Have a scroll on your FYP and you’ll find an infinite amount of curated personalised content. Whether that be dating advice, product reviews, adverts for the best cabin bag to take on your next budget airline trip or an influencer inviting you to get ready with them, this content all has information the algorithm thinks you want to search for.
A study by Adobe found that nearly 1 in 10 Gen Zers are more likely to rely on TikTok rather than Google as a search engine. The study found some of the top content searched is 19% new restaurants and 36% new recipes, meaning the typical Gen Zer is going to TikTok over Google for their lunchtime reservations.
TikTok’s rise to fame compared to its competitor sites (Facebook, X, and Instagram) is extraordinary. TikTok hit 1 billion monthly active users in September 2021, making the app one of the fastest-growing apps ever in terms of market hold since 2016. However, TikTok’s data usage has got the app into some controversy, with the US voting to launch a nationwide ban on the app over fears of data handling and national security.
TikTok’s search bar now shows users features such as ‘auto-suggest’, featured snippets with AI-generated text summarising videos, TikTok traffic analytics for content creators and more. TikTok’s SEO is unique in the sense that its algorithm relies less on how many followers, likes and comments an account has and more so on user activity, such as video watch time, video engagement, what your friends are watching and your previous searches.
For businesses and brands trying to promote themselves on TikTok, quality content is now key to getting your videos out there and a TikTok SEO strategy is invaluable. It is important to conduct audience research to know what they are searching for and what content they engage with the most. It is also important to conduct keyword research using traditional research tools and the ‘auto suggest’ feature on the app itself to see what users are typing to get the most relevant results. Engaging with your audience is also key as TikTok will boost your content into similar communities where it can be discovered further.
The biggest threat to TikTok’s growth as a search engine is its flaw in dismissing misinformation. All it takes is a handful of accounts to create content with fake news and the algorithm will push these false headlines out too…
