How did the celebrity magazine “Gala” end up in the top three of the most followed media outlets in the world on TikTok?

With more than 10 million subscribers on the Chinese application, the French press title is ahead of the media giants. Explanations.

Who would have thought that a French celebrity magazine would one day be in the top three of the most followed media outlets in the world on TikTok? Gala has just crossed the 10 million subscriber mark on the Chinese application.

Above Gala, in the ranking, we find two American channels. ESPN, unattainable, with 44 million subscribers, and Nickelodeon, 14 million. Gala On the other hand, it is ahead of very powerful brands like MTV and Discovery.

But how is this possible? How can a French weekly with 123,000 sales on newsstands, which is aimed at people over 35, have such results on young people’s favorite platform?

A recipe… simple

It all started in December 2019, Gala was present at the Ballon d’Or ceremony in Paris and had the idea of ​​filming the football stars, not on the red carpet and in front of the photocall where all the journalists were crowding, but just before or just after or from a different angle from the others. For example, for Lionel Messi, the reporter positioned himself behind his family, so we can see his children. This is the recipe Gala : sequences off the beaten track. With the most basic equipment: a simple iPhone, in order to give the public the feeling of experiencing the event up close with the celebrities and going to places where they do not usually have access.

From the launch, there were millions of views. Unfortunately, Covid arrived a few months later. No more glamorous and celebrity meetings… However, the Gala editorial team was agile in posting previously unused archives. This is how the young generation around the world started following this French account.

Since then, nearly 7,000 videos have been published with this simple but effective formula: raw images, without editing, without comments. Some exceed 100 million views. And contrary to what you might think, men are interested: they represent 47% of the public. A third of subscribers are between 24 and 34 years old. Only around 20% are French.

However, if the brand has gained notoriety, readers are not flocking to Gala.fr. Neither sales of the magazine nor of paper subscriptions have increased. It’s not the same audience who follows the brand on TikTok, who buys it on newsstands or who goes to the website. Each format is therefore complementary and makes the title one of the few profitable in the magazine category. Hence the disappointment of the Prisma group, a subsidiary of Vivendi, at having had to separate from it last November, forced by Brussels, so that Vincent Bolloré could buy Lagardère. It is now Le Figaro which has this nugget in its purse.