Tiktok Hits Different

 You're listening to the Radcast. If it's radical, we cover it. Here's your host, Ryan
 Alford. Hey guys, what's up? It's Ryan Alford. Welcome to the latest edition of the Radcast.
 We're coming live as always from the Radcast studio in the beautiful Greenville, South Carolina
 office of radical home of the Southeast fastest, largest, baddest ass digital agency in the
 country. I'm excited today because if you've been, unless you've been living under a rock,
 you know about the topic we're going to talk about today. It's one of the hottest video
 platforms on the planet that would be tick-tock. And I'm here with the head of client solutions
 from Neuro Insight. You might recognize that name from a guest we had a couple weeks ago,
 but I have soon brought Suran. What's up brother? Welcome to the show.
 How's it going? Thanks for having me here. Hey man, excited to have you. I'm ready to talk some
 tick-tock. Tick-tock, you don't stop. I tell you what, I woke up at 3am last night,
 couldn't go to sleep. What did I do? I went on tick-tock. Good three hours before I decided to go
 again. All right, my name for it is the vortex, the tick-tock vortex. There might be another
 probably like technical term. Maybe you'll, you'll, you'll set me straight, but I call it the
 vortex. Obviously sitting there and it's like the time vortex. I thought it was three minutes,
 it was three hours. You know, you're onto something because there are actual videos on tick-tock,
 which come in maybe when you get to the underthorough, the 500th where they basically say stop.
 You've been here long enough. Yes. And you're like, oh, did you get the one with the green screen,
 or were you getting the guy in the sofa? You're an expert. Yes. You know, the member of the,
 I think it was a commercial or something a few years ago, is like that you've come to the end
 of the internet. I've yet to come to the end of the tick-tocks. And that was my mission once,
 and now I've decided it's not. It's just to enjoy the running. Yes. Well, I'm excited to have
 you on. We're going to talk today about a study that Neuronsite sponsored and put together,
 given the growth and importance of tick-tock, which is how to advertise successfully on the world's
 hottest platform. Hey, I love the title. It's directing to the point who the hell wouldn't want
 to know how to do that. No, perfect. And it started off right in September when there was
 stock of the platform getting banned. It was getting banned in a couple of other countries.
 And people started to throw right up. And they were like, no, I don't take tick-tock away from me.
 I was like, why is it that people are so passionate about this? I don't know about other social
 media platforms. They would quite say the same thing. So we decided on our own without anybody
 asking to actually study this. And we study it differently. We don't ask people, hey, I want
 you to go on tick-tock and then let's have a conversation for about 15 minutes and you tell me
 how great it is. We were actually calling people in asking them to go on their tick-tocks,
 watch it while we were actually studying what was going on inside their brains. And when I say
 studying what's going inside their brains, they're different parts of your brains that light up
 when you're engaging with content, when you're engaging with a platform. The first one that we
 can all agree with and we see and we sense is I want to do this longer. And it's called approach
 or withdraw. So when you're watching comedy and you want to continue to watch the movie,
 there's a part of your subconscious that tells you let's spend some more time with this.
 And when somebody comes on the street and says, hey, you owe me five bucks, you're like, let's
 get out of this situation. That's where draw. The other parts are engagement. Is this something
 that's personally relevant? Can I continue to engage with this? And we sense that all the time
 and we spend more time with that platform. The other part is an emotional intensity. Do I feel a
 strong sense of emotion when I'm on this platform? Then comes what actually ends up changing our
 behavior. That is memories. Does this content platform actually create new memories for us?
 We've spent hours, especially me and during college having Doritos and watching
 infomercials and they never stuck. But on TikTok, what we were seeing was memories actually
 being created for people, for ads, for content. And two kinds of memories, one for the actual
 narratives or themes or visuals, which we call global, which are very important in developing equity
 associations. And another one, which is detail, grants, call to actions, messages. And the funny part
 is it's not like TikTok was a leader by leaps and bounds over other platforms.
 When we looked at Instagram, we looked at Pinterest, we looked at all the different social media
 sites. When you combine all those scores together, TikTok wasn't different. It wasn't the best.
