185. Why does my cohost love TikTok so much?
Want a boost of motivation to get started on TikTok? 👊 You’ll get it here! Hosts Phil and Lauren discuss Lauren’s recent foray into the world of TikTok and unpack how she hit 30k followers in 7 months of posting. We talk about why TikTok is great, how to come up with a post idea, how to grow your mailing list, and why you should strive for volume.
Episode transcription
Phil
I'm glad you're here. Listener, our guest today is someone you're very familiar with. And I've been wanting to record this episode for a while. And the timing just works out perfectly because this special guests that you're familiar with hit a very important milestone today. Would you like to tell us what that milestone is?
Lauren
I hit 30,000 followers on Tiktok. Today!
Phil
Today is how we're pronouncing it. How long ago did you create your tic tock account?
Lauren
You know, I came prepared to this interview with a lot of data. And I'm so glad you asked that because I have the exact data point for that question. I started posting on
TikTok 238 days ago.
Phil
Less than a year.
Lauren
34 weeks.
Phil
30,000 followers, there is so much to unpack in this episode. I actually am very excited about the title of this episode. I came up with this myself. Lauren unusually comes up with them. But the title is ‘Why does my co host love TikTok so much’? Why don't you start with that as your first question.
Lauren
I like TikTok because smoke and mirrors and flashy lights don't work on the platform. And I'm bad at those things. You are embrace and you will find success on the platform if you know who you are, and are comfortable putting your opinion out there for people to discuss. And so that's why I like it. Because you don't need to have camera skills, you don't even really need to have verbal skills, I write out most of my TikTok posts, which I'm sure we'll get to in a bit. And it's also a platform that really rewards volume. I've always got so many different ideas and just needed to figure out an easy way to hammer them out. And the more you post, the more your account will take off. So there's a lot of reasons why I like to TikTok. But those are probably the top ones.
Phil
Amazing. So in comparison to me, I don't like the platform, because it's not a platform that I open to consume content. I get on there and I don't leave happier. I like it as a research tool, all say but even then I go to YouTube, if I actually want to research something. What is there to learn from that, that maybe we feel this pressure that we're supposed to be on every platform, but we don't need to be.
Lauren
One thing that's really cool about TikTok is that community is a huge environment on there. And I'll elaborate on that with an example. So a few days ago, I commented on someone's video, and my comment has over 7500 likes, and people are chatting with me about my comment. And another example is before I even started posting my very first TikTok video, so my profile was completely bare, I actually had about 170 followers of my own, from people just following me based on what I did in the comments. So what's really cool about TikTok Is that the content is one thing, but the discussions around that content are a whole other platform that you can maximize. And I think that people who might find TikTok overwhelming are focusing more on how much information is out there and how overwhelming it is, when really, if you dig into the comments, you'll find that that's where things are a little bit slower, but still happening.
Phil
Hmm, that's interesting. I've been consuming some content about Instagram lately that talks about the comments section, and how that's kind of a missed opportunity where you can actually be visible and create content in the form of a comment that if it resonates with someone, then it can actually go viral. And that can actually drive follows because people are like, wow, this person is funny. Wow, this person is relatable. Wow, this person is insightful. It's almost like a testing ground for ideas down there.
Lauren
Yeah, it's so funny. Now I find that when I'm in TikTok, I don't even realize I'm doing it. But if a video catches my attention, the first thing that I do is look at the comments because I want to see what other people have to say about it.
Phil
I do the same. Is it important to be funny or to be witty on TikTok?
Lauren
I don't think so. I think sincerity and honesty is the most important thing. So you know the saying there's truth in comedy, so, yeah, sure, maybe being witty if, if that's the way that you operate is it it can be part of it, but you have to be saying something truthful or authentic to you. Whether you say it in a funny way or not.
Phil
Give us an overview of the journey. I didn't really expect this to be an interview. Your style you turned it into that right before.
Lauren
I did.
I know this isn’t what you want it and in my interview prep questions.
Phil
How did we land on this format? Right?
Lauren
I have no idea. I can just talk as well about this. So strange.
