Planning your music promotion for 2023? Short-form video should be part of your plans.

Short-form video consumption exploded across social platforms in 2022, and TikTok was the poster child of detonation. Dubbed by The Washington Post as the platform that “ate the internet,” TikTok has 1 billion users worldwide, and users spend an average of 46 minutes per day on the platform.

Though TikTok made headlines, the other major short-form video platforms lit up equally impressive or better numbers in 2022.

YouTube Shorts Had a Slammin’ Year

According to Music Week, YouTube Shorts ripped it up with 30 billion views per day (up 400% from 2021), causing music executives like Kevin Lipson (Republic Records) and Arjun Pulijal (Capitol Music Group) to hail short-form video as integral to record company marketing strategies, social presence, and album campaigns.

Shorts also doesn’t fall short on daily time spent by users on the platform. YouTube Shorts users spend an average of 45 minutes per day on the platform, and Shorts beat TikTok’s user numbers with roughly 2 billion users worldwide.

Reels Also Racked Up the Numbers

Reels have become Instagram’s fastest-growing feature worldwide (eclipsing Stories). Instagram users (roughly 2 billion) spend an average of 30 minutes per day on the platform (roughly equaling Facebook), and according to Hootsuite, 9 out of 10 users watch Instagram videos weekly.

User Demographics

TikTok Demographics

  • 57% of TikTok users identify as female and 43% identify as male.
  • 18- to 24-year-olds make up TikTok’s largest user age group.
  • 25- to 34-year-olds make up TikTok’s second largest user age group.

YouTube Demographics

  • 54% of YouTube users identify as male and 46% identify as female.
  • 25- to 34-year-olds make up YouTube’s largest user age group.
  • 35- to 44-year-olds make up YouTube’s second largest user age group.

Instagram Demographics

  • 52% of Instagram users identify as female and 48% identify as male.
  • 24- to 34-year-olds make up Instagram’s largest user age group.
  • 18- to 24-year-olds make up Instagram’s second largest user age group.

Given the reach and engagement of short-form videos and their user demographics, short-form video has unsurprisingly become a simple and effective way for musicians to reach more fans, attract audiences, and generate streams and music sales, and more musicians are certainly planning to use short-form video in 2023.

To expedite your own short-form video promotions in the year ahead, Digital Music News offers some solid, simple advice to save time and eliminate hassle.

Instead of creating separate content for each platform, create one piece of content that works on TikTok, Reels, and Shorts. “Consumers on all three platforms,” writes Digital Music News, “seem to enjoy the same type of content, and not everyone uses all three platforms.”

Here’s to improving discovery of your music in the year ahead.