTube, and scattering its 170 million monthly U.S. users. It will be. Known for its video feeds that are instantly tailored to users' interests, TikTok has become a cultural giant since 2020, spawning best-selling books, viral recipes, Billboard 100 hits, and even a cast on “Saturday Night Live.” I am.
“This is probably the biggest headline-grabbing event in the history of marketing, or the biggest shock to the system in the last 10 years,” said Craig Brommers, chief marketing officer at retailer American Eagle Outfitters. Ta.
Some marketing agencies and creators are taking bigger steps than others to prepare for a potential TikTok ban. Vicki Seeger, founder of influencer marketing agency Village Marketing, said her clients are moving some ad campaigns from TikTok to Instagram this month to ensure their marketing doesn't go dark on January 19th. He said he is doing so.
Lisette Sand Friedman, founder of marketing and communications agency Shadow, recently added language to her contracts with creators that could result in a “channel exchange” if TikTok were to disappear. I started doing it. So if a brand's contract with a creator includes, for example, three TikTok posts, and the app ceases operations in the U.S., the brand can choose to post them on Instagram or another platform of its choice. He said they could switch. Many creators post short videos and other content on multiple platforms.
Sand Friedman said this is a bad time to be “someone who's amazing on TikTok but terrible on Instagram.” “We probably won't cast them in big productions now. There's no point in folding our hands and hoping that the content works elsewhere.”
Still, many creators and marketers are balancing disbelief with very real concerns. Since President-elect Donald J. Trump's first term, there has been talk about a possible ban on TikTok, which “killed the wind” of the new law, Seeger said.
“I think in the back of our minds we all feel like that's not really going to happen,” she added.
TikTok and ByteDance are private and do not publicly disclose their financial status. But Brian Wieser, an analyst and founder of the consulting firm Madison & Wall, estimates that TikTok brought in $8 billion in U.S. ad sales last year, not including e-commerce, tipping and other businesses. are.
Businesses can pay TikTok to run video ads and send their posts to a larger audience. They also often pay to boost posts from creators they contract to promote their products. TikTok also derives some of its revenue from its robust e-commerce business, TikTok Shop, which has required significant investment from the company over the past year and a half.
The creator management agency helps connect creators with lucrative brand sponsorships, along with book, TV and merchandise deals, and has long advised creators to diversify their talent across social platforms. But TikTok's ban highlighted broader instability in the social media business, particularly in the creator economy, which Goldman Sachs predicts will grow to $480 billion by 2027.
Palette Media, an agency for more than 230 social media stars, now has employees dedicated to “syndicating,” meaning uploading creators' TikTok content to other platforms, including Instagram Reels, YouTube, and Snapchat, the company said. said Daniel Dax, chief executive officer. . It started in earnest about nine months ago.
Dax said his company has been advising creators to put the brakes on big financial acquisitions until TikTok's legal battle settles down.
Madison Luscombe, chief marketing officer at Creator Society, another creator management company, said she has been encouraging social media stars to collect email addresses and phone numbers from their TikTok followers. Some of the company's creators are also building email lists on Substack, a newsletter platform.
“Remember when MySpace was the next big thing?” says American Eagle's Blommers. “Remember when Vine was super hot? Remember Clubhouse, remember BeReal? The possibility of this ban, even if this is something none of us have ever seen. It's a reminder that as marketers, things come and go, even on a scale.”
Many marketers said creators, especially those who are more popular on TikTok than any other platform, will be hit hardest by the app's demise.
“The brand will be fine,” said Sand Friedman of agency Shadow. “It's going to affect all these incredible people who have gone on to become somebody and actually make money and build a life out of it.”
But not all creators are sounding the alarm.
Marides and Austin Terenko, the couple known for performing their dance moves on TikTok under the name Kost & Mayer, started posting on the platform after their jobs in the professional dance world dried up during the pandemic. said. Terenko, 27, said her work in the entertainment industry has taught her to “know that there are limits to whatever you're doing.”
“You may have had the same conversation with us at the beginning of the pandemic, when all of our dance jobs shut down. That's when you called us and said, 'Your job… We're closing down, so what are we going to do next?'' Ms. Terenko has since worked with major brands such as Home Depot and, with her husband, Walmart. He said he sells dance games. “Even if TikTok goes away, we'll find another one.”
