The controversy round whether or not TikTok ought to be thought-about a search engine continues to divide the SEO neighborhood.
However right here’s the factor – customers don’t care about definitions or technicalities. For a lot of, particularly youthful audiences, TikTok is a go-to place to go looking and uncover data.
So, whereas we argue semantics throughout the website positioning neighborhood, manufacturers that aren’t contemplating TikTok as a part of their search technique danger shedding visibility and engagement alternatives.
Let’s discover why customers aren’t considering our jargon-fuelled definitions and why they deal with TikTok as a search engine.
The shift in search engine dynamics
As SEOs, we historically see a search engine as a system designed to conduct net searches. It crawls via the net systematically to find particular data laid out in a search question.
The basic examples embody giants like Google and Microsoft Bing. These platforms index and rank webpages based mostly on key phrases, backlinks and different components, presenting them in an ordered listing in response to person queries.
Nevertheless, the idea of what constitutes a search engine is evolving quickly. Whereas we’re arguing over which platforms are literally search engines like google and yahoo, customers are simply looking out – in every single place.
This evolution isn’t just within the know-how that powers search engines like google and yahoo but additionally of their type and performance. Siri, Alexa, TikTok, Pinterest, Reddit, ChatGPT, Gemini (previously Bard), and SGE signify this shift.
Platforms not historically thought-about search engines like google and yahoo are actually fulfilling comparable roles to the likes of Google and Bing. So far as customers are involved, they’re doing so extra successfully. They see these platforms as search engines like google and yahoo, so why can’t SEOs?
And, please, don’t take my phrase for it.
Gen Z customers favor extra personalised, algorithm-led social networks (48%) over search engines like google and yahoo (44%) when searching for details about manufacturers, services or products, per WARC’s 2023 Consumer Trends report (subscription required).
This shift is broadening the definition of a search engine, in my view. It ought to signify an innovation in executing search advertising and marketing methods and serious about platforms.
Central to this transformation is person habits. The best way individuals seek for data has modified dramatically.
There’s a rising choice for fast, concise, and visually participating content material, particularly inside these Gen Z and Millennial audiences (which are typically my focus).
We’ve all seen the “40% of younger individuals, after they’re searching for a spot for lunch, they don’t go to Google Maps or Search. They go to TikTok or Instagram” quote by Prabhakar Raghavan, Senior VP at Google.
Relating to person habits, these youthful audiences worth these platforms’ velocity, comfort, and relatability, typically preferring the visible and interactive content material format TikTok presents.
Dig deeper. Survey: 51% of Gen Z women prefer TikTok, not Google, for search
Get the every day publication search entrepreneurs depend on.
website positioning right this moment: Assembly customers the place they’re
Somebody would possibly seek for a cooking tutorial on TikTok as a substitute of Google. Maybe they’re searching for extra than simply the recipe.
They may be within the platform’s participating presentation, improved person expertise, and neighborhood side. This might be as a result of sure searches are suited to visible content material or on account of their reference to a specific creator.
Serps are not nearly indexing and retrieving net content material. They should meet customers the place they’re and within the format they like – and Google acknowledges this shift.
In response to those developments, “Perspectives” has been created to problem these platforms (TikTok, Instagram, Reddit) and their search capabilities and convey customers again to a Google SERP for all these queries. Google additionally lately has been testing TikTok videos in SGE and featured snippets.
E-E-A-T has been iterated, inserting extra emphasis on the first-hand expertise of content material and its creator. It is a essential issue driving individuals to different platforms within the first place. This exhibits an extra dedication to enhancing the relatability and trustworthiness of content material options.
Dig deeper: The modern search landscape: How and where to reach your target audience
What truly issues
This debate can drag on endlessly, with arguments over semantics and definitions attempting to sway individuals to at least one aspect. Nevertheless, this gained’t make a distinction for our manufacturers.
As a substitute, we ought to be trying to our audiences to information us. As a result of, as a lot as we are able to argue TikTok isn’t a search platform, if audiences are looking out there and your model isn’t current, you allow worthwhile visibility on the desk.
Finally, we should always prioritize activations on the platform that greatest meets our model’s strategic wants and develop search content material there.
If that ends in a TikTok search technique, nice.
If we as a substitute focus solely on Google as a result of that’s what will transfer the needle, then incredible.
It could even be a mixture of them each, leveraging a extra holistic “search in every single place” method.
The important thing right here is to not flip down a platform as a result of it doesn’t meet your definition for a search engine proper now. As a result of whereas we’re debating about this, a model competitor is probably going executing these observations and gaining visibility.
Finally, as has all the time been the case, it’s not our job to dictate to customers the content material they need to devour and the place they need to devour it.
Slightly, we react to the indicators offered by our audiences and create the content material options they want within the format they anticipate them to look.
And, in an increasing search universe, on the platforms, they’re conducting such searches.
Dig deeper: Search universe analysis: A deep dive
Opinions expressed on this article are these of the visitor creator and never essentially Search Engine Land. Workers authors are listed here.
