You may be scrolling TikTok and see your favorite creator, but you will also be overwhelmed with the number of ads now popping up on the app.
Freshman Aaron Ortega is seeing a bunch on his feed, “I feel like there’s too many ads because like every four to five videos, there’s always an ad.”
Creators are selling products that could be amazing or a scam, “I believe the Tiktok ads I see are real because there’s always a link to buy the stuff that they’re promoting in the videos,” said Ortega who still is not motivated to buy what they are selling because of the volume of ads, “Sometimes these ads annoy me.”
According to the TikTok site, it opened its brand-facing wing back in 2020 and the company’s revenues skyrocketed. TikTok’s ad business made its first leap into performance marketing with lead-generation ads. That means individual small business owners can market to the TikTok audience. It also means huge companies can buy large creators and use their platform to sell products.
According to the TikTok ad site, you can see formats like interactive add-ons, search ads, and collection ads give a portion of the proceeds to the creator.
Here’s some quick facts about the TikTok ads:
- US TikTok ad revenues are projected to reach $10.42 billion in 2024 (representing more than 38% growth from 2023) and are estimated to hit $15.26 billion in 2026.
- US TikTok ad revenues per user are also forecast to increase this year, rising 31.1% up to $96.71, before climbing again all the way to $130.31 in 2026.
- This year, TikTok will make up 3.4% of the total US digital ad market, 2.7% of the total media ad market, and 12% of the total social ad market.
- Based on engagement rate per follower, higher education institutions (9.5%), sports teams (4.2%), and food & beverage (4.0%) represent the top-performing industries on TikTok. Ranking lowest on the list? Fashion (1.4%) and health and beauty (1.4%).
- One survey found that TikTok is the preferred format for short-form video content for 60% of ad buyers, vs. 19% who prefer Instagram Reels and 15% who prefer YouTube Shorts.
- Small businesses report getting more engagement on TikTok than on other social media sites, including Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and X.
- 92% of TikTok users take some type of action after watching a video and 37% have purchased something they discovered through the app.
Freshman Javaris Denson is tired of the ads, “I feel like the TikTok ads I see suck because there is so many when I scroll. Yes these ads are for real annoying.” He thinks they are all a scam, “The Tiktok ads I see are easily fake because they all look like scams to me.”
EHS dean of students Morgan Otey likes the TikTok app but could to without the ads, “I think Tiktok ads are super annoying and they’re mostly trying to sell me stuff in the TikTok shop. It’s really bothers me.”
