In this video Hernan Vazquez of ScaleDriven challenges the headline that TikTok is overtaking Facebook by examining January 2022 app download data and explaining why raw download numbers don’t directly translate into advertising superiority. He shows that while TikTok topped the download charts (52 M downloads), Meta’s suite of apps (Instagram, Facebook, WhatsApp, Messenger) collectively amassed over 100 M downloads, giving advertisers a far larger combined audience. Vazquez argues that advertisers should not blindly shift spend to TikTok simply because of headline metrics. Instead, they must consider each platform’s audience mindset, lifetime value, and how the platform fits the target demographic and product type. He illustrates this with examples from YouTube, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Snapchat, and a case where higher cost‑per‑lead on YouTube yielded better buyer quality than cheaper Facebook leads. He also likens new platform hype to a “new character” in a video game that is initially overpowered but normalizes over time. The core recommendation is a strategic, data‑driven multi‑platform approach, leveraging migration opportunities while aligning ad spend with the specific customer journey and business goals. The video ends with a call‑to‑action for a free strategy session at ScaleDriven.
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is kicking Facebook's butt by all of the measure, by any stretch of the imagination. Like, apparently, allegedly, TikTok is kicking Facebook's butt. And here's what I don't agree with that statement. All right, we're going to talk about that today. So what's going on, everybody? Hernan Vazquez here with scaledriven.com. At scaledriven.com, what we do is we help companies scale through paid media, direct response advertising, direct response marketing. And if you want to scale over the next couple of weeks or months or years, head over to scaledriven.com and schedule a call with my team. We'll see if we're a good fit. What we do at scaledriven.com is we give you a full marketing team, all right? So we can take care of your ads on all of these platforms that I'm going to talk about in a second. And we can also take care of all of your marketing for you. So if that sounds good, go to scaledriven.com. Now I want to share with you guys an article that I was reading before hopping online, which says something like TikTok takes back the top spot from Instagram in January download charts. And we're talking about apps, okay? We're going to be talking about apps and how many downloads they got during January 2022. So let me actually share my screen so I can share with you the article, and then I'm going to tell you why I think, um, I'm going to tell a couple things that I, that I think about. So let me actually share this. All right, there we go. Boom. So this is the article right here, is from businessofapps.com. All right, and it says again, TikTok takes back top spot from Instagram in January. So December, Instagram was, was the top January, TikTok went back. Now here's what we can see on the iOS App Store. TikTok got 19 million downloads in, um, January. Uh, YouTube got 11 million, and then Instagram got 11 million, WhatsApp, Facebook. So Facebook is number 5, all right? Instagram is number 3. So TikTok is, is up there by a mile. So 10 million more downloads. Google Play Instagram got 34 million, TikTok got 33 million, Facebook got 30 million. All right, and then the rest. So, so Facebook is down here and Instagram is down here. Now the combined total between App Store and Google Play is TikTok got 52 million downloads in January, Instagram got 45 million, and Facebook got 39 million, and WhatsApp got 31 million. So this will tell you, well, people are migrating from Facebook or Instagram into TikTok, right? And that could seem the case, but if we do a further analysis here, you can see that even if TikTok got the first spot with 52 million downloads, the rest— Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp— are owned by Meta. And then we have Messenger here, okay, on number 7. Then we have Telegram and Snapchat, they're their own thing. But— and CapCut, I don't know what CapCut is, by the way, so maybe you kids can tell me. But that's the thing. So, so TikTok got the first spot, but Meta got the next 3: Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp, right? So what is this telling us as advertisers, for us? And I've been seeing more and more and more, uh, Facebook threads or Instagram threads saying, well, Facebook is going down, let's move to TikTok, and I'm pulling my advertising from Facebook, going into TikTok and whatnot, or YouTube. And I mentioned, you guys, that I think that's great news. But if you think about it, when you are— when you are buying ads or buying advertising, buying traffic from a network, you're not only buying traffic from that network, from that one app, right? So we're not only buying ads on TikTok, we're buying ads on all of the network that TikTok belongs to, right? When we're buying ads on the Facebook Ads Exchange, we're buying ads on Facebook, we're buying ads on Instagram, we're buying ads on WhatsApp. I'm even running a Messenger campaign right now for my Social Ads Framework that we just launched last week. I'm running a ManyChat sequence and a framework and, and a Messenger campaign which I haven't run in a while, and it's working, and it's working really, really well. So when we are buying, uh, traffic from a network, we're buying ads on all of these different networks, right? So even if TikTok is number one— let me actually go back to the screen— even if TikTok is number one right now Right? TikTok got 52 million. Instagram got 45 plus 39. That is what? Seven eighty eighty four plus thirty one. That's over a hundred million downloads. Okay? That's over a hundred million downloads for Meta as a as a framework or as a network rather. So here's what I'm thinking when I'm seeing this, right? Like a lot of people are. Migrating their advertising dollars from one network to the next. And I mean, it's, it's a good idea if you want to get better results, right? And if you, let's say, if you want to spend $20K a month and you say, okay, I'm going to spend $20K a month in one network, then you want to bring those $20K to the network that generates the most revenue for you, right? And that might be YouTube, that might be Facebook. But the reality is that channels don't really die. Like, as I mentioned a couple days ago, people are still advertising on radio, they're still advertising on TV, they're still advertising on snail mail. So, so, so if you, if you think about comprehensively from a growth, like an actual company business growth perspective, you want to leverage the different networks. Now here's the thing, when you're launching ads on a new platform, on a new network, usually you need to rework your entire strategy. The reason behind this is because people tend to compare, let's say, well, I'm running ads on Facebook and I