2 Most Important TikTok Metrics in 2021

Ever wondered what the most important metric for TikToks algorithm is, or what the best TikTok influencer metric is?

In this post we cover what these metrics are, where to find them or how to calculate them, how to use them, and a rubric for success.

So what are these metrics?

Average Watch Time (AWT) & Views to Follower Percent (VTF%).

Average Watch Time (AWT)

Average Watch Time is the most important metric the TikTok algorithm uses to evaluate how a video performs and is more important than likes, comments, or shares.

The algorithm bases about 50 % of a TikToks performance purely on this metric, then 35% off likes, and 15% on other engagements like comments and shares.

To find the average watch time for a video. Select one of your videos. Select 'more data' in the bottom right corner. Then you'll see it shown within the videos analytics as well as many others.

See below for example.

You can see for this video that it has an AWT of 10 seconds which is strong for a video with a total length of 11 seconds which is why it was pushed to the For You Page (TikToks main content feed).

Optimizing for Average Watch Time

To best optimize for average watch time you should keep videos as short and as engaging as possible. Be sure to cut any unnecessary content or moments so that it just shows the funniest, important parts.

This is because average watch time at different total video lengths are shown differently e.g. 2 videos with the same 10 seconds AWT but one with 12 seconds total and 20 seconds total will be shown differently. Average watch time should be thought about on a percentage basis and the total video length changing what percentage of the video is watched.

VTF% - Views to Follower Percent

Views to follower percent is the best way to show how engaged a content creators audience is. This is valuable when identifying potential influencers for a TikTok campaign and generally how invested a creators audience is.

VTF% Calculation

VTF% is calculated by the following:

1. Taking the average number of views across an accounts 8 last posts,

2. dividing that by the number of followers the account has,

3. x 100.

Lets have a look at the All Blacks TikTok account as an example who have 252k followers.

Their past 8 videos recorded:

130k + 304k + 91k + 85k + 347k + 425k + 71.9k + 114k = 1,567k / 8 = 195k

195k / 252k = 0.773 x 100 = 77.3%

The All Blacks have a VTF% of 77.3% which is excellent for an account and demonstrates a very engaged audience.

When using this calculation to identify how engaged a content creators audience is, you should use the following rubric.