Why is TikTok winning the battle for attention?

The latest platform usage numbers are in, and they didn’t disappoint: TikTok is more than 2x stickier than Instagram globally, up to 5x in the UK. And with the global 18+ addressable market almost even at ~1.6B users (data.ai), TikTok now boasts a much larger “attention economy“ for brands to tap into, which begs key questions, e.g.:

• Why is TikTok so much better at capturing and retaining attention?

• What are implications around content and KPIs for brands on TikTok?

• ..and on Instagram?

The root cause of this gap starts with differences in algorithms: Instagram largely serves users content from accounts they follow, while TikTok surfaces the most engaging, dopamine-fuelling content. This may well explain why 2022 UK research found TikTok users 4x more likely to feel ‘happy’ than ‘indifferent’ after using the app, while the ratio was closer to 1:1 on Instagram.

User experience and time spent have improved on Instagram lately, but it helps to understand where a lot of that user indifference is coming from:

• The Instagram algorithm is oligarchic: for example in our recent fragrances report, 78% of Earned came from just 13% of posts from the accounts with over 750k followers.

  

• Oligarchy does not incentivise content innovation since the large accounts get most of the attention anyway: we find that as accounts get larger, they are less likely to come up with truly innovative/breakthrough content

• Instead, large accounts just post more often, and with brands remaining risk averse around influencer marketing, most Earned posts today remain “safe”, formulaic, and somewhat repetitive, dialling up influencer fatigue.

Meanwhile, by rewarding content quality over account size, TikTok creates a meritocracy that encourages innovation. In the same study, 86% of TikTok Earned came from mid-sized influencers who actually know and care about the category.

There are additional reasons why TikTok is stickier, and Instagram is trying to close the gap by adding features that head in the right direction - for example:

• Comments are central to the user experience on TikTok:

  • when comments are vibrant, users are more likely to spend more time per post

  • on top, comments provide an additional ‘unfiltered’ perspective that makes branded content (esp. paid endorsements) more tolerable (i.e. the biased influencer view is balanced by comments)

• The search experience is superior on TikTok — 64% of Gen Z have used TikTok as a search engine, and 10% prefer TikTok to Google for search (!)

All in all, social media potential has grown in line with consumer time spent there, but today’s content clutter has raised the bar on content quality, and lowered odds of breaking through. As a result, we’ve seen social returns flatten or even drop for a growing share of brands.

On the flip side, the 10-20% top performing brands on social are landing unprecedented returns (e.g. Sol de Janeiro, Gisou, Charlotte Tilbury, Fenty, Drunk Elephant, Rhode etc.), offering inspiration to the rest of the pack. The bonanza usually starts on TikTok, but these savvy brands re-calibrate content skills and strategies onto Instagram to see returns improving there. (see some IG community growth rates here).

Stay tuned as we share some of the best practices, tactics and strategies that separate the top performers from the rest.