ch TikTok (Pons, 2019, para 3) Based on the Ansoff Matrix, how effective have the strategies applied by ByteDance been to the growth of Douyin/Tiktok? Concept: ChangeTable of contents Introduction.. ByteDanee.......... Ansoff's Matrix... Objective and Methodology. Research and analysis based on the Ansoff Matrix. Market development. Douyin. TikTok Acquisition of Musically. o> Ro wR TikTok’s global reach. USA’s and Uruguay's Markets. Market penetration. Negative repercussion of the firm’s exponential growth..... Conclusion Bibliography. 17 Appendix... Supporting Document #1. 224 Supporting Document #2. 23 Supporting Document #3. 31 Supporting Document #4. 36 Supporting Document #5. 39Introduction ByteDance ByteDance Ltd., founded in 2012 by Yiming Zhang, is the most valuable privately held company worldwide (ColdFusion, 2019). The Chinese giant owns a variety of apps ranging from social media services to news aggregators (Kharpal, 2019). Over the last few years, ByteDance grew exponentially. Today, it controls 23% of the Chinese digital app market and values $788 USD (Iqbal, 2020). ByteDance implemented different strategies to obtain global presence, such as acquiring companies like Flipagram and Musical.ly (Jamshed & Boghani, 2019), and expanding into new markets. Nowadays Bytedance is present in over 155 countries and 75 languages (Shi, 2019). ByteDance is best known for its app Douyin (called TikTok internationally), which contributes to a substantial proportion of the firm's total revenue (Shi, 2019). In three years, Douyin achieved the monopoly of the micro-video app market (ColdFusion, 2019). It is the “leading destination for short-form mobile videos” and its mission is to “inspire creativity and bring joy” (ByteDance, 2020, para. 4) Change is defined by the Cambridge Dictionary as “the act of becoming different, or the result of something becoming different”. The BNET Business Dictionary defines change management as “the coordination of a structured period of transition from situation A to situation B in order to achieve lasting change within an organization.” (Michigan State University, 2019, para 1). Social media platforms must adjust and adapt quickly to changing technology and user behavior. Quicker but well-thought-out change cycles and transition periods are increasingly important for managers to ensure the smooth transformation from process to process, from existing to new markets, from one brand name to another.Ansoff's Matrix The Ansoff Matrix is a tool used by businesses to plan strategies and methodologies for effective growth and development (CFI, n.d.). Existing Products New Products: 4 g 3 Market Product 2 Penetration Development B | seuing moreot tne company’s] veloping end sling vew || = IF | ostinapreducts to exstina | pocuctsio exstng markets || 3 markets and increasng g ‘nario shar, 8 £ a 3 g A oe Diversification =| Development = B | seting the company’s enotng | Entering naw makats with by ‘rotucs innew markets | developing and seling new Products Increasing risk Objective and methodology The objective of this commentary is to analyze the changes implemented by Douyin/TikTok based on the Ansoff Matrix. Quantitative and qualitative data were obtained from secondary sources (articles, newspapers, studies, and videos). However, media sources may be biased and have the tendency to exaggerate. Additionally, a survey using convenience sampling was conducted to investigate the opinion of the market, Nonetheless, its limitation is it only portrays the reality of a small section of TikTok’s Uruguayan market.Research and Analysis of “Change” based on the Ansoff Matrix Market development Douyin In August 2012 ByteDance introduced Toutiao, a news app, targeting Generation X (Li, 2019). In 2016, Douyin, a micro-video content creating app which aimed at targeting Generation Z was launched in China (Wallaroo, 2020). This new platform supports various types of content, from dance to comedy, offering music, filters, and effects (Junjie, 2019). Both Toutiao and Douyin are digital platforms but there was a change in the approach of the firm, particularly with the target market. Bytedance applied market development strategies by entering a new market with an already existing product. This was the riskier change strategy applied, as it meant facing competition and uncertainty, and required capital investment, which could have been lost if the opportunity was not favorable. According to Bo Ji’, ByteDance was able to accurately target their market, leading to an immediate success. “The new generations (...) want to share their real feelings (...). They are more direct and expressive (...). He (Zhang) understands the young people and their psychology” (As cited by Bangkok Post, 2019). * Bo Ji: Assistant dean for the Cheung Kong Graduate School of BusinessDouyin Daily active users (millions) 400 = § 20 ° January 2076 | vary 2018 anvary 2020| Year DAU (millions) January 2018 40 January 2019 250 January 2020 400+ Douyin’s daily active users through the years. (Qu, 2020) The amount of DAU? has deduplicated from 40M? in 2018 to 400M in 2020, illustrating the increasing popularity of the platform in the Chinese