 But what was different about TikTok was the speed at which it was doing it.
 So if an average curve was every couple or three or four minutes, you're getting
 a high from a platform, a subconscious high, TikTok was doing it almost four times faster.
 And when it's doing it that quick, you just spend more time. Do your point of the vortex
 that's basically it. So what you're saying is TikTok is the cocaine of social media.
 Is that what we're saying?
 Since TikTok is the gatorade that allows you to keep playing again.
 All right. Okay. Sorry. My head goes down the wrong bunny hole there.
 Yes. So it's the gatorade. It's the replenishing in real time, the electrolytes that you need.
 Absolutely. Absolutely. And it's funny. My story with TikTok, like I haven't been a big social
 media nerd in the past. I've never, like, my wife kept bothering me to get on Facebook,
 so I did. But that was pretty much it. When it came with Instagram and Pinterest,
 it felt daunting to get on the platform. Yeah. But as soon as I got on TikTok, it was just
 amazing how intuitive the algorithms are. And how quickly it starts to pick up what you want.
 And how quickly it changes based on when you get tired of something.
 Yes. And I think TikTok just hits different.
 Haha. It does hit different. You know what? One thing it is about TikTok,
 it's platform is the right word because it's the combination of the
 content that's put there combined with the swiping and the navigation UI of the platform combined
 with the content creation tools. It is the mix. It's the mixology of all that that makes it
 hit different. Is that fair? Absolutely. And I'd say even beyond the discovery page,
 beyond the content creation page, the comment section. Yeah. Man, it is so fun.
 I'm making a video and she spent two minutes reading the comments.
 And I think TikTok's also coming at the perfect time because you think about it. You have now a
 generation of veteran content creators. From the guys who sort of started building it out of YouTube,
 learned it off snap, learned it off Instagram, Pinterest, Vine. And now they've come here
 and they've sort of understood how to do it right. And TikTok gave them that space.
 So I think it was a perfect storm that worked for TikTok. Yeah, because like we talked about
 pre episode, you've had a lot of of tries at this, whether it's Vine, whether it's
 Twiller and there's other and that's still around and others that are trying to, you know,
 grab hold of the magic and they just haven't gotten it bottled that all that up the way TikTok has.
 And I don't know that it's hard to put your finger on exactly one thing because I don't think
 it is one thing. It's a lot of things. It's a lot of things. And I think when we were doing our
 research, you know, and I think the numbers have completely blown up now. We were looking
 at about 52 minutes average time spent with the platform. And this is when with Instagram, it was
 about 53. Today, I think those numbers are way over. But why is it that somebody can actually
 spend so much time with the platform and still want to go back? And the truth is in the way it
 engages the brand. It is starting to basically engage you visually, engage you with text and close
 captioning is a big part now of how people do TikTok. It gives you the emotional highs and it's
 constantly relevant. And that keeps you wanting to stay longer. And I think the content also
 very diverse. I mean, from the duetting to the filters to how creative people have gotten it.
 I don't know if you follow Happy Kelly. I do. Man, her dance moves and just what she does is insane.
 It's it's created and magnified content creators on a whole nother level. And it's I mean,
 staggering. I just saw like I was reading an article yesterday before like it's creating like
 billionaires out of content creators like and that might be the small percentage. But just the fact
 that you're talking about billions not millions for content creators. But it's it it is. It's like
 it's stimulating this amount of creativity in people that maybe they had it in them all the time.
 But it's opening up certain channels whether that's influencers, whether that's just other outlets
 for people to express themselves. I mean, it's just it's kind of endless. I mean, I kind of get lost
 in the vortex on a tip not tick tip talk, you know, all the tips and stuff, you know, and there's
 all but I will say there's this kind of it's it's played off the ADD is them in all of us I think
 or our culture because everything is pretty much it feels like it's chopped in a good way.
 Chopply and it chop it chopped editing, you know, like quick to the point, whatever. And it's like,
 I think that's why I like it like my brain enjoys it because like, okay, we got to the point like,
 you know, whatever it is. But it's fascinating. And what's funny is that what started off as,
 you know, just minute long clips. Now you can actually see I don't know whether the movie producers
 would like to hear this, but you can basically see all of John Wick on TikTok.
