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TikTok's Taking Off!

This week TikTok added links. What's the big deal? It's a major shift for the fastest growing social network, and one that could fundamentally change the way it's used.

Right now, each of the major social media networks has some combination of the following primary benefits:

Entertainment
Education
Social network
Creative expression
Professional development
Discovery

The most successful channels are the best in at least one benefit, and are among the best in two more.

In the early days Facebook was, by far, the best platform for social networking, then it built in creative expression and entertainment with the ability create posts that were published to a newsfeed, which dramatically accelerated its growth. It then cemented its place at the top when it introduced the algorithm, thereby layering in discovery.

Facebook never really mastered professional development or education, but no one channel can be everything to everyone. Those gaps left space for other channels to grow, including Linkedin for professional development, Pinterest for discovery, and YouTube for creative expression & education.

As social media grew across the globe, so too did the competition, as new entrants popped up, each attempting to beat Facebook, and then each other, at one or more of the primary benefits.

Instagram made creative expression much easier, Snapchat created stronger social networks, and YouTube blew up when it was acquired by Google, who significantly enhanced its discovery benefit.

Each social channel has grown based on a single benefit, and has since either been acquired for it (Instagram), stagnated because it didn't become a clear leader in any one area (Twitter), or grew by adding additional value (Linkedin's education, Snapchat's creative expression).

Until this week, TikTok has been the greatest growth story of the past 5 years because it is among the best at entertainment and creative expression, but where it really shines is at discovery. That TikTok algorithm is why it's succeeded where Vine couldn't and why the incumbents haven't been able to easily rip it off yet. TikTok's For You page is near-psychic in its ability to surface the exact types of content that you're going to be interested in. The magic is in the fact that very little (or none) of the content comes from your social circle.

The addition of links, therefore, may seem like a simple feature at first, but that one tweak will drive creators to think much more seriously about TikTok as a channel. The #1 challenge they face on other channels is how to get their content seen beyond their circles of influence. Combining TikTok's discovery benefit with the ability to drive website traffic is going to massively expand the types of content shared and, therefore, the benefits that users get from the platform.

That one little feature addition should signal to us all that it's time to shift TikTok out of the category of opportunities that we're passively monitoring, to ones that we're taking an active interest in. If you haven't dipped your toes into the TikTok pool yet, here's a quick-start guide from the team at Later.If you're familiar with the basics and want to see how some of the best brands are using TikTok (pre-link feature), of some of their favourites.