"A Girl Trending, a Girl on Top": Who Are Ukraine's TikTok Creators and How Do They Make Money?

We spoke with Ukrainian millionaire bloggers on TikTok.

"A girl trending, a girl on top, I saw her dancing on TikTok" — this song is among the top 100 most popular tracks among Ukrainian users of YouTube Music, and it was written specifically "for TikTok". 

TikTok, the Chinese social network that lets users upload and edit video content by adding filters and music, continues to conquer the world. The number of app downloads worldwide has already surpassed Instagram's audience, as has the average time users spend in the app. Each month TikTok attracts more users than Snapchat or Twitter. Hollywood stars such as Dwayne Johnson, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Will Smith are already on the platform: all of them post unique content, trying to play with the popular trends and flash mobs of the social network in their videos.

The social network's algorithmic feed and recommendation system allows even a new user to break into "trending" and gather millions of views, which is a "window of opportunity" for teenagers who want to become popular and for bloggers who missed the "golden era" of YouTube and Instagram. TikTok ranks 3rd among the most downloaded apps in Ukraine's App Store and 5th on Google Play, and Ukrainian millionaire bloggers have already emerged on the social network itself. 

Popular TikTok bloggers can be roughly divided into two categories: those who came to TikTok already having a large audience outside the social network (musicians, actors, Instagram and YouTube bloggers who built their audiences elsewhere), and those who gained fame thanks to the app itself. Another feature of the social network, however, is that popularity on TikTok does not carry over to other social networks: the most popular video bloggers on the platform rarely have a large number of followers on Instagram, for example.

"Writing songs for TikTok" is standard practice today. The main advertisers on TikTok today are music labels. The main content on the app consists of flash mobs and humorous sketches set to music, and excerpts from individual songs that suit the situation being played out in form or meaning. Thanks to sudden popularity on TikTok, old hits from the 1990s and 2000s are again climbing the charts, and little-known musicians are conquering streaming service rankings. This is how the social network is changing the music industry: now the task of lyricists and producers is to make a song a "meme" and send it into the masses, making it the object of later folk creativity.

The TK Media editorial team spoke with popular Ukrainian (and not only Ukrainian) TikTok creators and learned how to become popular on this social network and how much one can earn from it. 

Oleksandra Kuzmenko

17 years old, 11th-grade student, Kyiv

What she films: music flash mobs, humorous sketches, life stories

On how she became popular on TikTok

Success did not come right away. I did not think I would reach such a large audience; I considered it unrealistic. I started making TikTok videos about three years ago, when it was still "Musical.ly" (TikTok merged with Musical.ly in 2018 — ed.). I tried very hard to film, but I could not gain any audience at all. I wrote to the popular "musers" of the time and asked: why am I not able to gain an audience? Then I realized there was no point in filming videos, that I was wasting my time, and I abandoned the app for a year. In August 2018 I was at the sea, I was bored, so I decided to record a few videos for TikTok. One of them became viral and gathered 6 million views. After that, many of my videos also reached millions, and followers started growing very quickly, so I began filming for TikTok and doing it more seriously. Now I understand that the secret of popularity lies in charisma and creativity. To achieve popularity in this field, you need to have many unconventional ideas and genuinely love what you do. Of course, the quality of video filming also plays an important role. But I gained my first 100,000 filming on an old iPad; I had no special equipment and not even an iPhone. 

On her audience

My audience is very diverse. The majority of the audience, namely 55%, is from Russia. Only 29% is Ukrainian. There are followers from other countries as well. The main age group of the audience is 18-24, with many followers aged 13-17 and 25-34 as well. But when I hold fan meetings, mostly teenagers and children come. Teenagers and children also recognize me on the street. 

On how to monetize a TikTok account

Performers of songs and various brands reach out. In Russia this is very developed; in Ukraine, unfortunately, it is much less common, but recently offers from Ukrainian brands have also come in. Rates depend on the size of the audience, on activity on the profile, and on the wishes of the creator. I cannot name an exact figure, but it is possible for a popular TikToker to earn money.

Lana Antymonova

Kyiv, student at KNTEU

What she films: music flash mobs, humorous sketches, dance

On how she became popular on TikTok

I started running TikTok at the end of September. It has been almost 3 months. But I think my pace is too slow compared to how quickly American TikTokers gain popularity. The audience grows geometrically. I consider an account with more than 20 thousand followers a success on TikTok. My first 20,000 came in 1.5 months. After that, the speed of growth really began to delight me. 

On her audience

I do not know the age of my audience; analytics does not show it. Other data: Russia — 40%, Ukraine — 27%, Turkey — 6%, Mexico — 4%, Kazakhstan — 3%. There are many more from Russia because the content is in Russian, and there are more TikTok users in Russia as well. 

On how to monetize a TikTok account

I worked on a barter basis with Nastya Kamenskikh. I took part in her challenge, and she posted it on her Instagram. I also filmed a video for "Allo" for payment. I know that guys with larger followings are hired by various performers to advertise through launching challenges. Egor Creed rose enormously thanks to TikTok! And also Little Big. Foreign stars consider TikTok one of the best ways to promote songs. I do not understand why our top performers (such as Monatik) have not yet come to TikTok. As for monetizing an account, I have heard that it exists, like someone will eventually find me and write, but so far this has not happened.

