Night Light | TikTok's Slow Burn

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Reed Duchscher
May 26, 2023

Reed of the Week

We’ve been thinking a lot about short-form content in recent weeks, and I found this AdWeek study interesting. At first glance it looks like a platform in trouble:

Recent changes to the algorithm are causing newer accounts to be preferred over established ones. While beneficial to some, veteran short-form creators may rely on YouTube Shorts, Instagram Reels, and Snapchat more than ever before. Less views on big creators’ videos also means fewer brand deals and marketing spend. Overall, average views aren’t decreasing that much, but It could be problematic if views continue to decline in the future.

Later, the article mentions that Tiktok may be adopting a “slow burn” model. On my own accounts I’m noticing that videos are taking a week to gain traction. 24 hours isn’t enough anymore to tell if a video will do well or not. I’d argue that we’re seeing this same model on YouTube Shorts too. It took 21 days for FaceTiming With MrBeast gain any traction, now it has 24M views.

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