Generation Z market. The entry and transition into the new market proved to be successful in a short period One of Douyin's strengths is it operates under Al*, providing customers personalized content. The algorithm makes a specific “For you” page for each user, based on previous activity (Le, 2018). When the app launched Al was very innovative, distinguishing Douyin from the competition and attracting new users (Li, 2019) ? DAU: Daily Active Users 2M: Million B: Billion 4 A\: Artificial IntelligenceMoreover, 60.9% of survey participants agreed that the algorithm suggests personalized content, while another 33.3% said that this happens occasionally. Do you believe the TikTok algorithm suggests videos you are interested in? 68 responses TikTok By August 2017, ByteDance faced a threat of rising domestic competition using Al. The fast-paced changes in the industry saw other micro-video apps like Kuaishou, Yizhibo, and Miaopai gaining market share and ByteDance decided to alter its course by expanding into new markets (Wei, 2018). Also, two opportunities led ByteDance to ‘expand. First, in Southeast Asia and South America there is a significantly massive young population, open to new social media and short video platforms. Second, China's micro- video services impacted overseas markets. Businesses decided to capitalize and invest in new developing technologies (Wei, 2018). In August 2017 TikTok (international Douyin version) launched to the global market (Li, 2019)Acquisition of Musical.ly: A Change in Strategy Tiktok’s main competitor was Musically, a similar app founded in 2014, popular in the USA (ColdFusion, 2019). In November 2017, ByteDance acquired Musical.ly. Zhang Yiming® stated: “By integrating Musical.ly's global reach with ByteDance's massive user base (...), we are creating a significant global platform for our content creators and brands to engage with new markets’ (As cited by Li, 2019). In August 2018, ByteDance integrated Musically with Tiktok. At the time, Musical.ly had 100M users and its considerably large ‘American audience directly migrated to Tiktok, creating a globally powerful app (Iqbal, 2020). Therefore, this strategy fits into Market Development. TikTok Quarterly First-Time Installs Since 2016 sso 1000 2016 2016 4016 1017 2017 2017 4017 1018 2018 sa18 O18 1019 2019 sO1e «ar agora: Sis toe ince (Iqbal, 2020, para. 48) 5 Zhang Yiming: Founder of ByteDanceThe horizontal integration of Tiktok and Musically was a great success. By 4Q18, installs had grown exponentially from 46.8M in 4Q17 to 205.7M, an impressive growth rate of 339.53%. In November 2018 it became the world's most downloaded app in Google Play (Influencer Marketing Hub, 2020). Again, the firm proved that quick action to change has created a longer-lasting impact on its competitiveness. TikTok’s global reach Since January 2020, Tiktok was the seventh most-used social platform with 800 MAUS. In 2019, it ranked fourth between the international most-downloaded apps (Iqbal, 2020). In comparison to other social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, or Snapchat, TikTok reached 800 MAU the quickest (three years) (Nicolau, 2019). The app’s rapid growth reflects the effectiveness of Market Development strategies Bsa) THE WORLD’S MOST-USED SOCIAL PLATFORMS oS Oe Pct (Iqbal, 2020, para. 36) ® MAU: Monthly active usersToday, TikTok is available in 155 countries (Mohsin, 2020). Region User Base segment Asia and the Pacific 36 North America 12 Middle East and 11 Latin America 10 Europe 10 % of intemet users aged 16-64 who are members of TikTok by global region. (Iqbal, 2020, para. 83) TikTok Around the World Sof interot users aged 16-64 who are members of TikTok by Northam LatAm | Europe | MEA APAC 12% 10% | 10% 11% | 36% (Iqbal, 2020, para. 83) 151/957The firm's global reach is reflected as up to November 2019, TikTok and Douyin had 1.58 total downloads combined. India's market had the biggest reception, a change that would prove problematic to be discussed in a later section. Total TikTik downloads by November 2019 by country India 2 china USA, ° 100 200 300 400 500 ‘Total TKTik downloads by November 2019 (Milions) (Wallaroo, 2020) USA’s and Uruguay's Markets In November 2019 TikTok was the second most downloaded app in the USA with 4M downloads. Additionally, out of the 60M MAU (up from 20M in 2018), 60% aged 16 to 24, and 80% aged 16 to 34 (Wallaroo, 2020), indicating TikTok’s audience was targeted correctly. A similar thing happened in the Uruguayan market 1521957When did you downloaded TikTok? 69 responses @ 2017 @ 2018 @ as @ 2020 How old are you? 75 responses @ 15 cr below @ 4601 above 84% downloaded TikTok between 2019-2020. Also, 79% of TikTok users are part of Generation Z (23 or below), indicating how ByteDance accurately focused on the targeted market. 153ib57Market penetration Market Penetration carries the lowest risk compared to the rest of the strategies as the amount of capital required is much lower. The first significant change was made in September 2016. ByteDance improved branding by refining TikTok’s logo (Graziani, 2018), providing brand awareness (by increasing visibility), identity and loyalty, as the new logo distinguished TikTok from the competition, attracting more customers. 