Artur Babich

19 years old, Kyiv

What he films: music flash mobs, humorous sketches featuring his younger brother

On how he became popular on TikTok

I created my TikTok account exactly one year ago. How to become successful on this social network? I think it's all luck and maybe a bit of originality, because one video and you're a star. 

On his audience

Most of my audience is from Ukraine, mainly Russian speakers.

On how to monetize a TikTok account

Mostly it is advertising of tracks and promotion of personal accounts. Offers come in, but very, very rarely. I don't have a price list for TikTok advertising; I do it just for myself.

Alexander Kantsler

SMM specialist, Kyiv

What he films: life stories, such as how a tow truck took a car away and about funny inscriptions on a tip jar in a coffee shop

On how he became popular on TikTok

I started doing TikTok in spring 2019. I simply decided to experiment and record different videos on TikTok to see how it works. Suddenly, my first videos shot up: they gathered 100, 180, 200 thousand views each, and I thought: maybe I'm getting something right, I should keep making videos. How to become successful on this social network? I have already figured out how TikTok's algorithms work. They are more complex than Facebook's algorithms, but at the same time fairly predictable. For TikTok it is important that a video has a high watch depth, so that your videos are watched to the end. TikTok cares that people visit the profile, open the comments, and subscribe. If a video has high watch depth, there may be no likes at all. I have a video that gathered 20,000 views in a few hours. It has 36 likes. People are simply curious how it ends, but it does not end anywhere, and they leave disappointed without liking it. Still, the video has a large number of views. The trick is that TikTok determines whether a person finds something interesting by how deeply they watched videos on similar topics.

On his audience

Something similar is happening with TikTok to what happened with Instagram around 2014: there are really a lot of teenagers and children, 50-60%. But there are adults too. My videos are for adults; I have no children's videos. I do not dance or sing in my videos. Adults are the ones who comment on my videos.

On how to monetize a TikTok account

There are two ways to monetize: official and unofficial. The official way is to earn money on your balance. It is an analogue of the YouTube partner program, but the conditions are always different. For example, for winter TikTok launched a contest: record a video that gets more than 100,000 views and get X money for it. You can record as many as 20 such videos, and it doesn't matter whether there are 200,000 or a million views — as long as it's more than 100,000, you receive the sum. Some tasks come with the condition to record a video to a specific song. The unofficial way is to place advertising for other companies and people. I do both. Brands have already approached me about advertising. I also sell advertising with other TikTokers: I offer this service. We have already promoted a Ukrainian song and one Ukrainian brand through TikTok. Rates are currently low. Recently we placed an ad with a profile that has 500,000 followers and 20 million likes: the post cost $30.

Anastasia Zakhandrevych

teenager, Ukraine

What she films: life stories, about school studies and new braces

On how she became popular on TikTok

My first post on TikTok was in 2018. I think everyone knows that success does not come quickly to anyone. Before my first video I dreamed very much [of popularity on the social network — ed.] and, so to speak, luck smiled on me like a princess (a video set to a song from a princess cartoon). "First shot" — in recommendations and 40k views. But it was not like that every time. I had to try a lot to understand what exactly my audience likes (although it still varies sometimes). I celebrated 100k followers already at the end of August. The secret of popularity remains a secret to me. The main thing is to be yourself.

On her audience

My audience includes many teenagers, but in the comments I also notice an older category. Mostly viewers from Ukraine, Russia, Kazakhstan, Belarus and the Republic of Moldova watch my videos.

On how to monetize a TikTok account

Sometimes brand managers offer advertising. But TikTok has its own specifics. No one has the right to integrate products that are not approved by the platform. As for the cost of advertising, it depends on the client; everything is agreed upon individually.

Yulia Lomanova

11th-grade student, Belarus

What she films: humorous sketches, life stories

On how she became popular on TikTok

I have been doing TikTok for more than a year; at first it was just "for fun", and then I got into it. For the last half a year I have been running the account very actively, because I like it. How did success come? Well, it depends on what you count as success. The popularity of my page? I am genuine and self-ironic. I enjoy and get a kick out of what I do. I like to entertain people. I love to play. I am not afraid to show myself as I really am. Now is the perfect time to sign up and promote TikTok, because it's easier now to get into recommendations and gather an audience — later the algorithms will become more complex and it will be like with YouTube. Six months ago it was very easy to get into TikTok recommendations.

On her audience

My audience is Belarus, Ukraine, Russia and other CIS countries. Mostly these are schoolchildren and students under 20.

On how to monetize a TikTok account

There are ways to monetize. For example, hosting live streams and receiving donations. Advertising brands. You can sell anything beautiful and visual. Various brands contact me: advertising for smartphones, contact lenses, musicians ask me to promote a new track. Rates depend on promotion goals. Mostly they are individually negotiated contracts. I promote the pages of other TikTokers, brands, and products I personally like. I have also made a training course on TikTok.