Why Does Every Company Suck at TikTok?
How is the world's biggest platform such a marketing blind spot?
As my book of business has evolved from comedians to brands, I have uncovered a surprising trend in the corporate sector.
To put it bluntly, they all suck at making TikToks.
The engagement metrics are paltry. Nine different accounts are posting on behalf of the same company. There doesn’t appear to be an overarching strategy or goal.
If this sounds melodramatic, here are some observations on the TikTok presence of the top ten companies listed in the S&P 500:
#1 Microsoft (623.2K followers, 2.9M likes)
Microsoft allegedly has 623.2K TikTok followers and 2.9 million video likes, yet their five most recent posts have all received fewer than 10,000 views:
You might’ve noticed the one pinned video on the left with 1.4M views - seems great!
Typically, pinned videos are the most viewed or “best” videos on a channel.
A closer look reveals Microsoft’s pinned video may have had some $help$ to get such wide reach.
While the Microsoft CMO might consider a video with 1.4 million views as an unequivocal success, I’d encourage them to look at the video’s Like Percentage (Likes/Views*100). It’s a stat I made up that more effectively captures engagement.
The above desk re-decoration video currently has 52.4K likes, or a Like PCT of 3.7%.
For contrast, here’s a random TikTok I recently posted, in which I accuse Tyrese Haliburton of being a stat padder:
This video of me recording my television has 2.1 million views and 273.4K likes.
This comes out to a Like PCT of 13.0%, or roughly one in seven people who watched the video.
Triple the engagement of Microsoft’s best video on their entire profile.
@microsoft follows 36 accounts, a third of which are other Microsoft GBUs:
There is no brand alignment across this litany of channels, and it's unlikely that @microsoftuk would have 110K followers with only 405.9K video likes:
Apologies if this sounds harsh.
I only make this claim because my own TikTok page has amassed 7.1+ million video likes, 17X as many video likes as @microsoftuk.
Yet somehow it only has a third of their follower count?
That math ain’t mathin’.
You're telling me 110,00+ people are interested in following a local subsidiary of a global tech company whose recent videos are performing so poorly, that they’re only being seen by an average of 1000 people? Or fewer than 1% of their entire “following?”
There’s also @microsoft365, a separate, verified TikTok account dedicated to the Microsoft productivity suite (Excel, PowerPoint, etc.).
This account allegedly has 312K followers, yet none of their recent posts cracked 10K views?
In the emojis of LeBron James:
#2 Apple (3.3M followers, 7.4M likes)
Wow, 3.3 million people are awaiting Apple’s first organic TikTok post with bated breath?
What’s likely going on here is that Apple has dumped a considerable amount of paid spend into the TikTok ads platform1, which is where those 7.4 million likes are from.
I suppose they also could have archived several bangin’ TikToks, as videos set to Private still count towards an account’s Like total.
Still, I am calling BS on that follow count. Nearly a 2:1 Like/Follow ratio is absurd.
#3 Nvidia (0 Followers, 0 Likes)
#4 Amazon (926.4K followers, 4.2M likes)
Amazon has nearly a million followers, but their 10 most recent videos all failed to reach 40,000 views?
Sus.
#5 Google (1.4M followers, 6.4M likes)
Woahh! 140 million views on one of their pinned videos?! Surely that’s going to be proportio-
Talk about stat padding!
Google’s TikTok account makes Russell Westbrook look like Manu Ginobili.
For those keeping track, that’s a Like PCT of 0.07%. Same goes for the adjacent pinned video, and the video on the right-hand side with 215.7K views.
So far, every single video from a corporate account with a high view count has had disproportionately low engagement metrics.
#6 Meta
I couldn’t find a TikTok account for Meta or Instagram, but @Facebook has 318.2K followers with no posts, and @instagramcreators has 300K+ followers, despite, well:
I mean this is just rich.
Imagine thinking your direct competitor is going to take kindly to you posting on their platform to share tips and tricks on why their users should use your platform instead.
It’s been proven that writing certain words in your video caption will automatically get your post flagged, such as writing “sexy” or “weed”.
Go try searching those words, or anything remotely foul/inappropriate, into your search bar.
Notice how nothing comes up?
This is why users have developed code words like “seggsy” or “ouid”.
There’s a whole dictionary of terms TikTok users know to navigate these restrictions.