start— and I want to start running ads on YouTube, right? And on Facebook I have, let's say, I don't know, I'm paying $3 per lead, and on YouTube I'm paying $7 per lead. Does that mean that YouTube is performing worse than Facebook? Well, from a cost per lead perspective, it might seem like it, but if you go deeper you might see, you might, you might find that Facebook traffic or YouTube traffic or TikTok traffic is better for your business in the long run. Like, for instance, what happens a lot of times is that YouTube will be more expensive than Facebook, but YouTube, on YouTube, people are in a different mindset, right? They're searching for stuff, they're learning. On Facebook, they're just scrolling away. So even if you're getting a really, really cheap cost per lead on Facebook, that doesn't necessarily mean that Facebook will ever work for your offer or YouTube or TikTok, right? Like people are saying, well, I'm getting great cost per lead on TikTok. Yeah, but the reality is that we want to see what the customer lifetime value of that traffic is over 30, 60, 90 days. I was having a conversation yesterday with a partner and we are sending traffic to a mini webinar funnel, meaning we send traffic to an opt-in page, people opt in, they see a 40-minute presentation and then they can schedule a call right there and then, right? And we were getting— I think that we were getting— we were paying anywhere between $50 to $80 per call, per book call on Facebook, and anywhere between $100 to $120 on YouTube. And he was like, well, we should shut off YouTube and then focus on Facebook. And I'm like, no, let's just keep them running for the next 30, 45 days. The reason behind it is because we're not looking for cheap calls, we're looking for buyers. Right? We're not looking for cheap leads, we're looking for actual buyers. I told you guys about that, uh, about that client that came to us because they were getting huge amounts of cheap leads but they weren't closing, right? So, uh, my suggestion was to tweak their campaign so that the cost per lead will go up but they will get more buyers. So the main point is this: do not get confused if you're seeing people migrating their advertising dollars into a new platform. And usually what happens with new platforms is that they give you a lot. This reminds me, like, for the gamers out there, when a new character comes up, let's say on League of Legends for instance, that character is completely OP. Like, that character is like super powerful because they want people to play with that character, and then they normalize it, right? This is the same thing that happens with advertising platforms. They, they are great at the beginning, but then they start to normalize. Right? Because at the end of the day, all of these companies, they, they, their, their responsibilities with their stakeholders, right? With their, with their investors. So what I'm trying to say here is that one network is not better than the other. One network is not better than the other if you understand who your demographic is and if you understand what framework, what mindset they're in. When they're buying, then probably then you will understand where to put your advertising dollars, right? If you're selling, for instance, if you're selling— and, and for instance, Pinterest is not even in this list, like the top 10 is not even there, right? But if you have a, if you have a product that might appeal to 35+ females that make the purchasing decisions in the house then by all means go advertise on Pinterest, right? We tried this for a client. She was an agency client, and, uh, she had a, she had a couple of great acquisition funnels. And we were running on Facebook, we're running, you know, pretty good on Facebook. We were actually breaking even or better on the front end, which is what you want to do with a, with an acquisition funnel. And we started running some Pinterest ads, and it worked, you know. She didn't got a lot of, a lot a lot of volume, right? But she got some, some purchases. And guess what? Those lifetime value customers— the lifetime value of those customers went up because those people were the purchasing decision makers, right? So the question is, where should you advertise? Well, the answer is it depends where your demographic is hanging out, right? Like, again, if you, if you have a younger demographic and you have an e-com product that might be like a, you know, a quick a quick buying decision or something like that, then you might want to go to Snapchat. Now, if you have a software company and you're selling hundreds of thousands of dollars per year worth of software services, then you may want to go to LinkedIn. And again, you don't need a ton of volume. So it all comes down to the strategy and where your demographic is hanging out and where you're selling your stuff. So do not blindly stop your ads on Facebook or YouTube or TikTok and switch gears because everyone else is doing Right? Do not do that. You need to think about this. You need to sit down. And always when, when there's a migration of advertisers, there's a lot of opportunity that opens up. I keep on saying that these are— this is great news because people are jumping ship from Facebook. I'll buy more traffic at a discount, better CPMs, better service. You know, it's like, great, let's, let's keep on doing it, right? So If you need help developing such a strategy, and if you need help sitting down and developing a strategy that will work for you, for your service, for your product, for your demographic, for your ideal customer, head over to scaledriven.com. On that page, you will see a message and a couple of case studies. If that resonates with you, schedule a call with my team. On that call, we'll develop a strategy that's specifically geared for you depending on the assets that you have, depending on your demographic, depending on your ideal customer, and most importantly, depending on your goals, right? So we'll develop a strategy for you on that call, and then we'll see if we're a good fit to help you implement it. In any case, you will leave with a strategy that you can implement right away, free of charge, right? Now we'll tell you if there's a good fit, we'll tell you how to implement it and how we can help you implement it. But in any case, you will get a lot of value out of that call. Strategic goal. All right, so I hope this, this helps, guys. I just want to share with you some thoughts of what's going on right now in the world of social media, and especially from the direct response advertising perspective. If you have any questions, any comments, any remarks, feel free to drop them somewhere around the video that you're watching this, or if you're listening to this, feel free to put them in the comments. And I hope that this helps. If you have any questions, feel free to reach out and head over to scaletribe.com to get your complimentary strategy session. Thank you guys for listening to this. I'll see you guys really, really soon. Bye-bye. Bye.
