Why TikTok is Diving Into Long-Form Videos
By Movieguide® Contributor
The past decade and a half has seen social media platforms relentlessly copy each other’s features, and now TikTok is back at it again as it replicates YouTube’s long-form video style.
“For TikTok, the ability to platform both short- and long-form videos — and keep users in the app instead of jumping elsewhere — is obviously an appealing strategy as it looks to jumpstart growth,” Variety reported on June 5. “Of course, doing so puts it in even more direct competition with YouTube, whose creators are producing potentially Emmy-worthy videos that bring in viewership on par with Disney and Netflix.”
YouTube is the most used online platform and is ideal for long, niche videos.
TikTok is known for its short, trendy videos, but now the app is trying to get a piece of YouTube’s pie. It not only wants the most views in short-form videos but in long-form as well.
“A recent eMarketer survey among Gen Z users found that while consumption of short videos is the most common social media activity, over 50% of respondents also enjoy longer videos,” Variety said.
“If short-form video can create a spark, long-form video can fuel a fire,” Spinutech wrote.
There is one drawback to long-form videos, though. They aren’t attractive to marketers.
“Long-form on any platform is not super appealing to brands because it is so expensive to sponsor a video of that length. Additionally, followers are not interested in long-form sponsored content — it feels like an infomercial,” MM+M wrote. “On long-form YouTube videos, the only sponsored option that is affordable to clients and appealing to followers is a mention, and this is not something most clients are interested in. They don’t want to share space with other content.”
“Regardless of YouTube’s larger user base and decade-plus head start, TikTok currently leads in minutes watched per user,” Variety said. “That’s a fact YouTube should consider as a very real threat to its unchallenged reign in the long-form social video world.”
Movieguide® recently reported on TikTok:
TikTok is planning to make a huge number of layoffs in its operations and marketing teams.
Per CNN, “The global layoffs are expected to hit teams that handle user support and communications, as well as content and marketing. TikTok’s current global user operations team will be dismantled as part of the move, and remaining employees will be distributed among the company’s trust and safety, marketing, content and product teams.”
There is no specified amount of the total number of layoffs, “but the employees said the layoff will affect a large percentage of the roughly 1,000 people working,” The Information first reported.
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