How TikTok Made Fast-moving Content the Norm

With its entire model based on an auto-playing feed of short-form video content, TikTok has taken over the social media world. Spurring the creation of global stars like sisters Charli and Dixie D’Amelio and prompting Silicon Valley powerhouses to completely change the way their feeds work (hello Instagram Reels), it only took TikTok a matter of a year or so to revolutionise the way we digitally market and even operate our businesses.

Why did TikTok have the effect it did? The combination of content medium and content delivery struck gold with audiences around the world. We already know YouTube as the second most popular website worldwide, coming in at 22.8 billion monthly visits and second only to Google. It’s been obvious to most content creators and digital marketers for years now that video achieves a cut-through that static imagery (and god forbid, long-form written content – bleh, who would even write a blog post in this day and age? Oh, wait…) could only dream of. So why did the TikTok app take off in a way that the monolithic YouTube app couldn’t?

Simple – their auto-play feature. Combined, of course, with the fact that their videos are particularly short form (though not as strikingly short form as their predecessor, Vine’s, 6-second duration limit). Also, unlike Vine, TikTok videos do not stay playing on a loop. As soon as they end, you are quickly whisked away to the next video, and before you’re even sure if you want to watch it – you’re watching it. TikTok’s interface doesn’t give users a chance to process the content they’re consuming before putting the next video in front of them, so it’s no wonder “wasting hours on Tik Tok” is a commonly echoed sentiment. Where YouTube has an autoplay that can be toggled on or off, there is also a 10 second window where the viewer is allowed to preview the upcoming video; and that 10 seconds is an ample time frame, allowing users the opportunity to quit the app and turn their attention elsewhere. Tik Tok’s comparably aggressive auto-play feature enables a supercharged version of regular social media feeds, the ones that keep us scrolling indefinitely, often without us being fully engaged or mentally present. Where does the time go when you’re on Tik Tok?

Of course, it’s not just about how the content is delivered to you – it’s how the content is chosen for your consumption, as well. It might be best to now take a look at TikTok’s algorithm, and how it selects the content that appears on its famous ‘For You’ feed (or #fyp as you may often see it referred to as in Tik Tok captions). In a 2020 press release, TikTok explained that the algorithm relies on a number of predictable factors, such as user interactions (how a user engages with a piece of content, as well as the type of content they post), video information (the sounds and captions used), as well as some more universal factors like the country from where the app is being accessed and language preferences. Within those evaluations, there is also a tag attached by TikTok to demarcate what is a “weak indicator” versus a “strong indicator” of preference. The nuances of such an algorithm mean that we often see content we weren’t even consciously aware we wanted to see (e.g. seeing content about holiday destinations after posting content about feeling burnt out or overworked).

And so now, here we are – YouTube has Shorts, Instagram has Reels, and LinkedIn announced in September they were scrapping their attempt at Stories in favour of a new short-form video strategy. Tik Tok has set the new precedent for social media across the world and it’s up to us to keep up.

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