Others with 0 followers can easily get 100,000 likes on Douyin. What is Douyin’s recommendation algorithm?

Tik Tok 's decentralized algorithm gives everyone the opportunity to become popular, but why is it that some people with 0 followers can get 100,000 likes overnight while others still get nothing even after posting 100 times? What are the rules of this game that became popular overnight? What is Tik Tok’s recommendation algorithm?

1. Let’s start with the popularity of TikTok

This year, TikTok has spread from China to the world. It first topped the domestic App Store and became the world's number one app in the first quarter. Even Ma Huateng angrily criticized Zhang Yiming ...

That’s right, everyone is obsessed with the popularity of Douyin. From milk tea to food, from music to brands , from grassroots to big Vs, they all became famous overnight. Brands and content creators have joined the market to produce popular online products, and the legendary cases of popularity have happened around us one after another.

Early cases: A single video of iFlytek Voice received 600,000 likes, and the app received over 100,000 new downloads; 3 Douyin videos of Lying Duck attracted over 100,000 new users to the app, and the number of fans increased by 4 million in 3 months; a single video of Dad Milk Tea exceeded 20 million views, and 249 new franchise stores were added! It also made popular products such as Peppa Pig, Haidilao , and Xi'an popular, and attracted a lot of attention. The following is an example:

Cases around us:

Netizen a casually posted a Douyin video, and the number of likes reached 100,000+ overnight, and the number of fans soared to 6,000+; Netizen b usually had mediocre traffic when operating Douyin, but suddenly one video had millions of views, 350,000+ likes, and 30,000 fans; Netizen c just started Douyin, and one video had tens of millions of views, 380,000 likes, and 88,000 fans.

The most puzzling thing is that the TikTok operators around me are also inexplicably popular. They are just addicted and have gone all in on it, but can only grope around like a blind man. This magic makes me, a marketer, have obsessive-compulsive disorder... Why is TikTok so popular?

I will solve the mystery of Tik Tok from the following 3 points:

2. Tik Tok for All, a Victory for Decentralization?

Traditional media are pyramid -shaped, such as television, newspapers, magazines, etc. The content is screened layer by layer and disseminated from top to bottom. They have absolute authority and occupy the commanding heights of discourse power.

In the era of mobile Internet , with the rise of platforms such as Weibo, WeChat , and Douyin, we have entered an era of self-media where everyone is content and everyone is media. The right to speak has shifted from centralization to democracy, and from centralization to decentralization, and the momentum is unstoppable.

In the era of self-media, the public has replaced television ratings with video playback volume and replaced newspaper circulation with tweet reading volume. We have entered a new media era of fragmented information, decentralized media, and everyone can become famous!

Throughout the history of world art, from expressing religious worship of divinity, to the return to humanity during the Renaissance, to the subjective feelings of Impressionism, until Andy Warhol completely decentralized art, the essence of the popularity of Pop Art is the democracy and equality of art, as he said:

The era of “everyone can be famous for 15 minutes” has arrived!

Tik Tok has created a world where anyone can become famous overnight with just 15 seconds of exposure. Short videos not only release the suppressed performance talents of the post-90s generation, but also quickly output new-generation IPs in a trendy and cool way. It is not difficult to understand why Douyin can make grassroots people become popular frequently!

The core of Tik Tok is the decentralized algorithm, which allows every video to be displayed equally and everyone has the opportunity to become popular, rather than just revolving around celebrities. Decentralization allows a steady stream of content to satisfy the surprises of thousands of people with thousands of faces.

But why can some people with 0 followers get 100,000 likes on Douyin overnight, while others get nothing even after posting 100 times? What are the rules of this game that became popular overnight? What is Tik Tok’s recommendation algorithm?

3. Overnight success, was it due to the algorithm’s logic?

Once you enter Douyin, it is like a deep sea. Douyin has frequently produced hot products to make you famous. Douyin has become the second half of merchants ' brand marketing . The winner in the second half of these 15-second short videos must be the system's ability to continuously output hot products. To do this, you must understand the logic behind the algorithm: intelligent distribution, superimposed recommendations, and popularity weighting.

1. Intelligent distribution

Toutiao’s algorithm is different from the centralized traffic distribution of other Internet products, just like Weibo’s traffic is concentrated on celebrities and big Vs , and no one reads newly opened Weibo posts. Even if you have 0 followers on Toutiao, the Doudong system will intelligently distribute dozens or hundreds of traffic to any video you post. The traffic distribution of new videos is mainly based on nearby and followed, and is intelligently distributed with user tags and content tags. If the completion rate and interaction rate of the new video are high, this video will have a chance to continue to increase traffic.

This is exactly the reason why someone with 0 fans can gain 100,000+ in one night and become an overnight sensation. Therefore, Tik Tok's decentralized algorithm allows everyone to benefit equally. This wave of dividends gives everyone a chance and there is something to watch every day!

