Recently India banned 59 Chinese apps such as TikTok, UC Browser and CamScanner, due to compliance issues and concerns over data privacy. TikTok influencers had built a massive follower base and had many brand deals that added to their source of income. But the ban had left these social media influencers without a medium to reach their audiences. During the COVID-19 lockdown, the number of active users on social media platforms has also significantly increased. This has led to the rise of many alternate apps such as Mitron, Roposo, Chingari, Bolo Indiya and now Instagram Reels.
In a move to capture the market share and move deeper into the short-form content space, Instagram has now introduced a new feature called Instagram Reels. Now you can create 15-second videos on Reels and edit using options like speed, timer, effects and audio. You can also choose the apply AR effects in your video. The audio option allows you to play music from the Instagram Music library or use your original audio. You can create multiple 15-second videos at a time and edit them separately using different options.
Instagram Reels allows the user to select the audience they wish to share their videos with. The videos created using Reels will be displayed in the Explore section and the Reels tab of Instagram. You also have the option to share the video in your feed and in your story.
Give Instagram Reels a try and create impressive thumbstopper videos.
The new trendsetting kid on the block, TikTok has taken the media world by storm. TikTok’s explosive growth, compared to other social media platforms, quickly made it the most downloaded app worldwide. Covering 150 countries and regions in 75 different languages across Asia, America and Europe, it gained 1.5 billion downloads quickly across the globe.
With over 178 million active monthly users in India, TikTok emerged as a platform with a continual increase in its user base, and on a mammoth scale. An interesting aspect to consider is that the initial audiences TikTok onboarded were new data users, who were virtually untapped in the digital space. It was an obvious wake-up call to leverage TikTok as a platform to target coveted Tier II and Tier III digital India. Moreover, 48% of the engagement was driven from the top metro Tier I cities.
It’s safe to say that a majority of the Indian Internet user base is now hooked to this entertainment-based content platform where anyone and everyone can become a creator. TikTok’s core objective was to bring the fun back to social media and provide a platform where anyone can be part of the trends or even start their own.
Due to this, TikTok quickly became a hub where India spent their biggest and most meaningful moments. Over 4.9 billion lit up festive seasons like Diwali, Christmas and New Year with groovy dance moves, spectacular AR filters, entertaining skits, amongst many others. A defining example of this was witnessed during the ICC World Cup when over 1 billion engaged with the app.
With the ban of TikTok in Jun 2020, there are a host of TikTok alternatives that have come up in India.
TikTok is India's breakout app in terms of year over year growth. But what’s the secret behind this aggressive growth? The ‘magic sauce’ lies in its wide variety of products that deliver on the promise of bringing back fun! Offering a range of optimizations, products like Branded Takeover, TopView Ads and Hashtag Challenges provide an immersive experience along with a chance at virality, and high impact broad reach and awareness. In-feed Video Ads enhance brand recall and drive brand affinity through its targeting, scalability and cost-efficiency.
There was an increase in the 25+ age group using TikTok - the Indian consumer with high disposable income ready to be tapped in to make the impulse purchase by multiple brands. The common symptoms of the TikTok addiction across Gen Z is that these users open the app more than 6 times a day and consume content for 40 minutes at a stretch. More popular among Android users over iOS, brands offering affordable, aspirational products find it extremely easy to derive ROI from TikTok marketing.
As per the Kantar Survey Data 2019, it was recorded that there was higher purchasing intent among TikTok audiences as compared to other online shoppers, with nearly 50% having shopped online in the last 3 months. The cherry on top of the cake? The TikTok user’s purchasing power was measured to show them spending more monthly on online shopping as compared to non-TikTok users, with the share of wallet for online shopping 17% higher than non-users. This data proves that marketing on TikTok is an open playing field for brands that are heavy on e-commerce, fashion, and retail, while simultaneously remaining scalable for fintech and BFSI.
TikTok is powered by the creation of native content that communicates that the user, not the product, is in control of what they’re watching. Think of it this way: TikTok is seen as a daily dose of video therapy that gives you a break from your everyday routine, available across a variety of content categories. It’s more than dance - it’s entertainment, beauty, music, fitness, travel, and so much more, making it the pandora’s box of native, creative and highly engaging content. Moreover, since the content is in video formats, it enables users to create or consume in their native tongue. The availability of vernacular content itself has been a key driver of app installs, user engagement, and many other important metrics.
