I admit – I’m guilty of spending a lot of time on TikTok, and I love lazing around and scrolling through my FYP when I’m winding down for the day. However, I can’t stand videos where small brands actively create videos to guilt us into feeling sorry for them and in turn, purchasing their products.
I’m also not attaching any videos here because I don’t want to shame the businesses! Small businesses use social media platforms to their advantage as it’s harder for these brands to get their messages across. I understand that everyone is working hard to create content for their business. It’s a lot of work, so please be proud of it! Despite that, brands shouldn’t continuously guilt others into purchasing their products.
I believe there’s a difference between sharing your frustration and just plain ol’ guilting. As a small business owner and someone who tries to support many other business owners, I’m always looking for different ways to engage with potential customers on social media. While we primarily use Instagram for pictures, many businesses have to be innovative and follow the trends on TikTok to get to the FYP.
However, when businesses start overusing one of these scenarios below way too often, it’s a form of guilt-tripping.
“Show me something that you thought would sell really well, but didn’t” sound.
I’ve seen this pop up multiple times on my feed – it will show items that they thought would sell well but didn’t. It’s frustrating when things don’t sell but by doing this, aren’t you guilt-tripping us into purchasing your goods? If you have multiple videos showing the same thing and asking for sympathy, I don’t think that’s the right way to do business.
What can you do instead?
Start to Finish Timelapse: It can be fun to watch something at high speed to see the entire process for how something is made from beginning to end. Show off anything you want in a high-speed timelapse. Use this to your advantage and show how you go about a day in your life – from creating products to packaging them out for customers. Source
Videos about conversations with terrible customers
I’m sure you’ve seen one of these videos on TikTok, and I’m not surprised. I love watching the drama unfold but if you’re only complaining about nasty customers, are you using it as your brand identity? There are a lot of entitled people out there but give a shoutout to all the lovely customers you have instead.
What can you do instead?
Say Thank You: Don’t forget to say thank you to all of your customers, friends, family and local community members who help support your small business. Bad customers aside, you still have a lot of supportive people on your side! Source
To all small businesses on TikTok, it’s a gentle PSA! There are many different approaches to test out. Look for unique ways to tell others about your brands and sell your products.
Stephanie Aeria is a content writer under Headliner by Newswav, a programme where content creators get to tell their unique stories through articles and at the same time monetize their content within the Newswav app.
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*The views expressed are those of the author. If you have any questions about the content, copyright or other issues of the work, please contact Newswav.