98.6% of respondents admitted the new logo is more appealing Douyin inical logo —-Douyin actual logo (September 2016) (after September 2016) In 2017, a significant number of changes to the app’s features such as effects, filters, and stickers were incorporated to increase engagement (Graziani, 2018). In September 2018, a new feature that lets users “Duet” and “React” to other people's videos was developed (Locklear, 2018). By March 2019, 43% of the platform's engaged users had uploaded a “Duet” video (Influencer Marketing Hub, 2020), demonstrating the success of Market Penetration techniques. In March 2019, TikTok added new screen time management options, allowing users to select a limit of 40, 60, or 90 minutes on the app (Carey, 2019). 20.3% of respondents use this feature or are interested in using it, while another 29% answered they are somewhat interested, proving the feature may have attracted more customers who were self-conscious and wanted to restrict the time spent on the app. 42,Do you use Tiktok’s Screen Time Management feature or are you interested in using it? 69 responses @ yes @ No @ Mayoo In 2019, TikTok introduced ‘Go Live’ and users with more than 1000 followers became able to livestream (Reed, 2019). A ‘Live Q&A’ function also became available, where influencers answer questions while live streaming (Graziani, 2018). These features were very successful and produced a new wave of growth. They attracted customers who were eager to see their favourite celebrities live. However, only 27.1% of survey respondents use the feature, suggesting that it was not as successful in the Uruguayan market, Do you watch Live Streams on the app? ‘Oresponses @ Yes @No0 In 2019, the firm began to pay $500 USD to influencers and celebrities for them to join the app (Wallaroo, 2020). From the survey, 27.5% replied that they downloaded the app to watch what their favourite celebrities post, implying that as they started downloading 43,the app, so did their fans, multiplying TikTok’s user base. This change proved to be effective, a win-win strategy for both the firm and the growing number of influencers. In February 2020, ByteDance introduced "Family Safety Mode”, which allows parents to limit their children’s TikTok utilization. This new feature enabled screen-time management controls, restricts inappropriate content, and limits direct messages (Perez, 2020). This change was a game-changer for TikTok as it could now attract new young audiences whose parents had previously prohibited, thereby once again increasing its user base. 34.7% of survey participants were 15 years old or below, meaning that a big segment is targeted with this new feature. Furthermore, most of these changes occurred in 2019, when 44% of total TikTok downloads occurred (Influencer Marketing Hub, 2020). Brace a Rue ar EN eugene oberio eT It ranked as the top most downloaded app in Apple's ‘ore IOS App Store for Qt 2019, << 33 million ‘Snapchat J downloads. (Mohsin, 2020, para. 22) In 1Q19, TikTok was the most-downloaded app on the Apple App store with 33M downloads. Although there is no certain way to prove the correlation, one can assume that these major changes and updates successfully achieved expanding the app’s market, share. 44,Negative repercussion of the firm’s exponential growth As the app became globally known and transparent, controversial issues and ethical concerns emerged. In February 2019, ByteDance was fined $5.7M USD by the FTC’ for violating the USA's child privacy law and illegally collecting personal information from children under 13 (Amiri, 2019). Also, Tiktok was banned for short time periods in Indonesia (2018), Bangladesh and India (2019) for the spread of ‘negative’content (Tech2, 2019). The app was accused of allowing pomographic material to propagate among youngsters and encouraging paedophiles and predators (Parkin, 2019). Considering that India is TikTok’s biggest market, a definite ban would have had a negative repercussion on its growth Entering new markets (both demographic and geographic) required a significant amount of changes to be made to comply with legal and cultural factors. The Indian government had ordered Google and Apple to take down TikTok from its platforms, The firm was forced to deactivate six million videos which had infringed on its guidelines. (Nicolaou, 2019). Interestingly, this approach resulted in a backlash on the Indian government's censorship policies and the issue is now a political debate. 