Seen majorly as an entertainment platform, TikTok is growing its roots into popular topics like food and DIY, while also setting its base in education. For example, #EduTok is a trending hashtag, that began as an in-app challenge. TikTok encouraged users to create and share videos with educational content to promote learning for the Indian community on the platform. This initiative took off immediately, and till date, continues to be a popular trend among users.
The challenge has seen over 10 million videos created and shared with the hashtag till date and continues to grow rapidly, having amassed over 48 billion views and 1.8 billion shares. This educational initiative has worked well to propel TikTok’s dedication to growing India’s creative economy to reach and contribute to the lives of digital users across platforms.
@parastomarGot your own business ? You need ##khatabook @khatabook.com♬ original sound - Paras Tomar
Customer acquisition was one of the key objectives for a booming fintech startup like Khatabook. We partnered with them to tap into a new audience, and with the help of vernacular influencer videos, we started targeting regional users, which helped establish TikTok as one of the important pillars for customer acquisition.
The TikTok marketing strategy for Khatabook was centred around a robust performance strategy that was executed to drive app installs. We created concepts that communicated the USPs of the app in a clear and concise manner and collaborated with 250 influencers across the country who created videos in 15 different languages. The content was also created around seasonal and festive events like Diwali and the Indian Premier League.
After we implemented the TikTok marketing strategy with vernacular content created by influencers, we saw where our CTR was 0.04%, later increased to 0.8% which led to 60% incremental growth in install volume and 20% reduction in cost per install. Till now we have uploaded more than 200 influencers’ videos in TikTok Ads that give us exponential visibility across channels and more creative assets to use.
We partnered with Bewakoof to target TikTok as a platform and scale it up to convert it as a profit delivering platform. We capitalized on home production videos which Bewakoof had made in-house to target our relevant audience.
We realized that dedicated product videos worked better than collection videos. Therefore, we created videos for the best seller t-shirts that Bewakoof had to offer and started leveraging them for performance marketing on TikTok. Since TikTok is a video-heavy platform, we ran at least 4-5 videos for different products at the same time to ensure zero dip in CTRs, therefore clicks and ergo performance. Using a two-pronged approach, we were able to target users for sales through app and website conversion campaigns.
By marketing on TikTok with influencer videos in regional content, our install to purchase ratio jumped from 3.02% to 26.55% and our ROI increased from 0.78 to 3.11.
Swiggy Starhunt was an exclusive campaign, created to engage with the company’s delivery partners, the true champions who deliver to satisfy our food hankerings no matter what the obstacle, be it traffic or the weather. The campaign was designed with the objective of creating an opportunity for engagement and fun to offer them a break.
With creatives and media like videos, GIFs, posts, and more, in 11 different regions languages, our social media strategy was created with the intention of reaching audiences across India. To give the campaign an extra push and get the buzz going, we collaborated with 7 TikTok influencers to help us out.
The TikTok marketing campaign resulted in an organic reach of 57 lakhs, with the active participation of over 350 of Swiggy’s unsung heroes! Over 1500 videos were uploaded onto the social media platform, with delivery partners showcasing their talents, garnering over a whopping 44 million views! The campaign was a huge success and provided impactful awareness among delivery partners.
Marketing on TikTok by adopting a granular approach and leveraging vernacular, your brand would be able to tap into key regions across India and engage them better to create memorable customer experiences.
Matching the brand with TikTok’s native audience and creating content utilising influencer marketing will not only provide your brand with a better chance of being shared and viewed but also provides the opportunity to create viral moments to increase organic traction.
By maintaining a frequency of regular, engaging and entertaining content you would be able to build brand awareness and affinity to ensure that your brand is staying relevant and trending.
Facebook has now launched Instagram Reels which is a 15-second short video post that can be shared on your story, feed or in the explore section. You can also edit the Reels with options like audio, speed, timer and effects.
With each day comes a new trend and also an increase in the variety of products and scalability on a completely dynamic platform, like TikTok. Social Beat uses an array of social media platforms to have a wider impact and reach, and TikTok marketing is that fast-moving bus with drop points in the untappable regions - get your brand on the bus before they miss it!