It seems as though all eyes have been on TikTok this week thanks to talks of a potential nationwide ban and its CEO’s testimony in front of Congress on Thursday.
We’ve been talking to marketers this week to get their thoughts on how they’re navigating the possibility of a ban, which platforms might benefit, and what they thought of the testimony. Read what they had to say below—and email us to let us know what you’re thinking. 📩
Responses have been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.
Reaction from testimony
Joshua Lowcock, global chief media officer at UM: It did not feel like a discovery hearing but rather an airing of concerns that went beyond data and national security to also include S230 and content moderation. Some of the issues raised were not unique to TikTok. There were moments that it feels like TikTok stumbled and/or failed to land its message and failed to give decisive categorical yes-no answers that would have helped its cause. There is little from the hearing that suggests that there will be anything but continued momentum towards some sort of restriction or regulation that adversely impacts TikTok.
Lou Paskalis, CEO and founder, AJL Advisory: The congressmen and congresswomen were well prepped and generally asked good, probing questions. Several congressmen and congresswomen were rude, and perhaps purposefully, did not allow time for TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew to even begin to answer their questions. This was a bad look overall, largely due to the frequency and consistency of occurrences. When he was allowed to answer, Chew consistently pivoted to talking points about users’ diversity of thoughts and did not answer most of the questions posed to him in an intellectually honest way. He did not come off as credible and several representatives said as much.
I think much of this will come down to whether or not Oracle will [convince] Congress that Project Texas is completely secure from any access, either by ByteDance or the Chinese government. I think [Oracle CEO] Safra Catz, or even [Oracle co-founder, executive chairman, and CTO] Larry Ellison, should be called to testify on the record that TikTok’s American user base is completely immune from any foreign access in the system that Oracle, now a part owner of TikTok US, is building for TikTok.”
Dona J. Fraser, SVP, privacy initiatives, BBB National Programs: Today's hearing displayed the need for more education and awareness about the data-privacy practices undertaken by companies and advertisers regarding the data they collect about teens on TikTok and other social platforms. It serves as a reminder that there is an urgent need for a comprehensive data-privacy law.
On pivoting marketing strategy if a ban happens
Kim Pham, co-founder of Asian CPG brand Omsom: I think it would be devastating for us, mainly just to lose another platform that we can have more experimental, more fun, more informal storytelling on. Does it really change too much of our strategy? Not particularly. I think all of our content across the board is moving more toward TikTok-esque content.
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We invest very heavily in [Instagram] Reels right now. We are definitely a video-first brand, so I think we will continue our investment there and take many of our learnings from TikTok onto that platform.
Tina Nguyen, founder of XXL & Co., maker of the XXL Scrunchie: If this was last year, I would feel way more stressed about it…Now we have other networks that we reach out to and post on. We always cross-post, and I find that those ones now do a little bit better. Just because I feel like TikTok has so many users and it’s hard to get consistent, big views compared to on our Instagram, where you can add longer captions, and it’s more personalized, as well as [on YouTube Shorts]. I find that you can still pivot to there, and we also have a YouTube channel where we post 30 [minute]- to hour-long weekly blogs that have grown at the same time as our TikTok. So you do have backups for our video content strategy.
Jeffrey Tousey, CEO and founder of Beekman Social: We are not of the philosophy of putting all our eggs in one basket. We’ve always got a diversified portfolio of channels and an omnichannel approach that we’re taking to make sure that if something like this happens, [our clients’] entire social footprint is not out the window. Because of the age of TikTok—it’s still kind of the youngest platform—almost literally every company we work with already had another social footprint before growing their TikTok footprint. It’s not like this was their only channel.