On the question “Should my company be on Tik Tok?” the answer is pretty clear “Who knows?”, this is because there are several business practices that are layered according to market needs. A fancy word to state that not all businesses are the same.
Over the last ten or so years the retail sector across Canada and the US has suffered plenty of setbacks due to two major changes that even large brands cannot control: people and technology. As shopping centers have seen drops in foot traffic, new generations with new wishes came along moving away from the suburbs into the city. Online shopping has happened and it fortified its position during the pandemic.
The death of Block Buster, Sears, and other big brands, was one important alarm that retail points were about to enter a long period of suffering. Some like Cadillac Fairview mall in Toronto wants its shoppers to come back and they are using the social platform Tik Tok as marketing tool to lure back people, and especially their young ones since it’s a platform with a specific demographic, therefore not the consumer segment with disposable income ready to spend.
The third element that has recently added to the uncontrollable element is the disruptive nature of Covid-19 and everything related. Most likely we won’t go back to pre-pandemic normality until 2025, the reason is the general and ambiguous nature of politics and its self-preservation nature of keeping parties’ popularity as priority number 1, while people’s safety is at number 2 with catastrophic consequences on vaccination delays and digital traveling passes.
The infinite sadness of retail continues because people have changed the way they shop, they do it by browsing comments and product ratings to see what the community has to say about your next hair drier or pair of sneakers. But also, Consumers have been hit with a slap at their face by the 2008 financial crisis significantly weakening its ability to spend without worries; now we count pennies in the jar.
So, let’s briefly recap the situation:
- shopping malls are vanishing because new generations cannot afford to live like their parents in suburbia with a McMansion and three cars; they moved downtown spending more of their money and quality goods.
- the real estate market for important cities like New York and Toronto is on a nose dive, after having gentrified old ‘mom and pop’ shops on a crusade to tear down and rebuild entire city blocks we found out large brand have left.
Vacant premises are left without commercial tenants due to the expensive leases building owners are asking. E-commerce platforms like Amazon have grown like never before during the last two years because of lock downs and social restrictions; everything is digital but large retail brands still struggle to acknowledge it and adapt.
To the question “Should my company be on Tik Tok?” the only answer is another question “Are you digital?” to which any decent and smart CEO can answer him/her self. Time is running out, but hope is eternal; I read somewhere.