Music industry girds for looming US TikTok ban

FILE PHOTO: This photograph taken on April 19, 2024, shows a man holding a smartphone displaying the logo of Chinese social media platform Tiktok in an office in Paris. TikTok faces an imminent shutdown in the United States after Congress passed a law in 2024 forcing its Chinese owner ByteDance to either sell the platform or close it by January 19, 2025. The US Supreme Court is expected to rule this week on TikTok’s challenge to the law. Meanwhile, the music industry girds for the looming US TikTok ban. (Photo by Antonin UTZ / Agence France-Presse)

NEW YORK, United States — TikTok has dramatically changed music discovery and marketing – a reliance that the looming US ban on the popular app has underscored as the music world braces for an unknown future.

That the short-form video-sharing app might shut down in the United States starting Sunday has fostered a sense of “marketing apocalypse” across the industry, says Tatiana Cirisano, a music industry analyst at MIDiA Research.

For years TikTok has been an integral tool for most musicians, a jump-off point for artists looking to break out, and an essential promotional platform for established musicians.

In an increasingly fragmented musical landscape, Cirisano says “Tik Tok served as sort of the one lightning rod where popularity could actually coalesce into a hit, and there actually could be these more mainstream cultural moments.”

Now, digital marketing companies say artists are scrambling to download and archive their TikTok content before the app goes dark – the “worst-case scenario,” said Cassie Petrey, founder of the digital marketing company Crowd Surf.

“We’ve helped a lot of talent build great audiences” on TikTok, Petrey said. “It is unfortunate.”

Life post-TikTok

What platform could fill a potential void is a question front of industry minds; obvious near-parallels include YouTube Shorts and Instagram Reels.

Both features were created in TikTok’s image – but neither have enjoyed comparable prominence.

“It’s one thing to measure the user base or the weekly active users of those platforms,” said Cirisano, numbers she said are on par with TikTok.

READ: A possible TikTok ban is just days away. A list of other apps available

But in terms of “cultural heft,” she said, “they haven’t really had the same impact.”

Jahan Karimaghayi, co-founder of marketing firm Benchmob, has urged clients to consider “changing their approach specifically to Instagram.”

“Instagram is a little bit more of an art gallery – it’s about showing content to your followers – where Tiktok it’s almost like you make content for people who don’t follow you,” he said.

Sarah Flanagan, an influencer marketing expert in the music industry, echoed that view, saying that on TikTok “discovery is coming from a viral sound point of view” versus image.

“That’s huge in terms of why Tiktok has worked so well for music,” she said.

It’s one advantage YouTube – which Karimaghayi pointed out many people already use “as a jukebox”– could have.

“If people migrate to Shorts, there’s a real opportunity for artists to connect even more music,” Flanagan said.

And Americans are already trying new alternatives, like China’s popular viral video app RedNote.

It’s surged to top Apple’s free app downloads, though experts say that could be a short-term trend.

‘Pressure to go viral’

As earth-shaking as a TikTok ban stateside could be for music, “I think there’s definitely artists who will breathe a sigh of relief for their mental state if Tiktok goes away, because of just the pressure to create content, the pressure to go viral,” Cirisano said.

In contrast to putting out a high-production music video, the explosion of short-form video has meant “suddenly artists were burdened with having to create their own format” rather than work with a full team, Flanagan said.

“Nobody was telling them what to do and how to look cool.”

READ: TikTok users speed up songs, changing the music industry

But experts agree any respite could be brief: losing US TikTok won’t spell the end of content creation beyond the music.

“There’s very few artists these days that can put up music and do very little,” Karimaghayi said.

For Cirisano, fear of a TikTok ban is a stark reminder that “social is what is driving music and culture, and that trickles down to streaming – when it used to be the opposite.”

Global impact

Of course, TikTok will remain core to music marketing strategies outside US borders – most stars already have teams working on global promotion, and that won’t stop even if American or US-based artists can’t use their accounts domestically.

The change might even benefit already-huge markets in places like Latin America and Africa, which could grow increasingly dominant.

But it could also negatively impact those seeking to break through in the US, which remains the largest recorded music market in the world, where many career-makers are based.

“TikTok was sort of that crucial bridge between global regions,” Cirisano said.

READ: China exploring possible sale of US TikTok to Musk — report

For at least an interim period, taking away TikTok would give “power and sway back to the traditional power players in music,” Flanagan said.

But, “sometimes change is good,” she added: “it was limiting in terms of how creative you could be when everybody always wanted to just push songs on Tiktok.”

And ultimately, the music industry is no stranger to evolving consumption habits or new media: “we’ve always kind of been at the forefront of technology,” Karimaghayi said.

“There will be a little bit of a bumpy road – but people are still going to use the internet.”