Scrolling Your Way to Packaging Success

November 9, 2022

How many of you, after a long day at work, find yourself reaching for the phone to catch up on all your social media feeds? You fix a snack, put your feet up, and start the endless scrolling—or at least as much as you can get to before someone asks when supper is going to be ready.

We sure do! Whether it’s Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, Reddit, or LinkedIn, there’s a lot to choose from for updates on Aunt Carol’s garden, the new job your second cousin once removed just got, or your sports team’s daily stats. So, believe us when we say we understand any resistance to adding yet another app to the mix when there are already too many to keep up with.

However, we do think you need to get one more: TikTok. While TikTok has been around since 2016, it forged a strong presence in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic and has yet to slow down, with more than 1 billion users and 200 million downloads in the United States alone. We know that doesn’t mean you need it, but keep reading.

For those new to the TikTok world—we’re just now getting caught up—it’s a social media platform that first made its mark with video content of catchy dance choreography and lip-sync routines. However, the platform has evolved to include other forms of content such as comedy, baking, food, sports, motion graphics, DIY, animals, facial treatments, and many more.

Wanting to move beyond strictly entertainment purposes, TikTok partnered with creators across their platforms to form the #LearnOnTikTok campaign, which highlights the app’s most exciting and unexpected features. Alongside its own creators and organizations, TikTok collaborates with notable experts in their fields, such as Bill Nye, to bring informative and inspirational content to its billions of users.

Now, we’ve got you up to speed on the ins and outs of the TikTok world, but you’re probably still wondering what this has to do with the packaging world. Interestingly enough, TikTok has taken the marketing and advertising world by storm—completely changing the way brands and organizations share content with their target audiences. Because TikTok is an easily adopted tool, businesses and organizations have begun using it in a variety of ways to interact with their customers in a laid-back, less commercial approach, such as participating in TikTok challenges, posting about their locations with captions and hashtags, and using branded effects (e.g., games, stickers, filters, special effects) to offer a more engaging experience.

Never one to miss out on an exciting marketing opportunity, The Packaging School (TPS) recently jumped on board. We started a TikTok account a few months ago to raise awareness of our online packaging courses and certificate programs. As of now, we have 174 videos on the platform proclaiming the awesomeness of packaging through 15-second video clips. And we’re already seeing some great traction.

To take things a step further, we partnered with Cory Connors, sustainable packaging consultant at Landsberg Orora in Portland, Oregon, to create a superb course introducing packaging professionals to TikTok. Connors has been in the packaging industry for 25 years, and his focus is on helping companies become more sustainable with their packaging. Working in a Weyerhaeuser corrugated production facility helped Connors pay his way through college while helping him understand the nuances of corrugated in the sustainability sector. He is the host of a sustainable packaging podcast in which he chats with industry leaders about sustainable packaging options, new products, and ways we can each make a difference in packaging sustainability. His TikTok account, @corygated, has more than 75,700 followers, 1.7 million likes, and more than 1,500 videos.

Working as a subject matter expert and instructor with TPS, Connors helped us build an engaging course on the importance of social media in the packaging space—specifically, how TikTok can be used to level up your packaging organization and how to create impactful videos for your audience. The course is about an hour long and is broken up into bite-size lessons that can be engaged with on any device, anywhere, anytime—catering to adult learning styles and their busy schedules. An added bonus—the course sells for only $49, making it light on your wallet, too!

What’s holding you back from joining the TikTok revolution? Take the leap, and if you don’t know where to start, check out this amazing course today at bit.ly/3CLvKCU.