EXCLUSIVE: TikTok announced plans to deepen its ties with the British film and TV industry at an event hosted by BAFTA this week in London.
The Chinese social media giant is an official partner of the BAFTA Television Awards on Sunday, where creator Charley Marlowe will be stationed to host the awards body’s TikTok red carpet coverage.
TikTok also unveiled plans to launch Spotlight in the UK, a service that allows broadcasters and studios to tap into the fandoms and viral conversations around their shows. Netflix recently used Spotlight, which launched in the U.S. in August 2024, to build hype around Black Mirror, with the TikTok account for Charlie Brooker’s drama reaching more than 400,000 followers in less than two weeks.
Deadline sat down with Dominic Burns, Head of Operations at TikTok UK, Ireland, and Nordics, to talk more about the ByteDance-owned company’s entertainment ambitions. Burns is a former NBC Universal and Fremantle executive.
He spoke about the potential of Spotlight for the UK’s film and TV industries, the safeguarding of younger users, pressure of bans in the U.S. and beyond, as well as its partnership with the Cannes Film Festival. The interview has been edited for length and clarity.
DEADLINE: You’ve just announced that you’re launching TikTok Spotlight in the UK. Can you tell me how it will enhance the already existing film and TV content on the platform?
DOMINIC BURNS: Entertainment is one of the biggest categories on TikTok, and the thing I love about how Spotlight has been developed is that we’ve identified and assessed a pattern of behavior that is quite specific to our platform. We know that broadcasters, TV studios and movie studios recognize the benefit of the noise and conversation that often happens on TikTok, but they don’t have the ability to directly turn that into value for their businesses. So, we’ve developed a toolkit that has different parts to it.
I think the most understated and valuable part of Spotlight is its ability to identify the scale and size through data and analytics. No other platform will provide this sort of insight into fandom because not only does it give studios the dimensions and status of the conversation, but also helps them get notified about it in real time. Rather than being aware that a wave has just passed and wondering how the spike in box office happened, you will know the noise is happening on TikTok.
A second thing is the ability to identify these fan pieces of content and apply an anchor link that directs you straight back to the box office and to streaming platforms, so that it becomes genuinely beneficial eyeballs that you can attribute to TikTok. That is the core of the proposition.
DEADLINE: It sounds like a useful tool for entertainment marketers to tap into a younger audience. How have studios capitalized on it in the past, like in the U.S.?
BURNS: There are ways in which we can curate fandom and incentivize the community to express their fandom. And, for the very biggest IP, that’s part of the toolkit we offer through Spotlight. We launched this in the U.S. with Warner Bros. for Dune: Part 2, and it was said to make a major contribution to the marketing success of that particular movie. Also, in the TV or streaming space, we’ve done stuff with Bridgerton, with Netflix, and with HBO’s House of the Dragon.
For Venom: The Last Dance, we had an amazing result. There were Easter Eggs linked to comments and videos to encourage engagement around specific content. One video got over 21 million comments, which is the most any video on TikTok has ever achieved. It’s that type of engagement that we’re trying to generate and using all the different ways in which people engage with the platform to drive that interest and conversation.
DEADLINE: One of your most prominent partnerships, which is why we’re here today, is the one that you have with BAFTA. How do you see that collaboration benefiting the way that Spotlight rolls out in the UK?
BURNS: It’s a way of making it known to the broader TV and film population that we support them, and that we see TikTok as a place for TV and film content to exist. We recognize that TV and film makes a massive contribution to our community, but we also recognize that increasingly our community makes a very significant contribution to the success of those industries. BAFTA is the perfect synthesis of that relationship and the formalizing of it.
There is an organic conversation that happens once a show or a movie releases, but it’s really important that this also works alongside formalized marketing activity that the studio or the broadcaster undertakes. Traditionally, that happens in a slightly different time frame, which is much more controlled in terms of the messaging that it’s providing. It’s a really exciting time to be at TikTok and to see the way in which we can work with these platforms and studios to move to an entirely new level.
