TikTok Marketing 101: Tips, Tricks, and Examples That Will Make Your Business Go Viral!
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It’s a beautiful Saturday morning! And like most grown-ups on the weekend, it’s time to work on your side hustle. 31-year-old Bradie gets out his power tools, mounts the ladder on the side of his house, and goes up to the roof. He cranks up the latest Meghan Trainor jam (I Made You Look) and get’s down to serious business! He’s got his trendy daddy shorts, a pair of sneakers, a headband, and a dash of sass! Nothing will hold him back from creating the best TikTok for this challenge. Not even the nosey 92-year-old neighbor who’s staring out of her window in shock as he vigorously swings his hips!
The TikTok craze has taken over!
TikTok is the fastest-growing social media platform, with over a billion monthly users and a billion hours of video watch time daily. [1] Everyone is on it! And the unprecedented potential reach and engagement make it a goldmine for businesses that want to expand their horizons and get in front of more customers.
In this post, we discuss everything you need to know about TikTok marketing, including the benefits, what you need to get started, and best practices. Additionally, we’ll show you notable examples of brands that are creating kick-ass content and winning on TikTok.
Article Overview
• Getting Started with TikTok Marketing
• What Type of Ads Can You Create on TikTok?
• Best Practices For TikTok Marketing
• Best Examples of High Quality TikTok Marketing
What is TikTok?
TikTok is a video-sharing social media platform that allows users to create and share video content. Users can create a video as short as 15 seconds and as long as 10 minutes on any subject. TikTok has a global presence but has a separate app for the Chinese market known as Douyin. TikTok users range from 18 to over 55 years old, with the majority age being 18 – 34-year-olds.
TikTok has evolved massively since its launch and has created an opportunity for creators in different industries to join. It’s no longer just about music. You can find comedians, skateboarders, dancers, fashionistas, beauticians, knitters, and other enthusiasts on the platform. Now, more than ever, influencers are sharing their lifestyle routines on TikTok, including the products they use, which has opened up the stage for TikTok marketing.
So, what exactly is TikTok marketing?
TikTok marketing, in simple terms, is using TikTok to promote a brand, product, or service. It can take different forms, including organic content, TikTok advertising, and influencer marketing. Developing an understanding TikTok marketing can help you create viral content and set you up for success!
Why Choose TikTok?
Apart from being the new shiny object in the social media world, TikTok offers some serious advantages that can help your business level up and set itself apart from the competition. Here are five reasons why you should consider TikTok for your business.
1. Easy Connection With Customers
Customers are on the hunt for authentic brands they connect with, and video is one of the best ways to showcase authenticity. Positioning your brand as approachable and genuine using TikTok will form a lasting impression on your customers, which will result in more engagement and brand loyalty. While you may be a serious, professional business, leveraging humor and pop culture trends will help you connect with a broader demographic.
Of course, you should stick to your brand’s core functions and values, but you also do not need to be boring. There’s a level of humor and relevance that can be tapped into within every brand’s expression.
2. More Reach
TikTok has the highest reach and engagement among all social media platforms. TikTok micro-influencers have an average engagement rate of 17.96% on TikTok compared to 3.86% on Instagram and 1.63% on YouTube. It is, thus, easier to grow your business on TikTok compared to other platforms. Contrary to other social media platforms, TikTok promotes what users love and engage with. This means your video content can go viral with zero followers as long as it is exciting and engaging.
If you are a global business, TikTok is the ideal platform to reach an international audience. It’s also the best place to reach the millennial and Gen-Z audience.
3. Go Viral
The absolute advantage of growing your business on TikTok is the ability to go viral with any number of followers at any time. As we mentioned earlier, it is possible to create a new account, post a single video and wake up to millions of views the next day if your content is engaging enough.
This virality has helped creators on TikTok to grow massive followings which makes them a safe bet when growing your brand. You can get an influencer to push your products or services in a highly targeted way. According to data, more marketers are using TikTok influencers for brand awareness and sales efforts. However, choosing an influencer on Tiktok can be complicated. That’s why TikTok created the TikTok Creator Marketplace, where brands can find specific influencers to partner with. You can see an influencer’s engagement rate, views, reach, demographics, and more.
