‘We were in awe’: Viral TikTok video delivers 20M+ views to promote marine navigation app

By Breana Ross

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    BALTIMORE (WBAL) — A Harford County man’s boating app is cruising to a new level of success after a little help from his daughter and a whole lot of TikTok users.

It took just 12 seconds for millions of people to see Jeff Foulk’s hard work. The Havre de Grace business owner has been trying to get the word out about his boat navigation app for three years. So, his daughter spread the word to more than 20 million people on TikTok.

The TikTok video shows Foulk dressed up in his company’s gear, determined to hand out fliers even as people passed him by. That video pulled on millions of heartstrings and inspired people to help.

“I’ve just been overwhelmed with the outpouring of support,” Foulk said.

Four years ago, Foulk created Argo, a free marine navigation app to help boaters like him. It’s the product of a dream 10 years in the making.

“There’s so much information that we don’t know about where to go, where not to go, and to have the power of getting that information on an app is kind of what I wanted to do,” Foulk said.

Ever since, Foulk has gone to dozens of local boat shows to hand out fliers. In January, he tried his luck at a boat show in Chicago.

“It was slow. You do get a lot of negative, ‘No, no, not interested.’ And, people just walk by,” Foulk said.

His daughter, Megan, captured that in a 12-second TikTok video, asking people to support her father’s app — and did they ever.

“Once it started to get 5,000 views, and then, just steadily kept going, I was like, this is going to just go somewhere really cool,” Megan Foulk said.

“When it hit hundreds of thousands of views, and the next morning, 1 million views, we were in awe. It was amazing,” Jeff Foulk said.

And, those views turned into customers and millions of app downloads.

“It crashed the app for a little while,” Jeff Foulk said. “I told my developer, ‘I thought we were ready for this?’ And, they said, ‘Yeah, we were ready for the boating season. We were not ready for TikTok in a couple of million people jumping on the app.'”

“I feel like a lot of people overlook social media as a really great tool, especially TikTok. Like, TikTok, the people on TikTok want to help other out,” Megan Foulk said.

Jeff Foulk told 11 News he’s excited to use his newfound popularity to help more boaters.

“I’m really looking forward to getting this in the hands of as many boaters as I can and making their boating life safer and more fun when they were out on the water,” Jeff Foulk said.

The app is free but they have premium features that go for $20 a year.

For a few days, Argo was the No. 1 navigation app in the app store — ahead of Google Maps and Waze. More than 20,000 people reviewed the app, bringing it up to a five-star rating. Jeff Foulk said he will keep using social media as a tool to grow his business.

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