Douyin/TikTok is The New Normal. But, Are You Ready?
If you still consider TikTok as an entertainment App, then you are not seeing Douyin has developed great businesses in China. Under the development of Douyin and TikTok, enormous opportunies are coming along with the new trends.
Are you still wondering how and why Douyin（抖音）/TikTok goes viral all of a sudden? Are you still trying to understand why your kids are so addicted to TikTok? Before you figure it out, it might be already too late to start understanding what does Douyin/TikTok mean to you and your business, whether you are an entrepreneur, a store owner, a growth hacker, a marketing person, or a CEO. So it is time that everyone should take a new look at Douyin/TikTok.
TikTok, aka the Western Douyin, is mostly used outside of mainland China. As a Chinese living in Finland, fortunately, I’m able to use and experience both Apps. As a user, I feel the huge differences between these two Apps, although they are developed and owned by ByteDance with highly similar features and functionalities. You can tell from the users, video styles, to monetisation methods, TikTok is still for a younger generation with more entertainment content (47% below 30). At the same time, Douyin has already become the top three daily-used App for Chinese people, which has 700 million daily active users who spend more than one and a half hours per day! It means Douyin has become the second-biggest Internet traffic gateway after WeChat.
Douyin is not a platform that you can simply describe as a toB or toC platform. I explain the four typical business models in my previous article. Douyin belongs to none of them, or you can say it has all of them! I summarize the current 11 ways for a Douyin creator to monetise on Douyin. The reason I add the date is that this is changing all the time! If you are not familiar with or never heard some of these words or abbreviations, especially if your business targets mainland China. You should feel worried not because you don’t know these, but you will be misguided by someone else who claims they know everything about Douyin.
I would not make this article boast how much I know, but I would like to share some new trends in Douyin, and it will be most likely to happen in TikTok soon.
Three new words and concepts you need to understand related to Douyin/TikTok:
1 KOS (Key Opinion Sales)
You might hear of KOL (Key Opinion Leader) and KOC (Key Opinion Customer), so what the heck is this KOS from? This ‘Sales’ does not refer to those who are standing in the store or traditional salesperson. It refers to a person who is making vertical-content short videos in a specific area, which brings them really loyal followers or fans. These followers have a much higher chance to buy the item that the KOS recommends or promotes. The main reason for convincing them to buy from this KOS is not because of the skill of sales or a good promotion from this person. It is mainly because of the trust and the uniqueness. Thousands of brands in China and abroad are looking for such KOSs on Douyin’s creator marketplace and ask them to promote their products. It is win-win cooperation in most cases. As a creator, you can make money by it. As a merchant, you can target more precisely with a higher conversion rate. You can see how many followers a Douyin creator has, their genders and ages, where they locate, what are their interest tags, how ‘loyal’ the followers are to this KOS, and most importantly, Douyin can forecast your marketing promotion based on your investment. It is accurate due to its algorithm. This is something you can’t get from Youtubers or Streamers.
2 Live commerce and video commerce
It is definitely not the same thing as TV commerce. The key reason is that TV commerce is passive, but Live commerce or video commerce is a big-data-driven activity with an algorism-self-corrected mechanism. In other words, Douyin knows you much better than anyone in this world, even yourself. Based on what you have watched, liked, followed and searched, they know what type of live shows or videos they should push to you. For an app with 700 million daily active users, all the activities are just making their promoting models more and more accurate.
3 ROI is out, GPM is the key
GPM = GMV/PV * 1000 It is derived from live commerce. It means how much GMV generated per 1000 views. Why GPM is better and more important than ROI. Let’s have a look at an example.
In the above case, from an ROI perspective, Plan B is better, simply because it has a higher ROI. However, in live commerce, we should look into GPM instead of ROI. WHY? ROI is a one-time investment. Your scale coefficient is fixed in a non-AI-corrected system. However, Douyin can help your video find more relative audiences and micro-target those potential buyers. Then the GPM will increase as time goes, as a snowball can grow bigger and bigger on a slope. The slope is the microtargeting system provided by Douyin which help you find relative buyers based on their user tags. However, you might happen to have negative micro-targeting if your content is not vertical enough. For example, you upload cosmetics-related videos all the time to Douyin. Still, in your live streaming commerce, everyone expects to see what cosmetics you are selling, but you start to sell running shoes. It will not only ‘fool’ your followers, but also the system, because one of your key tags is cosmetics, but not running shoes.
Three new opportunities from Douyin/TikTok for an ordinary person
1 Content Creator
Gary Vee mentioned in an interview what businesses would have great potential for growth in the next 5 years.
Becoming someone who can create content. Written, audio or video for the internet contextually. Because there will not be a human nor a business on earth in a decade that isn’t in need of a substantial creative department of making. Not thinking… which will always be needed, MAKING. And that creates enormous opportunities. —— Gary Vee
And yes, I actually knew this interview from Douyin (not TikTok!) and his personal account, which is even verified! I followed him after I watched that video.
I said to be a content creator is not only because Gary brings it up but also because Douyin/TikTop or short-video platforms do need more content with specific know-how. In China, people gradually tend to choose Douyin to search for something they want to ask instead of Baidu, which used to be the biggest search engine in China for almost twenty years. So, will TikTok replace Google soon? A short video is always better than an article with just texts and pictures. In addition, you don't really need to ‘create’ new knowledge as a scientist, but what you need is to create new content to deliver existing knowledge.
2 Personal IP
Building your personal IP is more than becoming a KOS. You are building something valuable for your entire career and life. Find your unique spot, foster it and harvest it. More importantly, it is something that everyone can do, from a nobody to a celebrity.
3 Be a mentor
When everyone wants to open a seafood restaurant, don’t open another seafood restaurant. Go selling seafood.
When everyone tries to become a barber, don't be another barber; go selling scissors.
When everyone is trying to become a content creator, go selling them the tools that a creator needs or the experience you have gained during your past life.
In summary, I strongly feel that Douyin and TikTok have become the New Normal. No matter what business you are in, it would be best if you started looking into them. I see the benefits and potential opportunities on Douyin or TikTok as a creator and as a seller. If we could go back to 2019 before Covid started, would you consider developing your e-commerce business as the top priority? So, we are not in 2025 yet. What is your decision on Douyin and TikTok? Follow me and let’s connect if you are also keen on Douyin or TikTok.