7 FTC: Federal Trade Commission 45,Conclusion ByteDance exponential growth was a result of evolving market behavior and strategic changes to the firm's internal and external growth strategies. Based on the Ansoff Matrix, ByteDance has applied Market Development and Market Penetration strategies for the growth of Douyin/TikTok, which have been highly effective. Market Development was used when launching both Douyin to the Chinese market and TikTok internationally, Two opportunities and a threat led TikTok to launch, and the acquisition of Muiscal.ly was very useful. Moreover, Market Penetration was used when refining the logo and adding features like “Duet”, and “Go Live", and parental controls incentivizing more customers to download TikTok. However, the changes implemented by the firm have resulted in negative consequences and the firm must face legal battles which are costly and time-consuming. Regarding aspects that need further investigation, apart from China’s, USA’s and Uruguay's markets, the repercussion of TikTok on European markets could have also been included to add more perspectives to the research. Word Count: 1793 16,Bibliography Amiri, F. (2019, February 28). TikTok to pay $5.7 million over alleged violation of child privacy law. Retrieved April 13, 2020, from hitps://www.nbenews.comitechitech- news/tiktok-pay. ilion-over-alleged-violation-child-privacy-n977186 Bangkok Post. (2019, November 27). Bytedance: The Chinese company behind global TikTok craze. Retrieved March 22, 2020, from https://www.bangkokpost.com/world/1803294/bytedance -the-chinese-company-behind- global-tiktok-craze ByteDance. (2020). Our products. Retrieved March 10, 2020, from https://www.bytedance.com/en/products/ Carey, J. (2019, March 28). TikTok update - Two huge new features announced and here's how to use them. Retrieved March 23, 2020, from httos:/www.express.co.ukllife- style/science-technology/1 106589/TikTok-update-new-app-features-announced CFI. (n.d.). Ansoff Matrix - Overview, Strategies and Practical Examples. Retrieved March 17, 2020, from https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/knowledge/strategy/ansoff-matrix/ ColdFusion. (2019, November 29). Why TikTok is Now the No. 1 Social Media App [Video file]. 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TikTok Statistics - Everything You Need to Know [March 2020 Update]. Retrieved March 24, 2020, from https://wallaroomedia,com/blog/social- media/tiktok-statistics/ Wei, H. (2018, March 28). Short video apps gain traction in overseas markets. Retrieved March 21, 2020, from https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/201803/28/WSSabaf86ba3105edcf6514055.html 162957Appendix Supporting document #1 ByteDance. (2020), Our products. Retrieved March 10, 2020, from https://www.bytedance,com/en Ft) eV 1rer iter) ee a een Inspire creativity, enrich life. transportatio China, which was later acquired by TripAdvisor—as well as the real estate search portal 99fang. In 2019, Yiming was named one of the world's 100 most influential people by Time Magazine. He holds a BA. in Software Engineering from Nankai University. 163357na oe ty Our Products Discover our suite of products and services. Gp) vouyin Douyin is China's leading destination for short-form mobile videos. Powered by easy-to-use video creation tools, Douyin quickly became a highly popular app across the country. It empowers everyone to capture and present the world's creativity, knowledge, and moments that matter in everyday life, presenting a wide and diverse range of content on the platform. For more information, please visit https://www.douyin.com. In] ByteDance Pent crete cree TikTok is the leading destinat mission is to inspire creativity across the globe, including Lo: Berlin, Dubai, Mumbai, Singapore For more information, please visitSupporting document #2 Iqbal, M. (2020, February 21). TikTok Revenue and Usage Statistics (2020). Retrieved March 14, 2020, from https://www.businessofapps. com/dataltik-tok-statistics/ TikTok Revenue and Usage Statistics TikTok, known as Douyin in its home market, was launched in China in September 2016. It was pushed out globally as TikTok the following year. The TikTok app allows users to create 15 second videos, soundtracked by music clips. Sounds simple enough, but it's a wildly popular concept. Depending on who you ask, the app was the world's second-most or fourth-most downloaded non-gaming app of 2019 (only behind various Facebook entities in either case). TikTok/Douyin parent company ByteDance also owns hugely popular Chinese Al-powered news aggregation platform Toutiao, created by CEO Zhang Yiming at the age of 29 in 2012. Notably, he was not backed by either Alibaba or Tencent. TikTok has succeeded where the Jatter failed with WeChat - success beyond China. 23,This was a strategic triumph. In November 2017 ByteDance acquired the popular (also China- based) would-be rival app Musical.ly app for a reported $1 billion. TikTok was merged with Musical.ly in August 2018, with app users’ accounts migrated to their TikTok accounts. This was seen as a way for the Chinese app to enter the US market - with Musical.ly already boasting a considerable American audience. TikTok/Douyin (and formerly Musicai.ly) users use the app largely to create, share, and view content based around lip syncing, dancing, comedy skits, and other physical activities. Clearly, this is something that appeals to young people (and quite a few older ones) around the world, with app snowballing in popularity over 2018 and 2019. Despite only being released in 2016, it was one of the most-downloaded apps of the 2010s, As of 2020, TikTok is one of the world’s best-loved apps (for those under a certain age at least), its success powered by some of the world’s most sophisticated Al. \That