 There's like 600 parts to this. Oh my gosh. How do you like that happen? It just it just goes.
 So what people have done and I don't know how much of this is driven by the studios because if
 it is, it's a very smart one. But what people do is they'll put snippets of a movie and some key
 scenes. And then it just starts to both from there. And then in fact, that's how that was one
 of the other things that I started noticing about TikTok was how quickly it influences behavior.
 So I was on TikTok. I was watching randomly scrolling and a Brooklyn 99 montage came on where a
 couple of the characters were it was just all the different episodes in which they're sort of
 talking and bantering with each other. I was like, oh, this is pretty smart comedy. I like it.
 And then after watching it over three or four days, I was like, I actually want to go and see
 the show. So I get on a whole loop and I start watching Brooklyn 99 Finishes Season's episode.
 But I've seen Brooklyn 99 ads on TV all the time when they were on. Never went to watch it. But
 these quick hits were like these little invitations you get. Hey, why don't you come in for happy
 hour? Hey, we're having this special now. And he just gets you to want to spend a little bit
 more time with the main content. I think it's super interesting what they've got.
 It is interesting. I do want to talk more about the study. So maybe some key takeaways or key
 things that maybe we're enlightening that you found or what ultimately does create successful
 advertising on the platform. Obviously advertising on the platform is very early.
 The platform as a whole is early. Everybody thinks these things are you're on the bill curve. We're
 still riding up this bill curve with TikTok as far as the masses of the US. I've certainly
 what age 12 to 22 is probably well at the top if not on the other side of it. But everybody else
 is still going up that bill curve. But I am curious, you know, like some of those key takeaways that
 you could share. Sure. So the first one, whatever what makes a good content or what makes a good
 platform for content doesn't necessarily translate always to a great platform for advertisers.
 But TikTok, Michael, he said it's differently. What we found is and just to preface with the way
 that we did the study. So people came in, they watched about eight minutes of content. And this
 is September, mind you that you know, you could have been scrolling for two hours before you
 so on that. So we did eight minutes of that. And then we did about 12 minutes of getting people
 watched a TikTok reel that we had created with ads, about 12 ads in our spurs between them.
 Now, when you put such a high content low or ad load on some on a platform that's technically
 not supposed to have so much at the time, you will see dips in how effective branding is
 or how effective advertising engagement is. We weren't actually seeing that. We were actually
 seeing it pretty damn stable. And not just stable, we were seeing it at the thresholds where people
 actually store the information into their subconscious. So when you walk into a store and you
 decide to buy something, it could be for many reasons. It could be because you're, you know,
 this is something that you've bought always out of habit. It could be because a friend or a family
 member told you that, hey, this is a great product. You should go for it or it could be an ad that
 you watched. But it's not any ad that you watched, but it was an ad that had created a story
 and showed the brand in a way that made your subconscious feel like, man, that's important
 information. I should remember that. Sometimes it can be as nauseating as the shamwaga
 or something can be as subtle as an ad that just for a brief moment said, you know, milk for
 humans. And it's only where the brain's actually like, man, this is important information,
 let me say, save that. And that causes people to change behavior. Now, some worked better than
 others driven by creative differences. But what we were seeing was it wasn't as that try to be
 too native to TikTok that we're working. It was as that we're being like, hey, we're an ad,
 but we're entertaining in this scenario and we're getting it out to you. And people were like,
 that's fine. Like I appreciate that. When they tried to go on trends and try to go too far
 down a trend. So those when people try to be too authentic to the content and try to be too
 authentic to the influencer, people were able to call those should right away. And those weren't
 working. But from an advertising perspective was working really strongly. Yeah, that's interesting
 because that's it's contrary, I think to what you've seen on other platforms, it also makes it
 that much harder to do, you know, and to become because you're constantly having to ideate around
 creating fresh content, fresh ideas. And, you know, unless you stay at home all day,
 like some of these guys is hard to do. And I think this is where if you're going to be a content
 creator for TikTok, you have to realize that, yeah, you probably may be able to write the wave
 of the algorithm for the first few months and you might be able to get your, you might be able to
 get your followers really quickly. But that doesn't guarantee you that you're going to sustain.
