Ed Sheeran's Album Promo, Snail Girl Beats Girlboss, & Latest TikTok News

Welcome back to HotToks. This edition we report on Ed Sheeran's album promotion using social, how Snail Girl is outpacing the Girlboss trend, and the latest TikTok features and updates.

Is Ed Sheeran’s New Album Promo Marking a New Era in Music Marketing?

During her entire era, Taylor Swift has been the Queen of Promo for her music. From dropping easter eggs everywhere to releasing social media posts, she has consistently brought it full circle with her storytelling capabilities in her merch, social presence, live presence, and, of course, her music. Alongside being called one of the most significant music sensations of our time, she’s also earned herself the title of ‘marketing genius’; we thank her for her service. Yes, I will find a way to weave Taylor Swift into everything, but that chapter is closing for right now. 

Today, we’re talking about Ed Sheeran and his new album promo. A week ago, on Sept 29th, Ed Sheeran announced the release of his newest album, ‘Autumn Variations’ on Twitter. On October 2nd, he released fourteen extra tracks in the form of “fan living room sessions” accompanied by the live recording of those sessions to his YouTube channel, which has 53.7M subscribers. He also shared clips of his experience surprising fans in their homes on Instagram. 

To keep the momentum going on all channels, he’s also shared some moments with creators, like Meredith from Wishbone Kitchen and Jake Shane on TikTok. These were more casual videos, speaking about his album in a lowkey way that feels authentic to the creators’ native content style. For example, in Meredith’s video, they made tacos and talked about cooking music, and Jake Shane’s video… well, let’s just say it was very on-brand for Jake Shane.

So, tap in: are we coming up on a new era of music marketing? Ed Sheeran is definitely shaking up the game, considering both pieces of content have over 1M views individually.

Move Aside Girlboss, ‘Snail Girl’ is Outpacing You

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We’ve had many different “girl” eras this past year; the newest one is on the horizon. Say hello to the Snail Girl. She’s laid-back, chill, and prioritizes self-care and happiness over the glorification of hustle culture and overworking.

The term, coined by the brand Hello Sisi’s owner, Sienna Ludbey, was first shared when she said she’s “slowing down and choosing to be happy rather than busy.” She says that as a ‘girlboss,’ she’s constantly felt pressure “to be perceived as successful” and appear super busy. 

On the flip side, “a snail girl takes her time and creates to create. She’s running her own race, and maybe that race isn’t going anywhere but home and back to bed.” 

The ‘girlboss’ identity, touted as the definition of women empowerment, has shapeshifted a ton over the past few years. People are realizing that the girlboss was a glorification of burnout in disguise. 

The term also has layers of complex hidden misogyny attached to it: Netflix’s former director of D&I, Michelle P. King, has said that these terms “are inherently misogynistic because by telling women they need to do more or be more to advance at work, we are in fact telling them that they are not good enough to start with.”

And now, Gen Z is pushing the “snail girl era” into practice. TikTokers are inspired by Ludbey’s article, made into a TikTok video, which now has over 32K views. 

It’s really become an aesthetic: Gen Z are taking to TikTok to share relaxing morning routines, daily walks, and skincare routines that give ‘snail girl’ energy, and the term “Snail Girl” has over 2.2M views on the platform. 

Love that we’re prioritizing ourselves out here, don’t get me wrong, but who else feels like this might be another one of those pendulum swings that might eventually catapult us back to ‘girlboss’ town in the next year or two?

Plus, the Latest TikTok News

As we all know, TikTok is always changing, so here are some rapid-fire updates to stay in the loop of all things product feature updates:

• First, an AI update from last week. Remember last week when we dove into TikTok rolling out the labeling of AI-generated content to provide extra transparency? Well, the AI-generated content is just getting too good. If you’re anywhere online, you’ve probably heard about Mr. Beast. Known for his absurd videos (giving people homes, houses, and more), he recently “appeared” in a TikTok ad giving people iPhone 15s for only $2. This deepfake ad of Mr. Beast was online for a few hours before TikTok flagged it down. In other words, though TikTok’s AI detection and technology are robust, the AI technology behind the fraudulent Mr. Beast video might’ve given it a run for its money. 
• TikTok is rumored to be testing out a paid ad-free version. Working aggressively to diversify revenue streams, TikTok is testing an ad-free subscription tier for $4.99 as of the testing phase. Not a full product launch yet–but it is currently being tested in the US. 
• Truly shaping into an entertainment platform, TikTok is now housing some (full) movies and letting viewers watch for free. On October 3rd (a crucial day in Mean Girls history), Paramount put the movie, in snippets, on TikTok to be viewed for free on the Mean Girls TikTok account.  Note: since writing, the full movie has been removed from the account. This has been happening since the early days of YouTube, where individual users would share snippets of movies for free online, and studios and streamers are learning from the success of this model and mirroring that on TikTok. But even the comments are calling out that this is “just a way not to pay actors and writers residuals.” Though both sides of the coin have a different POV, it’s important to notice that TikTok is increasingly competing with the likes of YouTube and streaming platforms like Netflix instead of platforms like Instagram and Snapchat.
• Is TikTok Shop really worth the hype? Brands are tapping in and saying that they haven’t seen great results or a dramatic increase in sales since testing out TikTok Shop. According to The Information, TikTok was expecting sales through their in-platform shopping tool to exceed $10M per day in the U.S. by the end of the year, but recent results show that U.S. shoppers merely spend close to $4M per day on TikTok Shop. Some shop owners describe the TikTok Shop setup experience as “buggy” and hard to manage. Some say there’s a lot of manual intervention to ensure orders are placed correctly and shipped on time.

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Thanks for reading!

Viv

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