2. Overlay recommendations

The so-called superimposed recommendation means that new videos will be intelligently distributed with about 100vv playbacks. If the number of reposts reaches 10 (for example), the algorithm will determine it as popular content, automatically weight the content, and superimpose recommendations to you 1000vv; if the number of reposts reaches 100 (for example), the algorithm will continue to superimpose recommendations to 10,000vv; if the number of reposts reaches 1000 (for example), the superimposed recommendations will be increased to 10wvv, and so on... Therefore, those Douyin hosts who have millions of playbacks overnight are also confused and don’t know what happened. In fact, it is the weighting of the big data algorithm.

Of course, the evaluation criteria for superimposed recommendations are based on the comprehensive weight of the content. The key indicators of comprehensive weight include: completion rate, number of likes, number of comments, and number of reposts. The weight of each level is different. When it reaches a certain level, a mechanism combining big data algorithms and manual operations is used.

3. Heat weighting

After watching nearly a hundred popular Douyin videos, I found that all the videos that became popular overnight and the videos in the Douyin recommendation section had millions of views, and the comprehensive data (completion rate, number of likes, number of comments, and number of reposts) were all very good without exception. It can be seen that after being tested by a large number of users, the content will enter the recommended content pool of Douyin after being weighted by layers of popularity, and receive the baptism of tens to millions of large traffic. The weights of each popularity are as follows:

Reposts > Comments > Likes

The popularity weight will also be determined based on time. The popularity of a popular video will only last for a week at most, unless a large number of users imitate and follow it. Therefore, a stable content update mechanism and the ability to continuously output popular videos are also needed.

In addition, Tik Tok’s celebrities and top influencers will be automatically weighted, which is the centralized tilt in the decentralized algorithm to support high-quality PGC content.

In the popular guide to passing the level, the algorithm only points out the path, and content is the golden key to activate human nature. The number of video views, likes, and attention are all votes from the hearts of the crowd, and the secret to passing the level is only content!

4. Did the viral video shake the nerves of human nature?

Good content brings its own traffic, a picture is worth a thousand words, and a video determines the outcome. Short videos use a 15-second direct approach to make people feel the beauty in the resonance of vision, hearing, and situation. Content that becomes popular overnight has its own rules, and the continuous output of content that hits the mark requires a deep insight into human nature.

Motivational causes: From a psychological point of view, the core motivations of human behavior are nothing more than three points: the pursuit of happiness and avoidance of pain; the pursuit of hope and avoidance of fear; the pursuit of recognition and avoidance of rejection.

The videos that go viral on Douyin are inseparable from these three psychological pursuits: novel and beautiful ones give us beauty and hope; fun and interesting ones make us laugh like pigs; and in the world of Douyin, you can always find what you like and resonate with, and the influencers have a deep sense of presence and accomplishment on Douyin.

1. Good-looking: Appearance is justice

Good looks, cute babies, cute pets, singing and dancing, and a wonderful life

Advertising guru David Ogilvy proposed the 3B rule of advertising (Beauty/Baby/Beast): appearance, cute babies, and cute pets. This principle also applies to the content rule of Tik Tok videos, and also includes singing and dancing performances, beautiful scenery, and the truth, goodness and beauty in life, using all the beautiful things to capture you.

2. Fun: Happiness is king

Drama, pranks, flirting, plot twists, funny jokes

Everyone wants to be happy. Laughter is the body's physiological response to the relief of danger (or pressure). It presents the inherent drama in life, or expresses absurdity and dislocation, or amplifies conflicts, or creates contrast (transfer). This kind of anti-expectation can release pressure and fear in the most effective way, making people laugh like pigs.

3. Novelty: Exploring the world with curiosity

Creativity, technical skills, extreme sports, talents

Yes, we like the world's wonderful ideas and marvel at their bizarre imaginations. This curiosity is the basic driving force behind the progress of human civilization and the constant exploration of the unknown world.

4. Usefulness: An Evolved Instinct

Beauty and fashion, DIY skills, knowledge, skills

Evolution is human instinct, imitation is human nature, learning useful knowledge and imitating practical skills are choices for survival and evolution, so now knowledge payment is selling anxiety.

TV ads have dominated the screen for nearly a hundred years, from 30 seconds to 15 seconds, and then to 6 seconds. They have to have the power to penetrate people's hearts or brains in the shortest time. Douyin and 15-second video ads have the same purpose, using 1 second of bait, 3 seconds of novelty and fun, and the remaining 10 seconds to present excitement. This condensed 15-second world is beautiful and interesting everywhere you look, and it is immersive. It can make a city, a person, or a batch of goods popular.

Today's greeting: Are you shaking? Greetings for tomorrow: Are you popular?

The author of this article @莫小白 is compiled and published by (Qinggua Media). Please indicate the author information and source when reprinting!

Product promotion services: APP promotion services, advertising platform, Longyou Games