Tumblr's Go-Forward Strategy Hints at a Potential TikTok-Like Experience for Creators and Users
Tumblr
Tumblr published a lengthy memo, providing users with an inside look at its strategy for increasing its user base and securing its future. According to the memo, one of the main issues with the platform is its core experience, which is not user-friendly. To address this and drive growth, Tumblr outlined guiding principles that it will focus on. Here’s an overview of them:
Expand the ways that users can discover and sign up for Tumblr by improving SEO practices so that people who come to Tumblr through search engines have a consistent experience that also encourages them to sign up for the platform. This includes potentially experimenting with showing users a wide range of content that exists across the platform.
Provide high-quality content when users open the app by making it easier for users to search and access content related to their interests and passions and improving the algorithmic ranking across its different feeds.
Facilitate easier user participation in conversations by eliminating the confusion within engagement actions such as replies and reblogs, allowing engagements on individual replies and reblogs, and helping users follow along with conversations within a reblog thread.
Retain and grow the creator base by providing creators with the right tools, helping creators get their content in front of people who may be most interested, incentivizing creators to post, and helping creators collaborate with others, such as adding the ability to embed Tumblr links in posts.
Create patterns that encourage users to keep coming back to Tumblr through more personalized messaging around push notifications and engagement and less spammy content.
Improve performance, stability, and quality of the platform by resolving bugs, increasing the app-loading speed, and launching new features faster.
In addition, during a follow-up live stream with CEO Matt Mullenweg and COO Zandy Ring, where the executives answered questions from Tumblr users, it was revealed that the platform is losing $30 million annually.
Although unexpected, Tumblr's transparency regarding its issues is not necessarily surprising since it is rarely discussed in conversations about social media platforms, other than some gimmick moves like allowing users to purchase blue checkmarks in response to Twitter. While Tumblr has attempted to capitalize on users leaving Twitter and Reddit, it is unknown how successful these efforts have been, and they are not effective strategies for Tumblr or any platform.
With all of this being said, the memo hints at some big changes that may be coming to Tumblr in the near future. These changes will be worth keeping an eye on, as Tumblr has a unique culture among its user base that differs from platforms like Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube. As a result, Tumblr will face some challenges as it makes changes. To address these challenges, it will be vital for Tumblr to incorporate feedback from its users and be as transparent as possible.
Based on its focus areas of providing high-quality content to users and retaining and growing its creator base, it's likely that Tumblr will roll out some type of TikTok-like experience. This experience will probably serve personalized content to users while also helping creators with enhanced visibility and discovery. Although this may receive pushback from its core users, it is likely key to Tumblr's long-term success, especially if it wants to compete with the major platforms. If it can provide enough value for everyday users and creators, that will open up the opportunity for it to increase its advertising revenue to get itself out of the red.
