If you’re looking to find out what the key differences are between the social media video giants like TikTok, Instagram Reels and Facebook Reels – then read on!
Cakeshop Media is a digital marketing agency that has created video content that has been seen more than 25 million times and seen on platforms such as LADbible and LADbible Australia.
Video content is a major driver for brands and businesses hoping to reach new customers and expand their followings on social media.
But when it comes to the likes of TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook, there’s always a question mark over which sites you should be investing your time in when it comes to publishing your slick, short-form video content.
In this article, we’ll walk through some of the main differences between TikTok videos, Instagram Reels, and Facebook Reels
Article Overview:
- TikTok videos help businesses and brands capitalise on latest trends and generate engagement
- Instagram Reels are effective for visually appealing video content and generating brand identity
- Facebook Reels allow businesses to reach wide audiences and monetise on this long standing social media giant
In the modern-day world, short-form video content reigns supreme. We all find ourselves scrolling through reels and videos every day, allowing these videos to inform us, educate us, or spark our imaginations.
For brands and businesses, short-form videos have become a grand, innovative marketing tool, allowing them to reach out to customers, assert their identity, and generate unprecedented engagement.
But competing sites like TikTok, Instagram and Facebook can make it difficult for brands and businesses to know where, exactly, to direct their attention.
Each site has its own set of features, its own general audience demographic, and its own benefits and drawbacks. Thankfully, here at Cakeshop Media, we know the insides and outs of all these sites, meaning we can help businesses out with their video needs.
Here’s a little of what you need to know:
What are the major differences between TikTok, Instagram and Facebook?
Exclusively a video-sharing site, TikTok boasts 1 billion active users worldwide and a very, very engaged audience.
The platform is known for its viral challenges, trends, and informative, fun content. TikTok’s trendsetting nature means that brands and businesses can often capitalise on the site if their content engages creatively with the latest trends.
Instagram is defined by its user interface’s photo-sharing and video-sharing capabilities, and its well-known Profile Grid, Reels section, and Highlight section. This has meant that Instagram, with its 1 billion+ monthly users, is much more curated than sites like TikTok.
Instagram is an excellent site for businesses and brands who want to show off eye-catching, visually appealing video content and ensure that it will earn them engagement.
More often than not, businesses operating on Instagram don’t always have to release instantly viral videos to steadily gain followers and views and assert their wider brand identity.
As for Facebook, this social media giant remains the standard bearer for all other social media sites. With as many as 3 billion monthly users, it consistently ensures a wide audience.
And while nowadays, Facebook is sometimes looked down upon as a less innovative space for brands and businesses (wrongly, in our opinion), the recent adoption of Facebook Reels – linking the site up with its Meta partner Instagram – means that content posted on these sites can be doubly effective for businesses.
So, what are the key differences between TikTok, Instagram Reels, and Facebook Reels?
Let’s break it down by Audiences and Features:
Audience
Most businesses will probably be aware that TikTok is more frequently used by a younger demographic, with most users being within the 16-24 age range.
Meanwhile, Instagram skews toward a broader – but slightly older – audience, with many users in the 18-34 age range. Facebook has a more diverse audience, with users of all ages, but trends suggest that older audiences would use Facebook much more, while younger audiences don’t feel the same need to set up or visit their Facebook profiles.
By understanding demographics, businesses can already start to make decisions about where their video content would be best placed.
Features
As mentioned, TikTok is known for its viral challenges, trends, user-generated sounds/music capabilities (thanks to its music copyrighting agreements), and creative content.
Its features make it geared towards being an all-singing, all-dancing app, meaning that businesses can generate plenty of engagement there if they gear their video content in the right way.
Meanwhile, Instagram Reels have historically been more popular because of their visuals.
The Instagram Explore page, the scrolling interface, and the Instagram algorithm itself have tended to mean that eye-catching videos gain more reach and engagement (think of all the travel content you might have getting unprecedented reach on Instagram).
Facebook Reels offer similar features to Instagram Reels, but they can be discoverable by Facebook’s incredibly large audience, allowing businesses to reach a broad range of demographics.
Facebook Reels is also a relatively recent phenomenon, and some social media analysts suggest it may have untapped potential for future advertising possibilities and monetisation for businesses.
While we’d need a separate article to go into that aspect of things, the general point is that Facebook is still a powerful, innovative social media site, and – despite some stagnation in recent years – it shouldn’t be dismissed!
Conclusion: Social Media Management Made Simple
All three sites contain numerous distinctive features, endless possibilities, and helpful analytics to guide businesses and brands in their decision-making process.
But we understand that making the right decision and choosing the ideal social media strategy can still be difficult.
That’s why Cakeshop Media provides bespoke social media packages to help businesses make the most of their TikTok videos, Instagram Reels, and Facebook Reels.
To find out more and have a chat, please get in touch.