said, it has not been without its controversies. In 2019, it was briefly banned in India for| morality issues”, with pornographic content and predatory behaviour a concern. It has been accused of not adequately safeguarding young users’ data. It is also being investigated in the |US over national security concerns. ByteDance has released a transparency report to deal |with these accusations, and has moved to ringfence TikTok from the rest of its operations. Nonetheless, as of early 2020, TikTok seems like the app to beat. Scroll on to read our collection of TikTok stats from around the web. 160357Key TikTok Statistics © TikTok MAUs estimated at 800 million * TikTok downloaded 738 million times in 2019, * Total TikTok downloads over 1.5 billion - making it the seventh-most downloaded app of the 2010s * Itisestimated that 57% of the TikTok/Douyin userbase is based in China + India top market for TikTok downloads in 2019 (if we exclude Chinese Android downloads), with 323 million * 46 million US TikTok downloads in 2019 ‘© Only 9% of US internet users have used TikTok, with 5% more interested in using it; this rises to 49% for teenage users * ByteDance reports 400 DAU of Douyin in China, and claim 68% of Chinese social media users/59% of smartphone users are Douyin users * Musically counted 100 million users at time of August 2018 merger with TikTok * Singer Loren Gray is the most-followed person on TikTok, with close to 40 million. followers * On Douyin, the most-followed account belongs to actor, model, and singer Dilraba Dilmurat, with around 55 million followers Android TikTok users spent 68 billion hours using the app in 2019 China accounts for eight out of every 10 minutes viewed on TikTok + Average daily time on TikTok estimated at 45 minutes ‘* USusers open TikTok an average of eight times a day, with sessions averaging just under 5 minutes * Indian users spend 38 minutes daily using TikTok * TikTok one-week retention rate stands at 26% * Alate 2018 Global Web Index study found 55% of TikTok users uploaded a video in the last month, compared to 68% who had watched one * TikTok 2019 revenue came to $176.9 million (excluding non-iOS Chinese revenue} fe ByteDvance contrals 23% of the Chinese digital app market Jp ByteDance became the world’s most highty-valued private startup, with a valuation ot? billion after a SoftBank-led $3 billion investment roundTikTok User Statistics TikTok is available in over 150 markets around the world, jin 39 languages. The latest available Official statistics show that there are 500 million TikTok users around the world (monthly active users). The 500 million figure, however dates back to an official announcement in July 2018. ByteDance has not released anything more recent. We can assume that given its huge popularity, the figure is higher. In September 2019, TikTok VP Blake Chandlee suggested that while it was not up to 1 billion, it was not at half that level either. Hovtsuite and We Are Sucial have se¢ (he figure at 600 million. This would make it the sixtr] most used social app in the world. Only the various Facebook properties, YouTube, and WeChat rank ahead of it. Notably it has leapfrogged Tencent’s QQ and QZone. TikTok users vs. other major apps Noy Source: Hootsuite/We Are Social 26,india was the number one market for downloads in 2019 (only counting IOS App Store and Google Play Store downloads), with 323 million downloads, accounting for 44% of the total figure. This is despite the tact that TikTok was in fact temporarily banned in the country, tor two weeks in April 2019. Legislators believed the app would expose children to pornographic content, sexual predators, and cyberbullying. TikTok managed to persuade the authorities that it had tightened regulations and the app duly found its way back onto the iOS App Store and Google Play Store. The ban cost the app. an-estimated 15 million new users in what looked set to be TikTok’s best month toup until that point in the South Asian mega nation. ‘The importance of the market to TikTok is clear. In October, it launched an education program in India - the first such initiative from the app. Certainly this suggests an app wanting to stay, inanation’s good books. Despite the fact that third-party Android downloads, which are not included in these figures, are by far the biggest channel for downloads in China, TikTok’s home market still logged around 52 million downloads (7% of the total). The US is in third with 6%, or 46 million. Adifferent set of TikTok statistics, from Priori Data, show slightly lower figures (though these stats go only as far as November 1° 2019). India still leads by some distance, logging 190.6 million downloads. The US, in second, logs 41 million TikTok downloads. This puts it someway ahead of the cluster of Turkey (23.2 million), Russia (19.9 million), and Pakistan (19.5 million), 169357TikTok download statistics ‘We can speak witha bit more clarity on download statistics. These show us, unequivocally, that 2019 was TIkTok’s year. According to AppTrace, TikTok jumped from 269" to 4" in global app download rank in February 2019. It has remained in the top-20 since (as of February 2020), and currently sits in fourth position Sensor Tower stats reveals TikTok was downloaded over 738 million times globally in 2019. This is a significant increase on the 655 million downloads recorded in 2018. TikTok downloads crossed the 1.5 billion threshold in November 2019. Lownioad activity peaked in (4, when the app was downloaded 219 million times. 