TikTok vs. Instagram

Social media marketing has become an important way for businesses to capitalize on their outreach by using platforms that are popular among their targeted demographic.

By Sara Skwaryk

Instagram has been a powerful force over the years for brands. It has become popular to work with influencers who have a large following on the app to promote their products. Influencers gain large followings for many reasons; however, the most popular reasoning behind followings are a connection to the influencers personality, their interests, or their aesthetic. Brands typically then contact influencers who align with their brand to target a group of people they believe would be potential buyers. 

Instagram is notorious for a more structured algorithm; people typically post flattering pictures of themselves or their lifestyle, the app seems to appear to the glitz and glam type of lifestyle. However, the app TikTok has taken the world by storm, it has received 1 Billion downloads globally since its launch in 2016 (Ducey), while active users world wide reached 500 million (Zhou).

Photo from SensorTower.com

TikTok has gained attention from mostly the younger generations, 66% of users are reported to be under the age of 30 (Ducey). The popularity stems from users getting to create content that is unapologetically themselves; often videos are filmed in their rooms or show parts of their personality. The app utilizes a ‘For You Page’ that allows viewers to watch short 60 second clips from people all over the world. TikTok is a gold mine for marketers to take advantage of if they were looking to target the younger generation.

So, how are Instagram and TikTok different? How do businesses have to change in order to appeal to the users of TikTok?

Instagram utilizes their feed page along with Instagram Stories and IGTV for marketing. On Instagram you can see an Ad for every four posts, and on Stories you will see an Ad appear for every four people you view (Comet). Some believe that this is too much exposure to Ads, it takes away from their viewing experience on the app. Instagram is the host site for 92% of well known brands (Luna Anak Agam). So, it’s no surprise marketers are using the app to appeal to the masses.

On TikTok, it is possible for a business to purchase an Ad, but it has actually become more popular for brands to create unique hashtags that users put in the captions of their videos to gain exposure. Companies are also creating TikTok accounts themselves. The National Football League (NFL) created a profile and share videos of professional football players engaging in funny trends, or just being overall personable. Team mascots of several basketball and hockey leagues have found themselves on TikTok; the well known and loved faces of sports teams also take part in trends to make the viewer laugh, feel a connection to the team, and hopefully share the video. By doing this, these brands are not aggressively inserting themselves into the viewers feed, but because they were able to adapt and take part in the fun without making it forced allows followers to truly connect to their content.

Despite any differences when it comes to getting influencers to advocate for a specific brand, the idea of an influencer wanting to appease their following transcends the barriers of whatever app they are working with. Influencers often say that when they started on their platform they never expected a mass amount of success, but once they have their following, they like to continue to create content often and in such a way that satisfies their viewers, and them.

Brands are able to take advantage of influencers in some capacity by often not having legal documents about their work together, they can dictate how many posts they want from the influencer about their brand, and ultimately decide how much the influencer is being paid (De Veirman Marijke). The teenage influencers that brands are using to spread their brands are ultimately happy to work with brands, however. They continue to post appealing content that exemplifies the brand that they are advocating for, which ultimately makes them an important factor in the advertising process.

So, when it comes to marketing through Instagram or TikTok it comes down to the companies ability to adapt to the younger generations. TikTok continues to grow, with data like Android TikTok users spending 68 billion hours using the app in 2019 and the average daily time being 45 minutes on the app (Mansoor), it is only wise for brands to find their place within the app. 

It is important for businesses to be in tune with the younger generations while adapting to new marketing strategies that include apps like TikTok. The app differences between Instagram and TikTok show explicitly that using those same practices interchangeably between the two platforms would be unsuccessful, for the two audiences are grounded in different attitudes and preferences for content.

Works Cited

De Veirman Marijke, et al. “Influencer Marketing: Teenagers as Commercial Content Creators .” Advertising Literacy: Dealing with Persuasive Messages in a Complex Media Environment, biblio.ugent.be/publication/8645400/file/8645402.

Ducey, Sierra. “Marketing Trends: Instagram vs. TikTok.” Digilant, 16 Mar. 2020, digilant.com/blog/featured-blog/marketing-trends-instagram-vs-tiktok.

Iqbal, Mansoor. “TikTok Revenue and Usage Statistics (2020).” Business of Apps, 24 Apr. 2020, www.businessofapps.com/data/tik-tok-statistics/.

Comet, Fernando. “TikTok vs Instagram.” Medium, UX Planet, 8 Apr. 2020, uxplanet.org/tiktok-vs-instagram-907fe88989c7.

 Luna Anak Agam, Daryl Nicol. “The Impact Of Viral Marketing Through Instagram.” The Impact Of Viral Marketing Through Instagram, University Putra Malaysia, www.aabl.com.au/aablConference/public/documents/pdf/2018_03_19_05_39_40_16_P152-R8_Full%20Paper.pdf.

Zhou, Qiyang. “Understanding User Behaviors of Creative Practice on Short Video Sharing Platforms – A Case Study of TikTok and Bilibili.” Understanding User Behaviors of Creative Practice on Short Video Sharing Platforms – A Case Study of TikTok and Bilibili, University of Cincinnati, 2019, etd.ohiolink.edu/!etd.send_file?accession=ucin155421202112545&disposition=inline.