TikTok is not a social network but an entertainment platform

Trevor Johnson, head of marketing for TikTok in Europe, believes that the famous app is not a social network to use but an entertainment platform.

TikTok is at the mercy of a “hype” of absolutely colossal dimensions and is probably the most in-form social network of the moment in the 2.0 galaxy. About the extraordinary strength of the Chinese app (and also about other somewhat more uncomfortable issues) he spoke last week in Horizon Congress the head of marketing for TikTok on European soil: Trevor Johnson.

In his speech at the congress, which was held last Thursday and Friday in the German city of Frankfurt, Johnson took pains to make it clear that TikTok is by no means a typical social network, but rather a platform focused on entertainment.. The social network’s marketing executive even claimed that the app had inaugurated an era in the universe of entertainment with its famous short videos (now omnipresent on other 2.0 platforms as well).

Johnson is also fully convinced that TikTok plays a leading role in the devaluation of what was once the undisputed queen of the media: television. According to the director of marketing for the social network, 35% of TikTok users confess to having reduced their consumption of television and other forms of video in favor of the Chinese app. On TikTok, people spend (literally) downtime and are unable to resist the copious (and endless) torrent of content that makes its way there (something that is undoubtedly very good for the social network, but also lends itself to fierce criticism).

Although TikTok was initially born as a platform focused on the teenage audience (who danced and sang there as if there were no tomorrow), it seems that this positioning has definitely become “out of date”. “Dances are currently only the seventh most popular category on TikTok. Videos covered with a sense of humor and featuring everyday situations are receiving more and more clicks»Johnson asserted.

Neither for teenagers nor focused solely and exclusively on dances: the great change of TikTok

That everyday life is currently becoming more and more important on TikTok seems to be a direct consequence of the pandemicwhen a whole plethora of new users landed on this platform and began to share moments of their daily lives (unrelated to sweeteners) there.

Another change to TikTok accelerated by the pandemic is that the average age of the users of this platform is notably hitting the growth spurt. TikTok is no longer exclusively the social network of Generation Z, Johnson stressed.

In TikTok, more than notable changes in terms of content have also been observed in recent times.. “We have become an incredible platform with a focus on learning and training,” Johnson added.

Like other social networks, TikTok is also increasingly a platform focused on sales. “Two out of three users say they would buy things they have previously seen on TikTok,” said Johnson, who believes that “shopping” makes excellent crumbs with entertainment.

Confronted with the (inevitably sticky) topic of “brand safety” and privacy on TikTok, Johnson emphasized on Horizont Kongress that the highest priority of the platform is to make the app a safe environment for users (who can, not in vain, report inappropriate content). According to TikTok’s marketing manager, the social network’s algorithm also does a very good job of filtering content of a controversial nature. Even so, “when it comes to ‘brand safety’ there is always something to do,” Johnson admitted.

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