Amritsar, NFAPost: The recent ban on Chinese video-sharing social networking platform TikTok has resulted in a loss of about 120 crore rupees in annual earnings of top 100 influencers on the platform, a report by the Indian Institute of Human Brands (IIHB) has shown.
The Indian government in June end had decided to ban all Chinese-origin applications, including TikTok, in view of the India-China standoff at the Line of Actual Control.
IIHB concluded this report based on data compiled after multiple discussions with market intermediaries, talent managers, and TikTok users.
Though paid content on TikTok did not fetch as much as those on mature platforms such as YouTube and Instagram, a content creator on TikTok with a follower base in millions could earn anywhere between 30,000 rupees and 35,000 rupees a month, according to the report.
The report further said that a brand could get a picture post from top 10 TikTok users for 1.2-1.5 lakh rupees, a carousel or GIF cost 1.5 lakh rupees, but dropped to 5,000 rupees for influencers lower down the rank. A story was priced at 5,000-50,000 rupees depending on the pecking order.
Influencers on platforms such as YouTube and Instagram, however, earn nearly three times more through various kinds of brand deals when compared with those on TikTok.
IIHB Chief Mentor Sandeep Goyal pointed out that for followers running into millions, the compensation provided by TikTok was poor.
“Crass content could be one reason TikTok did not find much favour with brands conscious of their public reputation. Also, the predominantly Tier 2 and 3 audiences made the platform unattractive to many metros and urban faced brands,” he added.
Goyal said over 60% of TikTok’s active daily user base was between 16 and 24 years.
“While that is theoretically attractive to brands, but in reality, this age-group does not really have as much discretionary spending power as compared to their peers in Western economies.” he added.
Top TikTok Influencers
Riyaz Aly, Faisal Shaikh and Arishfa Khan had emerged as top earners on TikTok earning anywhere between 4 crore rupees and 6 crore rupees each annually.
Aly, who had 42.3 million followers on TikTok, was known for his music lip-sync videos, and was the highest grosser amongst TikTok users. The 16-year old boy from Bhutan reportedly takes home 5-6 crore rupees annually.
Aly made his debut in ‘Yaari hai’ music video sung by Tony Kakkar and also collaborated with Shilpa Shetty and Deepika Padukone.
In India, Faisal Shaikh emerged as the biggest earner on TikTok with an estimated earnings of 4.0-4.5 crore rupees annually.
Shaikh, who was also known for lip-synced videos, is an actor and model and has appeared in multiple music videos.
The third most sought after TikTok user was television actor Arishfa Khan, whose earnings are estimated to be similar to that of Shaikh.
Khan was a popular endorser, much sought after by brands. Her TikTok account had comedy and lip-sync content, apart from her prime offering of beauty and makeup tips that helped her gain 28 million TikTok followers.
TikTok Alternatives
Made in India app Roposo is leading the way as an alternative to TikTok with 50 million downloads so far.
A short video application, Trell has also risen to prominence with having registered over 12 million downloads so far.
“The lifestyle community-commerce platform is breaking all the records by witnessing 12 million downloads in just 5 days, just after the bold decision made by Indian Govt to promote Atmanirbhar Bharat,” the company that owns Trell said in a statement.
The company also added that with the help of almost 220,000 content creators on the application, the app has received a total of 500,000 post uploads in just a single day.
Other apps such as Mitron, Chingari, and Tik Kik have also caught users’ attention in replacing TikTok, with over 10 million downloads each so far.
On Wednesday, Chingari co-founder and chief product officer Sumit Ghosh said on CNBC that his start-up is in the process of closing a $10 million Series A funding round by next week to cope with the rapid growth in users over a short period of time. Its technical infrastructure is handled by Amazon Web Services, he said.
LitLot and Tna Tan are two other Made in India applications similar to TikTok that has gained popularity over the last few days with over one million downloads each so far.
In a new update, photo and video-sharing social media application Instagram has introduced “Reels”, which is also an alternative to TikTok.
In this format users can create and share short videos on Instagram. With Reels, users can record, and edit 15-second multi-clip videos with audio, effects, and new creative tools.