The impending disappearance of TikTok, one of the most popular social media apps in the United States, has sent marketers, agencies and creators racing to embrace alternatives — even if they’re not entirely convinced that TikTok will in fact exit the United States this month.

Marketers are shifting dollars to Instagram and amending their contracts with social media stars so they aren’t stuck paying for sponsored TikTok posts in the app’s absence. Creators are pleading with fans to follow them elsewhere, while collecting their email addresses to connect on other platforms. And talent agents are telling TikTok stars to hit pause on buying a house or car for now.

“I’m just hitting 30 million followers, and 10 days from now I might lose it all,” said Joe Mele, 26, a TikTok star from Long Island, New York, who started posting jokes when he was a college freshman. “It’s a little scary.”

TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, is trying to overturn a law, signed by President Joe Biden in April, that calls for ByteDance to sell the app to a non-Chinese company or face a ban in the United States on Jan. 19. TikTok has claimed a sale is impossible and challenged the law as unconstitutional. It will make its last legal argument in the case Friday before the Supreme Court, after losing its case in a lower court.

TikTok’s disappearance would upend the social media and marketing landscape, routing billions in advertising dollars to rival platforms like Meta’s Instagram and Google’s YouTube and scattering its 170 million monthly U.S. users. TikTok, known for its video feed that quickly adjusts to users’ interests, has become a cultural juggernaut since 2020, giving rise to bestselling books, viral recipes, Billboard 100 hits and even a “Saturday Night Live” cast member.

“This will either be the biggest headline-making nonevent in marketing history or the most shock to the system in the last decade,” said Craig Brommers, chief marketing officer of the retailer American Eagle Outfitters.

Some marketing agencies and creators are taking bigger steps than others to prepare for a potential TikTok ban. Vickie Segar, the founder of Village Marketing, an influencer marketing agency, said her firm’s clients were moving some advertising campaigns to Instagram from TikTok this month so their marketing wouldn’t go dark on Jan. 19.

Lisette Sand-Freedman, a founder of Shadow, a marketing and communications agency, recently started adding language to contracts with creators where there could be a “swapping of channels” if TikTok disappeared. So if a brand’s deal with a creator included, say, three TikTok posts and the app stopped operating in the United States, the brand would be able to switch that to posts on Instagram or another platform of its choice, she said. Many creators post short-form videos and other content to multiple platforms.

TikTok and ByteDance are private and do not publicly disclose their financials. But Brian Wieser, an analyst and founder of the consulting firm Madison and Wall, estimated that TikTok brought in $8 billion in U.S. ad sales last year, excluding e-commerce, tipping and other ventures.

Companies can pay TikTok to run video ads or to send their posts to more viewers. They also often pay to boost posts from creators whom they contract to promote their wares. TikTok also earns a cut of sales from its robust e-commerce business, TikTok Shop, though that initiative has required significant investment from the company in the last year and a half.