 And you have to think of TikTok literally, I believe, as a cable network or as a TV, a full
 spectrum of channels. And you have to keep building content to get people to continue to want to
 watch your channel. And you can just keep one thing going because the competition's just too high.
 So when I think of reasons that people buy, and this is the Ryan Alfred made up acronym, but I
 think of the, I call it the NC or T. You have a need, it's convenient, or you're trialing something.
 Those are my three. Those are the hierarchy of purchases in Ryan Alfred's world. And usually for
 me, so I'm a focus group of one on that. Is there one of those three that you saw maybe
 that TikTok advertising fulfilled, like, you know, in selling better or responding better,
 either something like, and when I say need, I think they're pretty basic to give you a time
 to think about it while also kind of explaining more. And need is like toilet paper or batteries.
 You know, you need that stuff to live and to go, you know, convenience is, you know,
 right place, right time. And a lot of that's point of sell type stuff. But even digitally,
 there's point of sell things. And then of course, trial is, you know, an influencer shows a new pair
 of shoes that I've never had, but I'll trial that, you know. So is there a certain category of
 product or service, or can all three fit within this platform from an advertising standpoint?
 I think that's the cool part about this platform is all three can stand on it because in our world,
 while I get the, you know, the three, the three things that you're talking about.
 For us, it's all about stories. If I tell you a story and I make it super interesting,
 and if I say that at the end of this story, this is the product that helped me get you get me here.
 Your perception of that product will change. Now, and then depending on whether you have a
 need or whether you want to try it, that depends on you. But most mediums don't allow you to tell
 stories that way. But TikTok does. So I think if you're toilet paper, you can make some
 amazing stories on TikTok that people will watch. And if you're a brand of, and this is actually,
 and again, I don't know how much of this is sponsored and how much of this is original content.
 But there's this woman on TikTok who basically shows new recipes of model cakes or things like that.
 And she's using things like smuckers jams. It's such a basic product, but I have a smuckers jam
 because of that. Because I'm like, I want to try the recipe she used that. I'm going to use that.
 I don't remember the last time I saw smuckers jam commercial on TV that maybe want to go and buy it.
 And I think that's the key is the storytelling piece and the diversity in storytelling that
 you're allowed on TikTok. That and then also being smart enough to be able to leverage
 as an influencer, how you are doing. So and when Charlie Demilio did the partnership with Duncan,
 I thought that was spectacular because she's become such a lifestyle brand to have people
 to partner with Duncan was so much smarter to have a drink of hers in Duncan versus have her
 with the Duncan coffee inside TikTok. That's the part that I think people really need more help on.
 Is what kind of stories do I tell on TikTok? That will get people to either think of me as a need
 or think of me to try. And if you try to do what you've traditionally done on Instagram,
 it won't work. Or if you try to do what you've done on Pinterest, it won't work. Or what you've
 tried to do on Facebook, it won't work. It is something that you have to learn and will constantly
 evolve with TikTok. The best story that I think I can give you on this is if you ask a bunch of
 fish house the water, they're probably going to run away. And if you keep asking them the question,
 one day one of the fish is going to come up to you and basically be like, what are you talking
 about? What is water? That's the same thing with TikTok. In a few years time people won't understand
 what this platform is. They'll know how it feels, makes them feel, but they will not understand it.
 But this is where storytellers need to basically carve their new shoes out.
 And then brands need to figure out how to tell their stories. Yeah. It's definitely the most
 authentic platform going right now just by the nature of what works with the algorithm. And
 again, back to understanding the world that we live in with attention spans and everything else.
 I feel like the entire platform is built with that premise in mind, you know, from the way you
 move from video to video, how you skim and the UI of it to the type of content that's on there.
