Small businesses unable to pivot
If content creators and corporate executives made TikTok videos about the platform's possible U.S. demise, disco diva Gloria Gaynor's “I Will Survive” could supply the soundtrack.
Sure, businesses that built strategies around TikTok and promote products there would prefer not to seek eyeballs on another app. Smaller firms and solo entrepreneurs are bound to feel more pain in the event of a breakup. But if the popular video-sharing service remains under Chinese ownership and Congress bans it, many companies would learn to get along.
A lot of “What ifs” still surround a bill the U.S. House passed this month that would mandate TikTok's Beijing-based parent company, ByteDance, to sell its stake in the platform within six months or face a nationwide ban. It's unclear when the Senate will take up the legislation or if it will approve a ban when it does.
Big brands that have relied on TikTok to reach younger consumers do not appear to be panicking as they wait to see what happens in D.C. But they also have started planning. Some are retooling promotional campaigns originally intended just for TikTok. Many are testing alternatives and prioritizing work with influencers who have sizable followings on multiple social media platforms.
“I'm not the kind of marketer who wants to put all their eggs in one basket anyway,” said Jeremy Lowenstein, chief marketing officer for Milani Cosmetics. “We can always pivot. And like any technology, there will always be something new to try.”
Brands such as Los-Angeles-based Milani will lose a valuable tool if TikTok isn't welcome in the U.S. anymore. Last year, sales of a new Milani mascara spiked after an influencer couple known as The Lipstick Lesbians posted a TikTok video about it, Lowenstein said. He's already looked at alternative apps such as Flip, a little-known shopping platform that allows users to earn money by reviewing beauty items and then buying them from featured brands.
Another cosmetics company, Oakland-based e.l.f. Beauty, created a viral sensation with a 2019 TikTok campaign that used an original song to explain the company's name stood for “eyes. lips. face.” E.l.f. also was one of the first beauty brands to join TikTok Shop, the platform's e-commerce arm, during the U.S. beta testing.
E.l.f's chief marketing officer, Kory Marchisotto, said the in-app shop, which allows viewers to buy products from seller accounts and videos, is doing well. But she noted that Instagram Reels, YouTube Shorts and other venues also offer short real-time videos. “We'll take that incredible muscle that we built and develop and go with it wherever our community wants to go next, and they have always been the signal that has carried us,” Marchisotto said.
Some marketing agencies are telling brands to take basic precautions in case Congress ends up sending TikTok out the door. Billion Dollar Boy, a New York-based influencer marketing agency, has encouraged clients to spread their influencer spending across platforms, Edward East, the agency's founder and group CEO said.
Well-established TikTok influencers, including beauty and fashion gurus, continue posting regularly on the app. But they're also posting exclusive content on Instagram or YouTube or devoting more attention to their other social media accounts, said Nicla Bartoli, vice president of sales at The Influencer Marketing Factory, an agency that works to pair content creators and brands.
Jasmine Enberg, a principal analyst at research firm eMarketer, thinks a TikTok ban would have a bigger effect on businesses today than a few years ago. Even though Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts provide competition, they haven't cracked the magic formula of a TikTok video in driving sales, Enberg said.
“Even though you can replicate the technology, you can't really replicate the culture, and people aren't behaving necessarily in the same way as they are on TikTok,” she said.
TikTok does not receive the same level of ad revenue as Instagram and Facebook, according to data from eMarketer, but the firm predicts that it will surpass the other two this year in terms of the percentage of users that will make at least one purchase that originates on the platform.