Phil
But I think you need to give an overview. And you can mention me in the beginning. So as a part of this, I want an overview of start to where you're at now.
Lauren
Yes. So I was hearing more and more about TikTok and noticing more and more clients asking questions about TikTok.
Phil
Yes.
Lauren
And this was right around the same wave as Clubhouse, and I got Clubhouse and I just didn't connect with it. I felt I was on enough calls as it is. I don't need to do this in my free time, not for me. And then I kept hearing more and more about TikTok. And actually, our friend Jake asked are you on TikTok? I have some funny videos to send to you. So classic like how Jake was with vine back in the day. So I downloaded TikTok solely so that Jake could send me comedy videos. And I ended up loving it and realizing like wow, there's a lot more than teenagers doing dances on TikTok. I'm actually learning a lot of fun things. I'm actually seeing a lot of hilarious videos. I'm getting really interesting perspective from people and I started really, really liking it. And then you said, if you like TikTok so much, why don't you do something about it?
Phil
I said, for you to have the insight as an actual creator on a platform that you enjoy would be valuable when we're getting paid to give clients advice. I can speak about YouTube all day long, because I love it. I use it. I consume, and I create. But then you do not have the same passion for YouTube. I know you don't you don't like watching videos, which I don't know. I never do. Because like you'd love TV shows. But I guess that's more of a wind down.
Lauren
I don't know, there's a lot going in my head that I don't understand.
Phil
But you don't like YouTube as a platform, like assumption, and I just love it.
Lauren
Not for me. I don't know why. I'm sure I'll find out one day. I think it's SEO potential is amazing. I think I'm so happy for our clients who are on it. I'm so thrilled for you. But for me personally, just not my thing. And I've always had confidence issues about being on camera. I've always had impostor syndrome about telling people Hey, this is how you get a good branding, which I know is so silly, because this is it's literally what I do. But I'm much more comfortable being behind the scenes. Always. It's a lot easier to tell someone else what to do and then to do it yourself. And so when you suggested go on TikTok, I was ruminating on what for a while and thinking okay, well, maybe this is that once in a lifetime opportunity, like Instagram was back in the day. While it's still taking off, maybe I could really do something that excites me about this. And I was originally thinking, and exploring doing personal branding stuff, but it just didn't feel right to me, because I wanted to do something that I was so passionate about, that I could do it even when I was exhausted.
And even when I was done work for the day, I wanted it to be something that would solely got me really excited. And because I knew that if I fell flat on my face, if I was posting about things that I really really loved, then it wouldn't really matter as much. So I decided to start posting about life advice that I've heard from people along the way and throughout my career and then also books. And with books. I felt super unqualified because I read YA fantasy books, the bar is not very high in terms of intellectualism. I'm not good enough to be a reviewer, but I'm really passionate about it. And I feel maybe there's an opportunity for me to add a comedic voice and they're about books that are really popular on book talk. And so anyway, it ended up morphing and now I basically only post about books. Here's some data for you. I have posted 609 total videos on TikTok.
Phil
That's insane.
Lauren
Since starting 238 days ago, so that works out to be about two and a half videos per day.
Phil
That's why it needs to be rooted in something that you absolutely love. To anyone who knows you and knows the schedule that you maintain. I mean, there are some weeks where you literally work double the hours that I work. I mean, I guess on the clock, but still, you work more than I do. So how do you even find time to create that I guess the winners don't get hung up on the creation.
Lauren
Yeah, because if I had to have perfect hair and makeup, and lighting and multiple camera angles, and then editing, there's no way I could keep up with volume, there's no way anyone could keep up with that volume unless it was their full time job. And so I started experimenting with formats that were really the path of least resistance for me. So for me, I think that my strongest form of communication is writing. So I started experimenting with doing a five to six second B roll clip of me doing something dumb, like typing on my keyboard or writing in a notebook. And then I just quickly whip out a few sentences, lay it over top, and then hit post.
So my goal whenever I'm posting any video is for it to take five minutes from start to finish. And if something's going to take longer than I put it on ice and come back to the draft, if I want to finish it, or most of the time, I'll think this isn’t working. Let's move on. And that's really how I do it.
