Lemon8 is a social media platform for video and photos where users’ interest in food, beauty, wellness, and travel can come alive. TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, has in recent months been making its Instagram-like app to become more visible in the US market.
Actually, Lemon8 is not a new app in the market; it is only new to US social media users. Lemon8 toped number one spot on the App store for lifestyle apps, within one week after it was launched. The number one spot in this category is a big jump from an app that never reached the Top 200 Overall Charts in the US prior to last month, according to TechCrunch.
Social media influencers; specifically on TikTok, have described the app as if “Instagram and Pinterest had a baby,” with each influencer echoing the words of another. And a report from the New York Times confirmed that ByteDance paid influencers and gave them specific guidelines to post on the app and promote help them advertise the app.
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What is Lemon8? Is Lemon8 Legit?
Lemon8 is a video and photo sharing social media application. Unlike TikTok, It doesn’t support vertical video scrolling, and the content created on the app is based on a particular niche. The trending topics on the app are usually fashion, beauty, food, wellness, and travel. You will also see suggestions, recommendations, and well written contents.
Lemon8 is designed such that Fashion influencers using the app can “tag” where they bought their clothes and its correspondent price. The app resembles Instagram such that the contents curated are focused towards influencing your choice of products to go for.
Watch this video to know more about the app:
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Instagram is famous for “contrived spontaneity,” or the idea that a perfect moment or photo occurred naturally. Spectators are now more aware that some of the contents they consume on Instagram is edited or staged in some way, which has recently driven some users away from the app.
But those who enjoy aesthetically pleasing content can find it on Lemon8, free of the things they don’t like about Instagram’s interface.
Who owns Lemon8?
Lemon8 is owned by the same company that owns TikTok, ByteDance. Lemon8 is ByteDance’s little secret concept of trying to compete with the US-based Instagram, an app slowly losing its relevance among American users. ByteDance is very hopeful that Lemon8 can influence users to migrate from Instagram since it s Tiktok is the Top social media app in the US.
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Just of recent, the US government has made proposed legislation that it is considering banning Chinese social media sites in the US, due to national security concerns. Last month, US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy told NBC News that the House “will be moving forward” with legislation banning apps owned by foreign companies.
So now the thing here is, Lemon8 is at high risk if it pushes for the top spot, its fate will be at just as much risk in the US as its sister company, TikTok. However, Lemon8’s success in United States’ markets can do one of two things: Lobby creators to encourage politicians to ignore making any law that would ban TikTok and Lemon8 or encourage the government to act quicker.
Watch this video to know more about the app:
Why is Lemon8 growing so popular?
Lemon8 is in direct competition with “Little RED Book” in English originally called Xiaohongshu. In China, Little Red Book controls a large share of China’s social networking and e-commerce market, and Lemon8 is positive to replicate such popularity in the West.
As at now, Lemon8 is already widely used in Japan and Thailand, where Little Red Book isn’t famous in the lifestyle app category. Influencers on Lemon8 can link their TikTok and Instagram accounts to broaden their social media presence. Lemon8 hasn’t produced any popular influencers yet, although it can boast of many micro-influencers; influencers with 900-3,000 followers on Instagram or TikTok.Â
Most of the posts you will come across on Lemon8 ends with the #Lemon8partner caption, indicating that Lemon8 paid creators to start posting on the app to manufacture the platform’s popularity. These influencers have also started converting their followers from TikTok to lemon8.
Lemon8 vs. TikTok: Which is better for you to join?
Just like every other social media app, Lemon8 and TikTok both allow creators to create varieties of contents for the benefits of the audience. It is quiet rare is find someone who is not a renown personality or successful across Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok there.Â
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Lemon8 is leveraging on influencers for making it more visible than its sister app, TikTok, which relies on the creation of lovable contents. Just like what we see on Instagram, Lemon8 influencers will probably get tokens by a brand or company to sample their clothes or promote a particular products to the audience.
The kinds of niches you’ll find on TikTok range from cooking, dancing, comedy skits, educational content, or just showcasing ones personality. This is basically what influencers us to keep their audience engaged, and since the contents are served in video formats, influencers on TikTok can convince their audience that their content is more natural. Also, TikTok creators make money based on how many views their videos or live streams receive.
So in inclusion, depending on what you intend to achieve, you can make your choice using the comparism provided above.
Here is everything you need to know about lemon8
How Lemon8 content creators seek to engage their fans?
There is increasingly a large number of creators on Lemon8 who create “aesthetic” content. This are contents that have been perfectly created to showcase only the beautiful part of one’s life. But looking being a unique brand, even as the app continues to gain more popularity in the market, it seeks to deliver authentic contents to its audience.
But there are some creators who now fancy “recreating” their old contents from TikTok by creating short videos about topics that fall outside the fashion, beauty, or wellness topics on Lemon8. And if these contents could perfom well on TikTok then it is believed to replicate same energy on Lemon8.
So far, famous individuals having millions of social media followers haven’t migrated to the app. If I’m to guess, it could be for these reasons: Lemon8 won’t formally launch in the US until May. The Lemon8 app is currently available for download, but maybe top creators are gearing up for the official launch.
Another thing that could be restricting the massive migration to Lemon8 app for influencers is simply because they are not sure yet how to monetize their contents. Also, I believe that marketers could be hesitant to invest in Lemon8 just yet because of its link to ByteDance and the volatile relationship the company has with the US government.
How to use Lemon8 as a brand: Watch video belowÂ
My Final Thought
Lemon8 is in its infancy but has the potential to be a prominent contender in the US social media market. Some creators hope that being an early adopter will give them an edge in the app’s monetization policy once it officially launches.Â