11k 10k seems to show a pattern of rising downloads throughout the year. This pattern was somewhat disrupted in 2019 by virtue of what looks like an overspill of enthusiasm from the last quarter of 2018. Up until the end of 2019, TikTok counts a total of 1.65 billion downloads. 2019 downloads account for 44% of the total downloads. in Til du ape an Source: Sensor Tower that point in tne Soutn Asian mega nation. The importance of the market to TikTok is clear. In October, it launched an education prograc in India - the first such initiative from the app. Certainly this suggests an app wanting to stayIn the 2019 official iOS download chart, TikTok ranks fourth, with the chart limited to free apps. TikTok was well on the way to global success over the course of 2018. Sensor Tower reported that 2018 downloads were in excess of the 444 million reported by Instagram. Total TikTok downloads crossed the 1 billion mark in early 2019. According to this app download data, TikTok was the single most-downloaded non-game app on 10S in 2018, and the fourth-most downloaded on Android (Google Play Store only). Its overall global positioning reflects the latter, which accounts for a far greater percentage of users than the former. Going back a little, the August 2018 merger with Musical.ly provided a substantial boost to active users of the platform - particularly in the US. Musically, it should be noted was a hugely popular app, which had topped iOS free download charts in 19 countries and counted 100 million monthly active users. This was a clear part of TikTok’s strategy to grow its overseas userbase to over 50% of total users. This was not just powered by pure excitement over new functionality for Musically users; Apptopia reports a significant increase in advertising spend by ByteDance in the months following the merger (something not unnoticed by the online commentariat). TikTok Around the World Northam LatAm Europe | MEA APAC 12% 10% 10% «= 11% 36% 29,TikTok demographics (60% of US TikTok users are aged between 16-24, according to a November 2019 release from Reuters. MarketingCharts TikTok data (March 2019) finds over 50% of TIKTok users In the US are aged 18-34 - with a nearly even split between 18-24 year olds and 25-34 year olds. Interestingly though, we still find a quarter of US TikTok users are aged 45-64, Its appeal, therefore, is not simply limited to kids... ‘We should note that this data does not include those under 18 years of age, which is clearly a key TikTok demographic ~ and certainly may significantly reshape this data. ‘We also get a snapshot of TikTok user Income. We find a preponderance of usage among those with household income in excess of $100,000 bracket (37% of users). TikTok, then, seems to be an app for the comfortably off - which certainly makes a compelling case to would-be TikTok marketers. On the other hand, 30% of US TikTok users report household income of $40,000 or less. We might assume some quantity of these would be students, not yet earning an income - or those at early stages of their career. Wittt fears that young people might be spending too long using apps, TikTok contains a digital )wellbeing component which warns users when they've been using the apo for over two hours. TikTok came under investigation in the UK for its handling of its young users’ personal data. Concerns were also raised around its open messaging system, which allows anyone to ‘message anyone. TikTok was banned for around two weeks in India in April 2019. Indian legislators cited fears ‘around child pornography, grooming, and cyberbullying as being behind the ban. The ban was overturned after TikTok successful demonstrated that it had taken suitable measures to deal with these lesuics ‘Assimitarly short-fived TikTok ban was enforced in indonesia in July 2019. This ban was lifted ]when TikTok agreed to censor ‘negative content. There were widespread rumours that the app was to be banned in Pakistan in January-2019 These turned out to be nothing more than rumours, though they gained significant traction. A lawyer approached the Lahore High Court in August 2019 seeking a TikTok ban in the country. 