It is no surprise that social media platforms are becoming seemingly interrelated to one another in terms of new features. Do we suspect stories feature being adopted by a short-form video app called TikTok?
As TikTok continues its rapid ascent, with the app now on track to reach 1.5 Billion users in 2022, it’s also seeking to expand its content horizons, with a view to increased monetization of that collective attention, and providing more capacity for creators to generate revenue from their clips.
Which is where this latest test comes in. As highlighted by social media expert Matt Navarra (via Kev Adriano), TikTok is making a change to its still experimental Stories feature, which would integrate TikTok Stories into the main ‘For You’ and ‘Following’ feeds in the app, as opposed to keeping its Stories element in its own separate space.
Users will also be able to view Stories from their connections and users that they don’t follow, adding a new content consideration in the app.
You can see in the below example how the new Stories format looks in-stream, with a blue ‘Story’ marker on the first frame, and an indicator at the bottom of the screen as to how many total frames are in the Story.
Here’s what TikTok Stories will now look like in your FYP
— Matt Navarra (@MattNavarra) January 17, 2022
3/4 pic.twitter.com/vlbpCSOaWY
TikTok has also expanded the maximum length for TikTok clips several times, while it’s also developing its live-stream commerce tools, providing more ways to reach its growing audience, and keep them engaged beyond the short clips that dominate the main feed. Which is one of the platform’s key focal points – while short clips are clearly the trend of the moment, if TikTok wants to capitalize on its opportunities, it needs to become more than just Vine 2.0.
Essentially, it looks like TikTok wants to become a fully-fledged social network, catering to a range of users, with a range of content options. That can ensure that can expand its appeal even further, while also increasing its AD surfaces.
Stories is just the latest experiment, but you can bet that TikTok is also testing a range of other content formats and options as it eyes the next phase of its global expansion.
Fun fact: The Chinese version of TikTok, ‘Douyin’, recently began testing ‘paid short dramas’, allowing users to pay for individual episodes of longer, in-stream shows, as part of its own content expansion plans.
Maybe that’ll be TikTok’s next step? Let us know what you think, by tagging @itp.live!