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With a potential US TikTok ban looming as early as January, creators and agencies are divided: some see it as inevitable, while others believe it won’t happen.
The rift has flared since TikTok’s future was first called into question, but has only grown stronger as the stakes have risen – highlighted by the Supreme Court’s decision this week (December 19) to accept the app’s appeal against a US law it could overturn next month.
How organizations implement contingency plansSome creators and marketers say they’re not so worried about TikTok being taken down.
One of the reasons is that most creators today are already diversifying their content beyond one platform, be it TikTok, Twitch or YouTube. It has become a ubiquitous practice that agencies recommend to clients, as well as a model that creators themselves follow to maximize earnings.
“Creators are always at the mercy of the platform, so ensuring they have a presence in multiple places is critical to longevity,” said Nicky Rautenberg, director of content performance at influencer agency HireInfluence. “[On the client side]we almost always have a set of outputs that doesn’t just include TikTok.”
The pragmatic approach surprised some agencies, which had expected more turbulence from the latest twist in what seems like an endless saga over the fate of TikTok in the US — and, as Neil Waller, co-founder and CEO of the Whalar Group, pointed out, a widespread belief that a ban simply won’t happen.
“We’re not seeing a lot of reaction from creators,” Waller said. “I think the reality is that there’s been turbulence in the US with TikTok in the past – so it’s not like it’s a first thought. So it’s just, sort of, rolling with the punches.”
This resilience Waller alludes to TikTok’s first run-in with a US ban during Donald Trump’s presidency. That’s when Trump signed an executive order to force the sale or shutdown of TikTok. It was then delayed several times until President Joe Biden took office and signed the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Apps Act.
At the moment, agencies are doing what they can to make recommendations for the new year.
Alyssa Stevens, global director of PR, social media and influencer marketing at independent agency Connelly Partners, said anecdotally that she hasn’t heard of client and partner concerns. Through social listening reports, Stevens said that TikTok creators are spreading information about their other social accounts to their followers.
Recently, the agency began adding a line item to the 2025 contracts to continue providing short-form content on alternative channels if TikTok is removed.
From the perspective of a TikTok influencer creator Roxy Couse she also thinks the move motivated her to expand her reach elsewhere. This year, Couse mentioned adding her content to Instagram and LinkedIn and seeing her Instagram following grow from “about 4,000 at the beginning of the year to 148,000 now.” Her LinkedIn following has also grown from around 1,500 to over 4,000.
“In addition, I encourage my TikTok audience to follow me on my other platforms,” Couse said, adding that creators should also consider omnichannel approaches with email lists or blogs.
Even if TikTok goes away, trends around short videos or commerce won’t — because those products are no longer unique to TikTok.
Beauty and fashion influencer Valeria Lipovetsky, who is also a lead creator at influencer marketing platform Humanz, mentioned that she primarily attracts a millennial audience, but is looking to get more Gen Z on other apps. If TikTok is banned, Lipovetsky said she could see those followers “moving to platforms like Instagram and to a lesser extent YouTube Shorts.”
Lipovetsky agreed that “the demand for full-screen short video browsing isn’t going anywhere — it’s become a core part of how audiences consume content…Instagram in particular would likely see an increase in users, creating more opportunities.” for creators of all sizes to grow their audience.”
If TikTok eventually finds itself out of the picture, competitors would increase their share of the advertising pie commensurately and attract more creators as well. For the first time, Instagram is projected to account for more than half of U.S. Meta ad revenue in 2025 (or some $32 billion, up 24.4% from 2024), per eMarketer. In fact, since the law passed, Instagram “has been reaching out to TikTok creators and advertisers, including improving discovery for smaller accounts and allowing users to try out Reels before publishing more broadly,” Jasmine Enberg, principal analyst at eMarketer, said in a report. this week.
Instagram was added earlier this month a “trial reels” option aimed at creators who can test content with non-followers before sharing it with an audience. “If the TikTok ban is implemented in 2025, Instagram could get more than one-fifth of TikTok’s US ad dollars reallocated,” Enberg added.