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Originally found over 150 years ago on a Pennsylvania oilfield, the modest tin of Vaseline could hardly be considered an obvious target for digital platform algorithms.

However, its rise as a viral TikTok topic has positioned it at the vanguard of an promotional upheaval, where major corporations are spending big on content creators and reducing expenditure on marketing items in legacy broadcasters.

A Journey from Drilling to Digital

Originally produced in the 1870s by chemist Robert Cheeseborough, who saw laborers applying to their skin with a byproduct of the drilling process. Today, a spree of amateur-created clips have chronicled its broad application in “practical tricks”.

It has been touted as a remedy for cleaning shoes or extending perfume longevity, and also a remedy for squeaky doors. Users have even applied it to combat the nuisance of chip seasoning clinging to fingers.

Harnessing the Hype

Detecting the product’s new life online, strategists within the corporation amplified the hacks by tasking their in-house experts with verification and providing creators with the outcome data.

Claims that Vaseline reduced the burn from hot food on the lips were given the thumbs up. So too were ideas it could lengthen scent duration and restore leather handbags. Suggestions it could bleach teeth or make eyelashes longer were disproven.

A Plan Built on ‘Social Listening’

Billboards and TV ads would once have been the cornerstone of its marketing push. Yet this viral episode has persuaded leaders to turbocharge spending on content creators.

This monitoring of online platforms to shape commercial tactics has been dubbed “social listening”. Unilever's CEO, freshly instated, has indicated the goal is to spend a full fifty percent of its huge ad budget on digital creator content.

Evolving With Audience Behavior

Selina Sykes, who is leading the online push, said the company was merely adjusting to novel methods of engaging audiences. She said participating on platforms “without dampening the fun” was paramount.

“What is the key to genuine brand integration? That’s always what we’ve been trying to do as brands, since the era of community gossip and talking about what they used.

“There’s this moving away from a one-to-many model, where we would just broadcast out … Currently, it's countless discussions, diverse communities. The shift of the algorithms means that these communities feel niche, but they’re not.

“If you can make sure your brand is shared by consumers, recommended by peers, this builds credibility and connection. Creators are critical to that. This word-of-mouth strategy is being amplified.”

A Fundamental Consumption Turn

The approach indicates seismic changes occurring in how media is consumed, with Gen Z and millennial audiences devoting greater hours to social media platforms than legacy broadcast and print media.

The shift is reflected in falling revenues for traditional media advertising. In the UK, commercial funding for major broadcasters have declined by over six hundred million pounds in inflation-adjusted terms since 2019.

The Creator Economy Boom

It also reflects a media convergence as brands effectively act as media producers, collaborating with hundreds of content creators to promote their goods.

A commercial director at a major talent agency said: “Clearly, there is a migration of viewers away from some legacy media and they’re spending a lot more time on Instagram, TikTok and YouTube than they are consuming linear broadcasts or printed matter.

“Many companies report to us consumers have more faith in suggestions from the personalities they subscribe to more than they trust ads. It's an ongoing shift.”

He added firms may also cut expenditures by focusing on influencers over large-scale legacy ad buys, which also allows them to tweak their content more easily to see what works.

The approach is growing. Marketing investment on the creator economy is rising at quadruple the rate than total media spending. Across the United States, it has more than doubled since 2021 and is projected to reach tens of billions in 2025.

TV's Lasting Role

Despite the huge changes, experts said they believed TV advertising still had a prominent role to play, as broadcasters retained the power to frame public debate.

The executive noted: “One of the highest return-on-investment media opportunities is still the Super Bowl. It’s not about those broadcasters saying: ‘Our relevance has faded.’ The focus is on who seizes focus … I think there’s 100% a place for them.”