👉 Background: Youtube is the OG video sharing platform that launched back in 2005. It was the birthplace of gems like the Harry Potter puppet pals. Then, in 2020, when the pandemic had us all doing viral TikTok dances, Youtube wanted to get in on the fun and launched YouTube Shorts.

👉 What happened: Now, Youtube’s giving Shorts even more of a TikTok-esque glow up with its latest updates.

👉 What else: Part of the updates include:

• Longer videos, up to three-minutes - something TikTok’s also been increasing over the years
• And most importantly, a new templates feature, called Remix, which lets creators jump on trends quickly and add their own take to an existing video.
  

Looks like Youtube wants some of that trend-fuelled growth that TikTok has benefitted from.

What's the key learning?

💡The secret to a thriving social media business is simply to get users involved.

💡TikTok’s success comes from user-generated-content and the TikTok community building on that content. When trends go viral, it prompts others to post their “take” of the trend. This creates more engagement, and therefore leads to more growth.

💡While Youtube Shorts has more monthly active users than TikTok, TikTok wins on engagement. In fact, TikTok’s average view count was over 18,000 in Q1 of 2024, whereas Youtube Shorts’ was just over 640. So it makes sense why YouTube is trying to replicate TikTok's tactics to ramp up its engagement.