Week 3 - MBA 6101 - Branding Through TikTok

Even if you are not personally on the platform, you have most likely heard of TikTok, seen a TikTok reuploaded onto another platform, or use another platform that have mirrored its quintessential infinite scrolling feature. That said, TikTok is ushering in a new age of self-branding and marketing, allowing people to create quick, attention-grabbing clips. 

Some even say it is further shortening our attention span...

As much as I tried to avoid the TikTok craze, I reluctantly joined last year, and have now a personally curated feed consisting of cute animals, funny stories, and cooking videos. One of the many cooks that have built quite a following on the platform is a mother of two, Alissa Nguyen, known as @gaming-foodie. 

Whether creators are aware or not when creating their brand, it is important to highlight characteristics that are unique to your brand. For Alissa, it is her realistic cooking videos often featuring crying, screaming children in the background, mistakes during the cooking process, and her jokes when demonstrating the recipes. Here is one of her TikTok as an example. 

In addition to her most popular cooking videos, she shares other aspects of her life such as being a mom of toddler and another young son, trying new things, purchasing a new home and car, and what not. These type of life vlogging is one of the most common ways in self-branding, but it builds relatability and trust between viewers and the creator, a large part of retaining a following. Although Alissa do not consistently promote products unlike other creators such as makeup and lifestyle influencers, she has recently partnered with The Hunger Project to promote the organization and their work. Since she is known for her cooking content, The Hunger Project aligns with her branding and image. 

Ensuring that the organizations and products she intentionally promotes aligns with her branding is important, especially when social media audiences are nowadays more likely to call out "inauthenticity" when they deems it so. Online support can falter just as easily as it may have risen, the average content creator understands the importance of curating and maintaining the "perfect" brand.