Phil
It's insane. And that really is people get so hung up on the tech what camera should I use? What gizmo Phil do you have on your desk that I should also order use my affiliate link? Yeah. But the tech is just not important.
Lauren
Not on TikTok. But I noticed a real change in the growth of my account when I shifted my mindset about it looking and feeling a certain way. And I told myself, it just needs to seem like a FaceTime call. Like that's it just seemed like FaceTime. Because before when I would do ones where I was speaking, we all put on a voice like a voice that whenever we're being recorded, and I was looking back at my videos, I was like, this feels rehearsed, this doesn't feel like me. And I would then start filming and pretend like I was FaceTiming with a friend so that I would get my normal voice and then my video started doing a lot better.
Phil
People might go well TikTok followers. That's great. That's like Monopoly money. But can you talk about what else this is growing within your personal brand?
Lauren
Yes, and it's, it's absurd. But I also have 6,815 email subscribers straight from TikTok. You're just listener,Phil’s just shaking his head.
Phil
It's ridiculous.
Lauren
It's ridiculous.
Phil
I mean, I love it. Because I love I love this proof of concept. I think it's so valuable when we are positioned to give people advice. And we get hired a lot to do brand audits a lot. We do a ton of brand audits and just the nature of our business individuals or partnerships, but small businesses for the most part, we get asked about everything under the sun, even certain things where we're not as much of an expert in something else. Obviously, branding is our thing. And the process of branding we’ve got that nailed down. But we'll get asked about sometimes fairly obscure things that we're like, Well, we know a little bit about this. But so to be able to then field questions and provide guidance with that backup proof, I think is just amazing.
Lauren
Yeah, it's fun.
Phil
Why would someone want advice from us about TikTok if we're not even creators on the platform?
Lauren
Yeah, completely.
Phil
When was the last time we talked about Facebook on a client call? Neither of us like Facebook, I don't even use Facebook. So we're not your Facebook people. But I just love that you took that leap. And then to have this proof of concept feels so exciting.
Lauren
Well, the wild thing is I'm using TikTok is basically like a crowdsourcing platform. So I'll give an example about how I got my mailing list started a mailing list where I've sent out zero emails, by the way, just people just signing up and getting a sequence and that's that. So there's this book series that people have really loved. So there was an avid fandom and I am I am in that fandom, and I finished the book.
Phil
Tell us the book.
Yes, three different book series by Sarah J Masse. She's a YA author who's pretty much exploding with popularity on TikTok. I think her books have been published in 20 different languages, pretty bananas. And her series was just bought by Hulu, and it's being adopted by the same guy who did Outlander. He's the showrunner. But anyway, so I posted a video saying that I was depressed that this book series was done that I just finished it and I don't know what to read next. And that video ended up getting well over 100,000 views and 1000s of comments from people making recommendations on what book I should read next. And so I was thinking well, if so many people are commenting on this, maybe I can Just gather all this information, put it in a spreadsheet and help people decide what book they should read next.
And so I ended up just creating a spreadsheet. And every time someone makes a suggestion, I just put it on the spreadsheet. And then I'd look up the review score on Goodreads. And then I'd look up how many pages it was. And that was that. And then I created it in like a Google sheet. And then I posted on TikTok, I said, hey, I'm creating a list of all of your amazing suggestions for myself to decide what I'm going to read next. Comment if you want access to it, and I'll let I'll let you know. And then I got tons of people commenting. And so then I set up a sequence where people could access it.
Phil
Simple.
Lauren
That simple. And what I've learned is that if you just ask people for information, and then compile it, that act of compiling alone has a lot of value. And now I have almost 7,000 people who have got access to that list. And I haven't even read the majority of the books on it.
Phil
But it's just a it's almost like a transferring of information in a way that's appealing for people.
Lauren
Yes. And I mean, I did something similar over the weekend, I did a video about gaming, and I wrote it in a way that I knew would create controversy. I mean, every time I've gone viral, it's because I've created controversy and stirred the pot, which we can talk about in a second. But so this particular video has 670,000 views. And it has almost 13,000 comments, with people weighing in on their opinions of good games that people should try, and what the best games are for beginners. And almost 7,000 people have shared the post, and about 4,500 people have saved the post, and 68,000 people have liked the post.