 And you know, it's it's not it's both a wonderful thing and a terrible thing for brands in the fact
 that they can't just mail it in, you know, like it's a it's unbelievable opportunity because you
 still have organic reach. You have all these things. Yes, we'll you know, we're moving quickly
 towards to pay to play. But you know, you can't just phone it in by doing the auto share of your
 posts, like you just said, like their Facebook Instagram. And I think, you know, the large brands
 are starting to understand that. But unfortunately, the small to medium brands kind of get left behind
 a little bit, unless they really focus on a strategy and get behind it or have an owner that understands
 and appreciates marketing. Not absolutely. And I think this is I was just thinking about this the
 other day. The we've been through it. We are going through a paradigm shift where the world
 was all about TV advertising. And then you had this little thing called social on the side, right?
 I think with TikTok, it's just completely shifted now. I think now the thinking is needs to be,
 I need to invest my dollars the way that I invest on TV on these platforms. Because these are
 the platforms that are going to drive my actual sales. And TV will give me some awareness. But
 it's no longer 80, 20 or 70, 30. This is a 50, 50 if not more in terms of investment. Yeah.
 And to your point, the smaller brands, if you're trying to advertise on TikTok,
 you have to really start thinking about it in terms of you can do it as a brand if you decide to
 be completely authentic and make your own crazy stories. And it could work. But at the same time,
 there's a bunch of content creators and influencers that you would not have even thought about
 from moms and kitchens to, you know, to, to, there's this college student who gives legal advice.
 On not leave, but she provides, she provides an analysis of all the legal proceedings that are
 happening in, in the court systems. But she's just a college student. But as a voice,
 she's very authentic. Somebody that you can partner with, there are people across the board
 in terms of entertainment that can help you build your brand and do it in a very authentic way.
 Then I think this is the time when you actually influencer stops becoming that little appendix
 at the end of your creative review and starts becoming, this is the influencers we will use.
 These are the stories we will tell. And this is how our brand will integrate.
 Yeah. It doesn't start with, here's a 30 second spot.
 That's right. And back to what you said, the influencers
 slash their pages are kind of like the channels on TV, you know, they're having their,
 yes, they're the celebrities that tell the story and they are the, you know, sponsors,
 but more than anything, it's, you know, what channel do you want to be on? You know, no different
 than you're doing a cable by, you know, for television, you know, you're going to be on ESPN.
 Are you going to be on CNN? Are you going to be on Fox News? And, you know, when you choose
 the influencers, you know, you're going to see that same chart, you know, the flow chart that
 was TV stations, it's the influencer chart. And instead of like you said, page 77 of the deck,
 it suddenly page seven. And that's what's amazing. It's like these guys have become sitcoms and
 episodes and their own right. Like, um, and TikTok also tells you when they're going on life.
 Yeah. So I read buzzes like saying, oh, this person's life, you want to go and see what they're
 doing. Yeah. Um, and like you go, because if, if it's something that interests you, you go.
 Yeah. I love it. Um, I definitely want to follow back up on this. This is going to be a fascinating
 topic to cover. Um, where can everybody keep up with everything, you know,
 neural insights and some rot like where can they keep up with you? Where's, where's a good place
 to kind of learn more, so to speak? So you can always come through our website,
 neuralinside.com. And we have a bunch of case studies that are published. Um, but yeah,
 follow me on LinkedIn. And, you know, I keep sharing out little bits of tidbits on what I
 think is happening within the, the marketing world. Um, we, you had Tyler on the other day,
 we were talking about Super Bowl. Um, and we've got a bunch of more fascinating stuff coming over
 the rest of the, the, the earth that we'd love to, you know, people can keep reading up on.
 Right. Well, I know we're going to have you back on again. If you'll do us that favor,
 it continue talking all things, the latest and greatest in neuro. And of course, with mediums
 like TikTok, I could talk about it all day, but really appreciate some rots of run coming on
 today. If you aren't on the TikTok bus, it's time to get on, ladies and gentlemen, because it's
 here, it's rolling and it's not stopping. So, uh, keep up with everything, neuro insights.
 You know where to find them. And of course, you know where to find us at the.rad.cast on
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