MARKETING
In July of 2020 , in a virtual staff meeting for the Sacramento History Museum , an employee named Jared Jones , who normally works the museum ’ s front desk , said to the group , “ I ’ d like to try TikTok .” They collectively rolled their eyes , as the museum ’ s CEO Delta Mello remembers it . “ Yeah , right , that ’ s for dancing and stuff . Not our audience ,” Mello thought at the time .
But Jones made his case . He had been experimenting with TikTok in his own time , he had seen other museums use the platform with some success ( like the Black Country Living Museum in the United Kingdom ), and he thought it could be a clever way to reach younger audiences — especially in the bleakest depths of the pandemic , when the museum , in Old Sacramento , was closed to the public . Back then , Mello had one primary goal for the museum : to not be forgotten . Maybe TikTok could help ?
So Jones got his wish . And the museum soon struck gold with an 82-year-old volunteer , Howard Hatch , who , with a charming earnestness , demonstrates how to work the museum ’ s 1852 printing press . Jones says , “ The video got 50,000 views overnight ,” and the account swelled from around 1,000 followers in December 2020 to 1 million by the end of March this year . They were shocked to see it cross 100,000 . “ At 600,000 followers , I thought , this is it . That ’ s all she wrote ,” says Mello . She was wrong .
In one exceptionally meta video , Hatch uses the 169-year-old press to print a version of the 19th-century Daily Bee with a headline that blares , “ SACRA- MENTO HISTORY MUSEUM REACHES 1,401,000 TIKTOK FOLLOWERS .” The history museum now has 1.6 million Tik- Tok followers , more than any museum in the world — more than The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City ( 24,000 ), more than the Uffizi Gallery in Florence
( 84,000 ), and the Smithsonian and the Louvre don ’ t even have TikTok accounts .
Why did this work ? And if a venerable brand like the Sacramento History Museum can unleash TikTok ( or Snapchat , Twitch or the newest social media flavor of the month ) to reach audiences , does that mean that every company should pounce on the trend ?
“ The key takeaway is authenticity ,” says Christie Pierce , director of digital media at 3fold Communications , a Sacramentobased marketing firm . “ The more authentic you are ,” he says , the more the internet will “ push that content to people who are interested in it .” He adds , more bluntly ,
Put yourself in your audience ’ s shoes and think deeply about what platforms they ’ re using , why they ’ re using them and whether they ’ ll still be using them in a year .
“ The title of your article should be ‘ Don ’ t Be Schlocky .’”
So here are some strategies for not being schlocky .
i . Be authentic , be entertaining
Museums are good at telling stories . That ’ s what they do . So in a sense , the Sacramento History Museum just focused on what it normally does — sharing cool nuggets from history — but using the new format . The focus is on Hatch being Hatch . “ The word ‘ authenticity ’ is overused , but Howard is authentically being himself ,” says
Mello . “ He ’ s been doing printshop demonstrations for classrooms for over 20 years . This is nothing new to him .” The museum is careful not to overly produce these videos , but instead offer tiny slices of printing wonder . One Tik- Tok video , for example , simply focuses on Hatch spreading ink on the printer , which has an oddly satisfying sound . ( And , of course , this is tagged # oddlysatisfying . The 167,000 likes would agree .)
The juxtaposition of old media ( printing press ) and new media ( TikTok ) fuels the entertainment , and entertainment is the internet ’ s hard currency . “ Social media is entertainment ,” says Mia Lopez , marketing director at Uptown Studios , another Sacramento-based marketing firm . “ The reason TikTok is popular is that it ’ s entertainment , and you have to be entertaining in order to be relevant .” She says this is true of not just TikTok but all social media platforms , to various degrees , as people “ are not there to talk to your brands . They ’ re not there to be sold to .”
Gilmore Heating , Air , and Plumbing understood this , as the company ’ s television commercials feature owner Darrin Gilmore filming awkward ( and hilarious ) TikTok dances with his daughters . ( Although the company doesn ’ t have an official TikTok account .) And Naija Cuisine in Sacramento also doesn ’ t have a TikTok account , but a TikTok fad that involved eating fufu , a Nigerian food staple , led to hordes of TikTok users visiting the business earlier this year .
ii . Make a real commitment ( or maybe don ’ t bother )
Should a company even hop down the rabbit hole of social media marketing ? When Pierce first works with clients who are anxious to get their TikTok on , he
42 comstocksmag . com | August 2021