Phil
Those are metrics that you literally will not get on Instagram, the discoverability just doesn't exist.
Lauren
Yeah. And there have been people who have reposted it and done their own interpretations of this video, because I really did ruffle some feathers with this, which I was expecting and hoping for because I wanted a little boost on my activity. But basically, I don't know anything about video games. I know nothing. But people love giving their opinion. And almost 13,000 people have left comments with their thoughts on it. And so I'm not going to do this. But if I was going to be starting another mailing list, it would be like great video games, if you liked The Last of Us, and then people could get access to that list too.
Lauren
That could be your second freebie. Maybe?
Lauren
I don't know if I want the gamers coming after me though. They're kind of mean.
Phil
They are.
Lauren
So I have some interesting stats that I wanted to share. Okay, so 609 total videos over the past 238 days. I think that's like seven months or something. Yeah, 358 of those videos have over 1000 views. So it's about 60% Okay, 99 of those total videos have over 10,000 views. So it's 16% of the videos I posted. Only 37 videos have over 100,000 views. So that's like 6%. And I have only three videos that are over 1 million in views. So that's point 4%.
Phil
These are great statistics.
Lauren
Are you serious?
Phil
I think that my YouTube is probably somewhere similar. I don't have any in the millions of views yet. My highest view is half a million. But that video is in its minority. It's probably close to the point 4% Or something like that the total number of videos I've created. So yeah, because people think oh, every content piece that you create has to be a home run. And it puts are not immense pressure.
Lauren
Yeah, exactly. So that's part of why I think I like TikTok is because it's all about volume. In my opinion. Obviously there are best practices that you can do to make your video have greater chances of taking off. But if it's all about volume, then there's no point in putting a lot of effort into each tic toc. Because only point 4% of the videos that I've posted have gone over a million,
Phil
We may need to make this an episode on itself. I think we probably should just introduce this idea with advice for people on how to make content creation easy. I think we should bookmark that and make a whole episode called Easy Content Creation ideas.
Lauren
Yeah, we have a lot of clients who are on TikTok now trying to make it and I look at their profiles a lot. And they only get about 200 views for per video. I'm not sneering down at 200 views, we all have to start somewhere. But if you are posting for months at a time and are only getting 200 views per video then that's an indicator to me that you're not really adapting and trying new things and reflecting over on what could make your videos better. So first things first is if you have an idea, try to recreate that idea in multiple forms. An example would be with The Last of Us, like, let's say, you wanted to say something about how you love The Last of Us the TV show, and you had no idea that games were a great plot, or had great plot to them or something. So first, you could do a speaking video saying that, then you could actually do a writing video where it's B roll, and you're writing that same thing on top. And then you could do another video where it's games to play, if you like The Last of Us, and then you could do another video, that's books to read if you like The Last of Us. So I think it's really important to take your idea and try to package it in multiple different forms, so that you can see what your audience wants from you.
The other thing is that I've noticed for our clients who are trying really hard to take off on TikTok, they don't have a strong enough hook at the beginning. I read some really great advice with TikTok, where you should try to use the word YOU in the first one to two words to make it feel really personalized. It makes sense. Instead of saying hey, guys, make it hey, you, like you're talking to someone right in their face, it makes them stop in their tracks.
And I guess the final thing that I'll say is you’ve really got to be persistent. So I know we're going to do another episode on easy content creation, but the more you post, the more success you're gonna have. So you really have to experiment and post a lot to try to figure out what formats are going to take off.
Phil
And make it easy for yourself if that's a time limit, then that's what you do. For me, it's creating templates that answer the question what comes next? So I have a visual system on Instagram, where I alternate just text only posts, countdowns, numbered things. So I don't spend a lot of time actually coming. It takes me five minutes to come up with a post idea. And because part of the equation is already answered up front. And yeah, my feed looks cool, because I repeat things, but I don't fuss like I used to over my Instagram feed being picture perfect, because what is the point, no one cares. No one cares. I'm not a lifestyle influencer, or a photographer. I don't need this cohesive visual, you know, masterpiece. I need to use what I'm good at, which is educating people. Yeah. Right, exactly. And so you've got this passion about books, you lean into that. You're creating content that you do almost as a hobby. But soon you're going to be able to monetize that. I mean, you could be monetizing that. Now. Have you started to do brand deals?