1 troubies extend across te racine Ucean also. ne U9 ICneduyievancess,/muion | 172257 for collecting data on users under the age of 13 without first seeking parental consent.Supporting document #3 Graziani, T. (2018, October 21). How Douyin became China's top short-video App in 500 days, Retrieved March 23, 2020, from hitps://walkthechatcom/douyin-became- chinas-top-short-video-app-500-days/ How Douyin became China’s top short- video App in 500 days A THOMAS GRAZIAN| 8 JULY 30,2018 / NEW WECHAT FEATURES Ashort history of Douyin Dou Yin is an impressive product: it was developed in 200 days, and within ayear got 100 million users, with more than 1 billion videos viewed every day. How did a team of 8 achieved such as result in just 500 days? Let's look into it What is Douyin? Why do all of these effects matter? Creating interesting video or audio content is remarkably difficult (much more so than writing interesting articles — and even that is tough, I can tell you) — providing tools to make the content richer and funnier is incredibly valuable Another game changing aspect of Douyin is its intertace: while competitors like Kuaishou are asking users to click on videos, Douyin has a more convenient and addictive “swipe” interface (similar to Musical.ly and... Tinder) Competitive landscape ‘The market of short videos in China is not anything new: some of the entrants started as early as 2011. 34Who did Douyin have to beat in order to make its way to the top? + Kuaishou (83): launched in 2011. In March 2017, it received a 350 million USD investment from Tencent. In November 2017, Daily Activer Users had already exceeded 100 million ‘+ Miaopai (##8): launched by Weibo in 2012, Miaopai benefited from the traffic generated by its parent company. However, its core product remained mediocre and performance has been disappointing. Miaopai still managed to raise a 500 million USD E round of funding in November 2016 + Haokan Shepin (#3408): a project of Baidu, “Haokan Shepin” relies on Baidu's technological resources and know-how. Launched in November 2017, it already ranks #27 among the free Apps on App stores. Kaishou is mostly present in Tier 3 and Tier 4 cities in China. Its content consists mostly of users showing off wealth or flirty behavior. This is quite different from Douyin’s positioning: most of its users are in Tier 1 or Tier 2 cities, and are young people, often below 24 years old. Douyin’s content is often fun and quirky, appealing to a more educated audience. Of course, this is a curse for Kuaishou who would like to appeal to these younger and wealthier users (who are more valued by advertisers and investors alike), but Douyin seems to only be getting stronger. Astory of Douyin Douyin experienced a meteoric rise in the span of less than 2 years. + 2016-09-26 A.me official launch + 2016-12-22 A.me changed its name to Douyin + 2017-01-09 Receives several milion RMB of seed investment from Toutiao + 2017-03-13 Yue Yunpeng forwards a short video with a Douyin watermark, which is forwarded 5,083 times, and receives 83,175 likes. + 2017-08-11 Video views exceed 1 bilion + 2017-11-10 Toutiao purchases Musical.ly for 1 billion USD and merges it to Douyin + 2018-01-23 The App starts getting international success, ranking #1 among free App downloads on App stores in Thailand 1787The phases of Douyin’s growth Phase 1: September 2016 — April 2017 'The early phase of September 2016 was mostly about refining the product and finding a core group of early adopters. It was also the opportunity for Douyin to improve their branding by changing their name and logo in order to get ready to scale, Phase 2: May 2017 — December 2017 This second phase marked the explosive growth of Douyin. This growth was partly fueled by sponsoring some major Chinese variety shows in order to gain exposure, such as “Hip-Hop in China” (:|+,3]47 408), “Happy Camp” (He RAAH) and “Everyday Upward” (KX14_b). Douyin also perfected its App by including a wider choice of filters, stickers and effects which could be added to the videos to make them more engaging. ‘The App also started exploring opportunities for monetization. In September 2017, it ran a first advertising campaign with sponsored videos from Airbnb, Harbin Beer and Chevrolet.‘The campaigns were a success, and Douyin stated that this model was the future of its monetization. As we discussed, the upscale audience of Douyin makes it an interesting platform for such campaigns. Finally, this second phase of development also saw the entry of Douyin in live streaming. The live streaming capability was restricted to users with substantial audiences (above 50,000 or so). Live streaming provided Douyin with another opportunity for growth and monetization, and its strong foothold in short-videos enabled it to enter a promising but extremely competitive space. a7éds7‘Comments on the App store during this growth phase were overwhelmingly positive, insisting on the addictive nature of the App. The few negative comments were largely linked with the performance issues linked with the surge of users, which put some stress on Douyin’s infrastructure. Phase 3: December 2017 to today At this stage, Douyin had made this way all the way to the #2 rank of the Apple Chinese App store, and first in the video/photo category. Douyin however still managed to move forward and extend its scope by introducing a “Live Q&A” function which spawned a new wave of growth. By pricing the cost of having a question answered much lower than other platforms (users have to pay to get an answer, but they pay only about 3 RMB against hundreds of RMB on other platforms) Douyin managed to further fuel its growth. This current phase is also the one in which Douyin has to deal with the drawbacks of growth: with an user base of more than 100 million, avoiding nefarious behavior is a challenge. The App has to keep getting