What a lot of marketers don’t realize however, is that the same goes for terms like “YouTube”, or “link in bio”.
This is why you’ll often see phrases like “lincoln bio” from savvy creators.
It’s one thing to be an artist promoting their full album on Spotify, and not understanding this is partially why their organic promotional video performed so poorly.
It’s another thing entirely to organically promote *Instagram Itself* without putting some paid spend behind it.
Of course, all of this begs the question,
Is any company good at making TikToks?
In the social media / advertising circles on LinkedIn, the gold standard is Duolingo.
Not only does Duolingo possess the only realistic Followers/Likes ratio of any account we’ve looked at, but the engagement metrics on the majority of their individual videos mirror those of my comedian clients (the gold standard for engagement %).
In other words, there’s actually an audience for the content they’re posting.
Their secret?
They aren’t providing heartwarming customer success stories, or showcasing internal DEI initiatives, or providing any educational content whatsoever.
They handed the keys to a 23 year old and Let. Her. Cook.
It’s purely an awareness play.
Their owl mascot “Duo” hops in on TikTok trends and memes, and she behaves fairly unhinged compared to other “professional” accounts on the platform.
Now personally, their content is not for me. I do not want any brands in my feed.
Ever.
Full stop.
The moment I sense an account is trying to sell me something, or is acting as a “fellow kid” under the guise of generating brand awareness, I pull away.
I find it deeply disturbing when Tums or Crocs or Buffalo Wild Wings comments on one of my own videos, and says something like, “AIN’T NO WAY FAM 😂😂”.
It reeks of Bo Burnham’s social brand consultant character, or the student who waived his birth identity to become a corporate humanoid called “Subway” on Community.
But the engagement and critical acclaim seem to indicate I’m in the minority here.
If I were the CMO at Duolingo, I’d be trying to quantify the monetary value of our TikTok presence. What’s the exact amount of people who download our app as a direct result of our social media output? What’s my ROI on paying several employees tens of thousands of dollars to make all these videos? What’s the conversion rate for turning this captive, Gen Z audience into low-churn MRR in our subscription tier?
But maybe they’re content in knowing that when current high schoolers on TikTok study abroad in Florence in 2026, and are debating which app to learn “Uber for Rachel?” in Italian on, they’ll pick the one with the owl drinking Dua Lipa’s pee.
When you’re a newer, modern company like Duolingo, it’s okay to take creative risks.
Your focus is still on the awareness phase of the marketing funnel.
But what about when we already know who you are, and have watched multiple movies about the founding of your company?
Your organic content doesn’t have to be funny or "cool” to resonate.
Just interesting.
Teach us something!
Why can’t Google show us how to use advanced Google search functionality, or tier rank useful Chrome extensions? Why can’t Apple post videos that demonstrate the recent iOS updates, or customizable features on the newest AirPods? Why can’t @microsoft365 educate us on useful Excel formulas, like the @ExcelDaddy account?
These are all genuinely things I would enjoy as an audience member.
Instead, they are they pumping hundreds of dollars into… office desk re-decorations?
For contrast, go look at the videos of literally any individual creator. A chef, a comedian, a bodybuilder, a cyclist, a popular high school girl. I can guarantee they will have better engagement metrics than every single company covered in this article.
I’ve analyzed thousands of posts from high-performing TikTok accounts. I can tell you with confidence that it’s possible to have videos perform 5X, 10X, and 40X better than the content currently churned out by the most profitable enterprises in the world.
The big bellies’ collective output is getting lapped by everyday creators in terms of reach and engagement. These nothing-posts are actively harming brand perception, failing to drive revenue, failing to add value to their existing customer base, and failing to meet its target audience on the platform they’re on.
It feels like Toby Flenderson mistook the freestyle rap cypher for a Bloomberg webinar.
If you want to be boring and stuffy, and talk about your culture, or your values, or your generous 401(k) matching policy, save it for LinkedIn Job Search.
But if you want to post on TikTok, post TikToks.
David Zucker is a digital marketing consultant based in New York City. A former analyst at TikTok, his unique, data-driven approach has catapulted the growth of his clients’ audiences all over the world. He also happens to have oculocutaneous albinism, a rare genetic disorder which renders him legally blind. This condition offers him a unique perspective on digital marketing strategy, especially with respect to accessibility. To schedule a consult, click here.
Every fourth video on the app is now an ad, if you haven’t noticed. It used to be every sixth.