Lauren
Not yet. I needed new glasses, so I messaged Bailey Nelson. and said hey, I'm a book talker and I get three and a half million views per month. Are you looking to do sponsored collabs with someone like me? And they wrote back saying no, they don't, they're not looking for creatives. So that was as far as that went, and I ended up paying full price for these glasses.
Phil
You still monetize the knowledge one to one with clients.
Lauren
And I want to I want to put affiliate links in that book list that I have. Yes, whenever I can find time to do that. One other thing I would say is that it's better to be as specific and niche as possible on TikTok. One of my videos. So silly. So there's this trend that was going on in tic toc and I recreated it, TikTok curates the algorithm to show you people who are similar to us, so you must be I think someone I don't know if we're allowed to swear on this, but it was so you must be a fucking idiot, which is so funny. I didn't do that one, though. But that was that was the one I came across. That was so funny. But what I did think was okay, I'm gonna use this as an opportunity to try to get hyper specific and make someone feel like they're extremely rare, even though everything that I'm saying is actually very general and not specific at all. So I wrote ‘you must be a voracious reader, while there's like 69 million people on book talk every day, so there's check. A loyal friend who wouldn't call themselves a loyal friend, right? A doting pet parents, so there's like 50 million, maybe even more pet parents in America alone. So another check. That's not very rare. an introverted eldest daughter, I mean, half of us are introverted, and the other half of people are probably eldest. And then who's searching for books that made you feel the same way you did when reading Sarah J. Masse novels for the first time. And Sarah J masse, her hashtags use like hundreds of millions of times and then I said it's nice to meet you. So I'm making the person feel like they're really specific when really They're not at all, there's like a 5050 chance that you fall into each of these categories. And this post was liked almost 200,000 times and got 13 and a half 1,000 saves and was shared over 7,000 times.
Phil
Wow, are you going to let that inspire another post that you hope to go viral?
Lauren
Yeah, I tried recreating it a bit later, and it didn't take off as much. But I'll probably probably do something similar.
Phil
The same thing happens to me. My number one video on YouTube is three free apps for content creation. And I've renamed it four or five times. Some have done well, but nothing close to that original. And so this, I think, is maybe the last point we make in this episode is that it's your success is not always entirely dependent on the content itself. There's just a whole variety of algorithm related factors that will determine and sometimes it is luck. It's not just incredible, relatable content. It's a combination of things, but even just a good post sometimes will fall flat.
Lauren
Completely. I mean, a lot of the ones now that I'm looking like the one of my videos that got over 2 million views I posted right during the Taylor Swift ticket debacle. And it really really got under some Swifties skin because I was like Taylor Swift should be speaking up about how her ticket sales were a disaster. And people didn't like that. But there were fights in the comments. And so that's what really made this take off. But obviously like I couldn't post something like that now and have it do well, but it was just so happened that I posted it at a time that just felt right and because it was easy for me to post I've got it out there. And then that's why people like Perez Hilton stitched it and stuff.
Phil
Any parting advice for someone who's overwhelmed by TikTok?
Lauren
Just get started and expect to fail and make it something fun for you and you alone, and then you can't go wrong.
Phil
Excellent advice and not overwhelming advice. If you need some resident insight from a TikToker extraordinaire that is not only build 30,000 followers as of today, but also an email list above 7,000 well, you know your girl. A fun episode. Just a solo episode was still interview format was a bit strange. Listener, we're happy you've tagged along with us for this interesting discussion. If you enjoyed this episode, you know what to do. Leave us a review five star, five star, that helps other people discover this podcast so we work hard to create. You know the drill. We'll be back next week with a brand new episode. Thank you for hanging out with us on Brand Therapy.
Lauren
Bye bye