better at monitoring videos and comments in order to maintain a healthy environment for its users. a7is7Supporting document #4 Nicolaou, A. (2019, November 8). How fo become TikTok famous. Retrieved March 17, 2020, from. Tiktok: India bans video sharing app [Activist group launched case against Chinese-owned app which it {said encouraged paedophiles and pornography The Indian government has ordered Google and Apple to take down the IChinese-owned Tiktok video app after a court expressed concerns over the [spread of pornographic material. Tiktok has already been banned in neighbouring Bangladesh and hit with a large fine in the United States for illegally collecting information from children, ‘The app, which claims to have 500 million users worldwide including more than 120 million in India, has been fighting the effort to shut it down after a high court in Chennai called for the ban on 3 April. 36,Industry sources told AFP that the information technology ministry had now sent out an order to Google and Apple to remove the app from their online stores. Neither of the US companies would comment. Reuters reported that Google had complied with the order. The app was still available on Apple’s platforms late on Tuesday, but was no longer available on Google’s Play store in India. TikTok the video The app - which allows users to make and share short app taking over the internet videos | can still be used by those who have already downloaded it on their smartphones. © Read more India’s supreme court, which on Monday rejected a Tiktok appeal to suspend the order, is to hear the case again on 22 April. “We have faith in the Indian judicial system and we are optimistic about an outcome that would be well received by over 120 million monthly active users in India,” Tiktok said in a statement Tuesday. ‘The Chennai case was launched by an activist group which said the app encouraged paedophiles and pornography. With short videos of up to 15 seconds, Tiktok has become a major rival to. Facebook, Instagram and other social network sites among teenage smartphone users in the past year. Tiktok has found particular popularity in smaller cities and towns among first-time internet users who don’t speak English, said Jayanth Kolla of technology consultancy Convergence Catalyst, a demographic underserved by the large U.S.-based social media giants, 37,“It looks like the Chinese internet companies have cracked the code of getting into India,” Kolla said. “The speed and the rate at which some of these apps are growing, that is alarming. It definitely requires more time to study better” But facing increased pressure the app, which is owned by Chinese Arm ByteDance, said last week it had taken down six million videos in India since last July which had infringed its guidelines. ‘The company said the measures were to “reinforce our ongoing commitment toensure that our platform remains a safe and positive space for our Indian Branches of the Indian government have signalled that they will start taking a tougher line on policing the internet. But this stricter approach has sparked concern about government overreach and censorship. Some say it could herald a shift towards a new internet ‘model in India echoing to China's own “Great Firewall.” “For Google to have complied with a directive is quite remarkable,” said Arun ‘Mohan Sukumar, an internet governance specialist at think tank Observer Research Foundation, Sukumar said this could lead to increased pressure being put on companies like Google and Apple. “This is probably going to be seen as an opportunity by ‘TikTOk video Ww ” TiTokvideo: _, many law enforcement agencies to go forthe jugular."he foreoleetionet= said. children's data ‘oun friktok has continued to be drawn into controversy in| a india. On Sunday a 19-year-old man was allegedly shot dead by a friend in Delhi as they posed with a pistol to make a video to show on TikTok, police told Indian media. ‘Three friends were driving in Delhi, when one pulled out a homemade pistol and aimed it at the driver. Police said the gun accidentally went off, shooting the man through the head. [And the moves in India to ban Tiktok are the latest in a string of woes for the [popular app. [Bangladesh banned Tiktok in February as part of a clampdown on internet [pomnography. ‘The same month, the US Federal Trade Commission said a $5.7m fine ordered| Jagainst Tiktok was the largest imposed in a child privacy investigation, The social network failed to obtain parental consent from underage users as required by the US Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, FTC officials said 1809857Supporting document #5 Have you ever downloaded the app Musialy? 39,When did you downloaded THTOK? ene ene enn How much time do you spend on the app? trcoy se ee Otaetenpsenanene eVects an toma eaves @ spre 0 and30 russacarentae @ Sewer arom (tse an a. Do you use Tktok’s Screen Time Management feature or are you interested in using it? ny you downed Ta (Ste a a opt) 184957Do you believe the TikTok algorithm suggests videos you are interested in? Which loge attracts you the most? © tira ioga 1 Do you watch Live Streams on the app? Torespansee eve @No 44