4. Reach Across Multiple Platforms
TikTok videos don’t always just remain on TikTok. Due to their virality, they are shared by viewers on Instagram, Twitter, Whatsapp, and other platforms. That’s the beauty of TikTok marketing. You can create one video that reaches multiple different audience segments across different platforms.
Apart from user sharing, you can easily repurpose your TikTok videos and use them on all social media platforms. You can also compress them and add them to your emails to change things up a bit. Additionally, you can use your TikToks as Instagram stories or publish them on your website. There’s no end to how creative you can get with your videos!
However, if you intend on repurposing your videos, we recommend recording them on your native phone camera. That’s because you can be penalized by Meta (Facebook) if your videos have TikTok visual watermarks. Also, ensure your messaging is cohesive on all channels to avoid confusing your audiences. Your brand message and imagery should be consistent and cohesive across all channels.
5. Cost-Effective
Many business owners are weary of spending time and money on TikTok marketing, but it is undoubtedly one of the best platforms to get into if you’re focused on growth. You can succeed on TikTok with any budget size, and it is also easier for lesser-known brands to make a splash using organic reach.
To illustrate this point, Katy Lucey, Director of Paid Social at Tinuiti says, “With engagement becoming more costly on Facebook, brands should look to emerging social channels for more affordable growth opportunities. This is why it’s necessary to diversify your media mix and pivot to inventory where there is faster growth potential, such as TikTok, Snapchat, Pinterest, and others.”
Getting Started with TikTok Marketing
So far, we’ve covered what TikTok is and the benefits you stand to gain from TikTok marketing. Now let’s get into the best part of the actionable steps you can take to get started on TikTok.
1. Create Your Business Page on TikTok
Creating a business page on TikTok is as easy as signing up on the app. Add your name and user name. Your username is your @name on the platform, and it’s also used to create your profile link. Add your bio and category, and you are good to go. You can also link directly to your YouTube and Instagram pages from your profile.
Once your page is live, we recommend experimenting with different content types until you find what works for your audience. Creating content is easy. All you need is your phone camera to get started. And if you don’t know the exact format you should use or what topics to hit on, you can look at your competitor’s videos and then develop a unique angle that suits your brand. You can also follow trending hashtags and memes, then apply them in your brand’s context.
2. Influencer Marketing
Another way to build your business on TikTok is by using influencers to reach your target audience. Influencers typically crack the code of audience connection, allowing them to build massive followings quickly. Building your business with them is easier as they have the authority to reach your desired audience. Using influencers also helps reduce audience acquisition friction as the audience is already familiar with the influencer.
3. Use Hashtags
When getting started, you can create TikTok hashtag challenges that other users can join and use to create and share content. This is one of the best ways to start a trend, and it can attract millions of TikTok users to create their versions of your campaign.
4. TikTok Advertising
TikTok advertising is great because it has yet to become saturated with advertisers, leaving a lot of room for ad impressions and clicks. You can create in-feed adverts, sponsored hashtag challenges, and banner ads on the homepage. You can also create targeted ad campaigns using location, demographics, age, and similar audiences that have viewed a specific piece of content. All you need to take advantage of TikTok advertising is a TikTok for Business account, which allows users to run self-serve advertising campaigns.
What Type of Ads Can You Create on TikTok?
You can create three types of ads on TikTok: In-feed ads, hashtag challenge ads, and brand takeover ads. Let’s take a closer look at what they are.
In-feed native ads: These are traditional ads on TikTok. They are normally unskippable and can be used differently by customizing them with website links, sign-up, and shop buttons.
Hashtag challenge ads: These types of ads appear as a banner and redirect the user to an instructions page on how to participate in a featured challenge. While creating a brand-driven hashtag challenge is great, we recommend sponsoring TikTok’s challenges for a greater chance to go viral. A hashtag challenge is typically placed on the discovery page, providing the maximum amount of reach.
Brand takeover ads: These ads use a variety of videos, Gifs, and images that redirect users to a landing page or hashtag challenge. They are full-screen ads normally displayed when a user opens TikTok. They are specific ads for each category, meaning that only one brand can occupy a particular category per day.