DEADLINE: A big concern with social media generally is the safeguarding of users, mainly younger ones, from harmful or inappropriate content. For example, Australia recently passed a law that bans anyone under the age of 16 from using social media. What practices do you have in place in order to ensure their safety?
BURNS: We have a suite of products in place to help parents and our community. Remember that we’re a 13+ platform and any accounts that we discover to be on the platform that are younger than that age are removed or blocked. We work with all the local entities to ensure that we have a responsible approach to supporting parents and young people on the platform. For example, limits on the amount of time they can spend on the platform. It’s an area that we take incredibly seriously.
DEADLINE: Although TikTok is one of the most popular social media platforms in the world, there has been a lot of pressure in the U.S. with several attempts at banning it. And in the UK, a couple years ago, it was banned on government phones. What are your thoughts on that? And what kind of steps have you taken over the past two years to diminish those fears in the UK?
BURNS: In the U.S., we are in discussions with the administration. It seems to be in an incredibly positive space and there is a real will on both sides to ensure that TikTok remains in that country. We’re very positive and confident about the future of TikTok in the U.S.
In the UK and EMEA more broadly, we’ve spent over $12 billion on Project Clover, which is our new secure data process, ensuring that the data of our users is protected and housed in Europe and the U.S. We are constantly working on the trust and safety side of our business; it’s one of the parts of our business that has the most employees and the most investment. It’s something that we take incredibly seriously so that the community can thrive, enjoy the platform and the positivity that it brings to so many lives and so many businesses increasingly.
DEADLINE: Moving back to TikTok’s involvement in film and TV. There have been a few initiatives in scripted content, such as the Short Film Competition, which took place at the Cannes Film Festival over the past three years. Why is that an important collaboration for you?
BURNS: It’s us working with one of the most reputable film festivals in the world and also trying to demonstrate a way in which there’s a direct relevance between the content that was flowing through that festival and our platform. And actually, that particular competition was introduced at a time when we were seeing a real surge in longer-form content on the platform. I believe it was introduced shortly after we had increased the time that you could post a video from 1 minute max to 5 minutes, and we’re now even longer than that. That has been a very organic change that’s happened on the platform.
The relationship continues this year, we are still a formalized partner of the Cannes Film Festival. You will see TikTok growing its relationship with the film and television community and all of the most reputable events around the world. This is part of solidifying this relationship because we believe that we are the preeminent platform for TV and film content, and that’s just part of our commitment back to the industry.
DEADLINE: Will scripted content become a big part of your content strategy?
BURNS: It’s not formally now. The impact of scripted on our screen is huge, which will be a part of how our community digests that content and then reproduces their version of it. But no, we don’t have any formalized strategies in encouraging longer form or scripted content on the platform.
Who knows what the future holds? TikTok will, as it has always done, let the community decide what direction the app goes in. But right now there’s no formalized strategy on our side in that area.
DEADLINE: What type of film and TV content performs best on the app?
BURNS: On the TV side, it depends entirely on the show, and the way in which it engenders conversation. For example, the last series of The White Lotus‘ broadcast window ended a month or so ago, but there is still a surge in the content around forecasting what the next cast list will be for the next series. That’s something that only happens around that particular show.
One of the real beneficial outputs I see from from Spotlight, having worked a part of my career in the TV production sector, is that production companies will be able to understand more about what is happening with their classic catalog brands that may even give them evidence for a recommission or for a renewal of that brand to bring it back to TV because those shows are constantly being recycled and brought back.
On the movie side, it won’t surprise you to hear that the huge juggernauts engender a lot of conversation and fandom. As I said earlier, the nature and the actual subject matter of that fan conversation is impossible to predict. The marketer that can identify that in advance and really get that right every single time is gonna be worth it. We’re hoping that Spotlight gives them the toolkit to be much better and helps them take advantage of that noise when it happens.
