TikTok and its influence on the music industry: Fad or Factor

TikTok is a place where you’ll find various content, including funny videos, dance challenges, and most importantly new music. Content guaranteed to entertain you for hours. 

If you are an artist or someone trying to break into the music industry, TikTok is a place to discover and connect with your fans and like-minded industry professionals.

How important has this social platform been for new artists trying to get discovered? Is it worth exploring how to navigate its infinite waters in hopes of discovering new fans? Lastly, are the artists who are being discovered on this platform one-hit-wonders? Let’s explore more.

Pro’s of TikTok

Thanks to the app’s organic reach, artists won’t be fighting annoying algorithms to reach their target audience. The app does that for them. 

Similar to the days when artists got discovered on Youtube, like Justin Bieber, Ed Sheeran, and The Weeknd, now we see more and more artists being discovered on TikTok.

However, are their newfound success offering them record deals? Or do most end up having few club appearances thanks to their viral songs and nothing more? Also, for those who do claim a deal, how profitable are they to the label?

The app also allows you to go live once you have a minimum of one thousand followers.

The platform allows you to get paid through your viewers or “fans” sending you “gifts”. When you’ve collected your gifts, you can trade the virtual icons and exchange them for virtual diamonds. You can then use the diamonds to collect real money using your chosen secure payment method. 

Artists can also hire influencers, mostly through music influencer platforms like Breakr, where the influencer creates a TikTok to their song and shares it on their profile, which is another great way to give your song exposure.

TikTok Cons

Many artists can be discovered on this social platform, however, do they have longevity? Do people care what the artist has to say outside of the catchy lyrics fans create videos too? Can the newly discovered artists sell tickets? The music trends promoted on TikTok change so often that it makes a song very easily forgettable. TikTok easily deletes past trends/sounds and replaces them with new ones making the artist easily replaceable as well. To be a successful artist your music must stand the test of time and be able to sell tickets. The app is very much adjusted to Gen Z’s short-term attention span and cravings for the next big thing, forgetting the last trend like it never existed.

Viral TikTok artists

However many viral hits have found their fame through TikTok. 

Like Lil Nas X ‘Old Town Road’, Popp Hunna’s ‘Adderall (Corvette, Corvette)’ or Mooski’s ‘Trackstar’. Another interesting example is Ckay’s viral hit song ‘Love Nwantiti’ which was released back in 2019, but it only found its fame in 2021 thanks to Tik Tok.

Posting your song on the app also increases people searching it up on other platforms like YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, and Google search. And then finding and adding the song to their Spotify, Apple Music, etc 

As of now, TikTok has reported over 1 billion global users. An average user spends approx 89 min of daily scrolling which is three times as much as any other social media platform.

TikTok’s own music marketing platform SoundOn

TikTok just launched its music marketing and distribution platform, SoundOn. A new platform that allows artists to upload their music directly to the app.

Based on their website artists retain all rights and royalties, meaning they’ll own their masters in addition to receiving 100% of royalties (or later, 90%).

SoundOn is designed to empower new and undiscovered artists, helping them to grow their fanbases and get their music heard. Artists wanting to register to SoundOn can do so through: https://us.soundon.global or https://www.soundon.global/.

Having said that, new music is being discovered every day. We are having an opportunity to see more talent, more beautiful musicians, and rising stars. However, there are and will be questions surrounding their longevity, how much do you want to give credit for your success to it? More importantly how beneficial TikTok can be for artists career in the long run.