Video content can be a problematic area for many businesses, difficult to produce without creating something advertorial rather than engaging, and often thought of as being considerably more expensive and time consuming to create than imagery or written work, despite the benefits in engagement and user interaction.
The massive popularity of short-form video platforms like Snapchat, TikTok, and elements of Instagram and YouTube, have allowed digital-first businesses to work around many of the perceived issues with traditional video content, whilst also appealing to different audiences focused around those platforms. TikTok particularly has lead a recent revolution in the consumption of personalised, community engaging video content
TikTok promises a huge opportunity for brands to boost their reach and engagement, particularly with a younger audience. The steep rise in the app’s popularity has allowed brands using the platform to become more confident and creative as they reach out to a widening audience of potential customers. Moreover, the fast-evolving nature of TikTok trends require a more agile, innovative and authentic approach than they have perhaps done previously with slower-paced platforms that give a greater creator control over content interaction.
While many companies still shy away from the app, some have embraced it with open arms, resulting in huge success.
Budget airline Ryanair is a prime example of how humour can increase engagement and brand presence, utilising the TikTok platform to reach the right audience with the right video content. The consistency and tone of its viral content has enabled the brand to accumulate more than one million followers on its official account, using a simple formula. The airline uses images and footage of its planes alongside a filter designed to superimpose human facial features onto any background, resulting in a kind of personified mascot. Carefully selected trending audio is added, utilising sounds which seem completely unrelated to air travel but are cleverly adapted to fit the context. All the while, the company ensures that its USP remains front and centre of all its posts to reinforce wider cross-channel messaging and other advertising campaigns.
BMW is another brand not usually associated with short-form video to have strongly adopted TikTok as a content platform, despite the generally lower average age of TikTok users. Using both classic and cutting-edge camera techniques, the automotive brand’s creative team provides followers with demonstrations of how its marketing material is created – using the platform to expand the reach of their marketing, whilst also encouraging engagement by placing the users behind the scenes. The energetic, refreshing content allows for a more youthful view of the brand that better mirrors TikTok’s core audience than BMW’s more traditional marketing would.
TikTok represents a huge opportunity for brands using video content to boost their reach and engagement with younger audiences ‘ if they can successfully play to its strengths – as well as giving the opportunity for experimentation and the utilisation of different viewpoints of their business to create unique experiences.
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