How TikTok drives demand

TikTok is creating demand.

Think back to March 2020. While most of us were focused on Covid updates, a quiet revolution was happening in the world of skincare.

By revolution I mean an increase in market share for CeraVe measured in the hundreds of millions of dollars…

The analytics picture is a bit of a mess (TikTok has no API, and the other platforms are a bit shy over the details). However, something big happened.

Here’s what we can see through Google search data (Google Trends). The blue line is CeraVe, the red line Neutrogena.

A group of beauty bloggers (Hyram,?Dr V?among others) started talking about CeraVe, waxing lyrical about its effects and how it compared to other products. They were doing it on YouTube (longer form instructional videos comparing products and giving recommendations) and on TikTok (quick, amusing soundbites).

It also seems likely that there was some hefty brand activity happening on TikTok at the same time.

The result?

#CeraVe has over 938m views.

#Neutrogena, 121m views

This translated into a surge in interest in CeraVe and an uptick in sales.

Interestingly, this uplift seems to be driven primarily by TikTok. Here’s what mentions of CeraVe look like over other open social platforms.

Here, the spikes are mostly driven by brand campaigns supporting nurses through Covid.

What’s the conclusion?

When the right factors align, TikTok can raise demand to giddying heights.

It’s a self-contained space, resonating with a particular audience.

However, two can play this game. When we started looking into this a few weeks ago views of #Neutrogran stood at approx. 88m. In a few short weeks, this has grown by around 40%. CeraVe on the other hand grew by around 8%. It’s still way ahead in terms of absolute volumes, but the gap is closing.

It remains to be seen how this translates into market share.