75% of marketers to increase spending on TikTok despite possible ban -survey

A survey from Capterra revealed that in spite of the possible nationwide ban in the United States, 75% of marketers are still planning to increase their spending on the ByteDance-owned short form video platform TikTok in the next twelve months.

The survey, which was reported in March, saw participation from more than 300 marketers working for US-based businesses and using TikTok for marketing and advertising purposes.

When asked about the possible nationwide ban, 60% of marketers said that they agree that concerns over the app’s data privacy and national security are justified. 47% said they don’t think its algorithm is transparent, and 45% said they believe it spies on users in the United States. Meanwhile, 31% said brand safety concerns are a top challenge of using the short video platform.

Also Read: TikTok considers splitting from ByteDance to avoid US ban -Bloomberg

However, in spite of these critiques, more than half (%56) of the respondents stated it is highly or somewhat unlikely for the federal government to ban or prevent the app from operating in the country, and 52% said it is highly or somewhat unlikely for their state or local government to do the same. In addition, 87% said they believe that TikTok is a promising platform for long-term marketing strategies.

Furthermore, when asked about what would happen if the possible ban becomes a reality, 82% of respondents said it would have a moderate or significant impact on their social media marketing or advertising targets, and 70% said their companies would need to expand their digital presence to other social media platforms in that case. Facebook (80%) and YouTube (79%) emerged as the top two platforms that the marketers said they would use as an alternative. 

While TikTok still faces the possibility of a nationwide ban, a new Instagram & Pinterest like app by ByteDance called ‘Lemon8’ is growing in popularity in the United States.