Launched in October 2020, the objective of the Prime Video TikTok account was to attract a younger target audience of 13-20 year olds, on a platform where brands are still having difficulty adapting to the specific codes. There are many young people from the “banlieues”, the suburbs outside Paris, within this target group. These areas are commonly associated with the ills of French society and problems linked with immigration. And the young people who live there consequently seem disconnected from other youths in France. But, with TikTok, they can share a common space, where they can express themselves and interact with other people. For Prime Video this represented a great opportunity to share a whole new vision of youth today and convey a message of hope and inclusion.
Describe the creative idea
To attract a younger audience and to stand out right from the start on this new platform, Prime Video did what it does best: it created a series. A new genre of series: the first 100% TikTok series.
It was called “Cités” and respected the platform’s codes and audience. It’s an ode to youth and to France’s cultural heritage and aims at demonstrating that the two are not disconnected. “Cités” conveys a message of hope and inclusion.
It’s made up of 12 one-minute episodes (the maximum length allowed on TikTok), in which we follow the everyday lives of various young people, who live their lives to the beat of quotations from French celebrities (musicians, authors, poets, etc), whose words have never sounded as true as they do today. The casting, filming, editing and post-production, i.e. every single step of the production, was carried out directly on TikTok,
Describe the strategy
To reach and recruit this young audience (of 13-20 year olds), a generation that is always looking for new forms of entertainment and experiences, Prime Video wanted to directly involve them in the production process. They were therefore given the chance to take part in the casting, by participating in a TikTok challenge a month before the shoot.
Each episode was designed to represent youth in all its diversity, using codes specific to TikTok, such as filters, effects, transitions, references, challenges, music, dance, etc.
And finally, to direct the series, Prime Video chose Abd Al Malik, the famous rapper, poet and director, and even Officer of Arts and Letters, who is particularly involved with French youth (the TikTok audience) with regard to inclusion and diversity.
Describe the execution
Every single step of the production of “Cités” was carried out directly on TikTok. First of all, the casting one month before the shoot (via a TikTok challenge that recorded more than 45 000 participations to become actors in the series). The episodes were filmed using an iPhone and all the editing and post-production (transitions, effects, filters, etc.) were of course done using the platform’s integrated tools. In the form of a premiere, the series aired for the first time via a TikTok live stream which was watched by more than 59K real time viewers. The 12 episodes were then uploaded as one to TikTok via a dedicated H5 page and accessible for a week, before becoming permanently available on Prime Video France’s TikTok account.
List the results
+27M views for the episodes in 1 week.
+100 articles in the press, in more than 10 countries.
+12 national TV mentions including TV NEWS and 3 talk shows.
3 national press covers
10 national radio mentions including a 50-minute report on Europe 1, the most listened to radio in France.
At the end of March 2021, Cités will be broadcast live on the public TV channel “culturebox" during the national festival “Spring of poetry”
+45k participations in the casting via the TikTok challenge launched earlier and 105M hashtag views
+45k followers of the Prime Video TikTok account in the first week, a rise of 20%!
+60K real time viewers for the TikTok premiere