TikTok has become the new and very essential tool to promote movies, series, streaming… entertainment. It is the ideal vehicle to contact the younger generations as has already been confirmed by films such as “The Gray Man”, “Moonfall” and “Top Gun: Maverick”, the highest grossing of the year and which, in addition, managed to break the generation barrier by generating interest in a sequel to a 1986 title and starring a star they may not necessarily be all that familiar with, Tom Cruise.
For the marketing content of studios and platforms to make sense, strategists have had to understand and put into practice Marshal McLuhan’s dictum: “the medium is the message”. TikTok has arrived with a new aspect or variation of audiovisual language. Yes, it is short video content, but the dynamism, the form of use and the interaction of users is different, of course, from that of cinema and television, but also from that of YouTube.
On TikTok, users like to see themselves. That is, they like to generate content related to their interests. They like to interact with content through the content they create. They want to see people like them. For example, for “Top Gun: Maverick”, in addition to talking about the usual aspects of the film, you had to take advantage of the new recruits. TikTok users “could” be them, or at least fantasize about them. Part of the dynamic is breaking down the barriers between fiction and reality, as transmedia content does.
TikTok has over a billion users and over 1.6 billion monthly active users. For marketing strategists, the key is to detect and develop new forms of interaction through the content of the products they promote, but also through peripheral content. That is, they do not have to be exactly about something that happens in history, it can be about something that happens in that “universe” but in relation to history. For example, playing with a reality show or a talk show that indirectly discusses something that happens in the film. There is also the possibility that talent will generate content.
The key is to “go crazy” a bit, without this implying forgetting other content that can also be included (behind-the-scenes issues, interviews or small challenges such as the typical “I never, never” with an actor or actress).
Having a tiktoker as part of the strategy is about letting them use their language instead of imposing a copy. TikTok implies more naturalness and that feeling precisely that its name leaves you and that is expected to ring the bell and take and reach more and more users, translating into more and more movie tickets, more and more clicks on any platform… tiktok