Best Practices For TikTok Marketing
TikTok is like the wild wild west, and in order to survive and come out on top, you should implement these basic tactics in your strategy.
1. Use Relevant Hashtags and Captions
Like every other social media platform, hashtags are king. They are the keywords the algorithm uses to catalog your content. When someone clicks “Discover” on TikTok, they usually see a list of videos sorted by trending news and hashtags. This means having relevant hashtags can help increase your content’s reach.
At the same time, having relevant content captions is a crucial part of this strategy. As you’ll see, the discovery page doesn’t have hashtags only. It also sorts videos using trending terms. To boost your content’s reach on the discovery page, we recommend using the trending terms as part of your video captions.
2. Go with Current Trends
Hoping on a TikTok trend is the fastest way to gain recognition, so you must keep yourself updated constantly. Look out for trending hashtags, topics, and sounds. Yes, sounds are big on TikTok and can help you blow your competition out of the water if used well.
Trends on TikTok move fast, so be prepared to keep up with the wagon and when creating videos based on popular trends, remember to add your unique touch. Don’t just recreate what everyone else is doing. Make the trends your own and infuse your brand personality.
3. Involve TikTok Influencers in Your Marketing
Influencers are the fastest way to build your brand credibility. This is because they already have an existing fan base that likes and trusts them. They are “sneezers,” as Seth Godin likes to call them. They can give you an “in” with your target audience and vouch for you. Involve them in your marketing campaigns.
4. Engage in the Comments
It’s tempting to be a snob on social media. Mainly because it takes too much time and energy to interact with everyone. But fight the temptation. Don’t be one. Engaging with comments on your videos will help you build rapport with your customers and increase your video’s reach.
Additionally, engage in other people’s videos. Leaving meaningful comments can help you gain new followers. Additionally, if your comment has many likes, it can be pinned by the creator of the video, which translates into more visibility for you.
5. Post Consistently
TikTok, like all other social media platforms, loves creators who post consistently. The more videos you post, the higher your reach and engagement rate. However, this is a trial-and-error tactic. We recommend posting at different times, using different frequencies until you find what works for your business. Remember, consistency doesn’t mean posting daily (although it’d be great if you could). You can consistently post three times a week.
6. Create Custom Branded Filters
Social media users love filters, and one way you can boost customer engagement is by creating brand filters and inviting your audience to try them out. This can help you create a special connection with your audience online.
7. Make Catchy Videos
This goes without saying; your videos must be interesting and appealing to attract attention. Whatever you do, always find an exciting angle and unique way to communicate your message to the audience. Since TikTok is very organic, we recommend creating good quality videos that don’t look like they’ve been made by a professional agency (even if they were). The TikTok audience values authenticity and relatability, so keep your videos relatable.
When creating videos, always include text overlays in your videos. Statistics show that users prefer videos with text overlays as they help them keep up and understand what is being said in the video. On the other hand, someone might want to watch your video in a boardroom but can’t have their sound on, so it helps to have text overlays to help them follow along. It also makes your content more accessible to people who are hearing impaired.
Remember to add a well-thought-out caption and hashtags for SEO when uploading your videos. Adding a caption will help TikTok index your video and suggest it to the right audience. Don’t use random words. However, craft an SEO-driven snappy caption to help the algorithm recommend your video to the right audience.
8. Put Your Brand First
It’s tempting to jump on all TikTok trends and lose yourself in the craze. But remember, your brand and message should always come first. To walk this thin line between fun, trendy content and brand-message-focused content, we recommend finding unique ways to infuse your brand into trends. Alternatively, you can look for trends that align with your brand, although that’s a long shot.
9. Tell A Story
According to Sawyer Hartman, filmmaker and vlogger, storytelling is key to TikTok and any social media platform. Use the problem-solution formula to grab people’s attention. You can also use Problem, Agitation, and Solution (PAS) formula or the Attention, Interest, Desire, and Action (AIDA) formula to create a video storyline.
10. Have Fun
Most importantly, have fun! If you enjoy creating content, your viewers will also enjoy watching it. You can never have too much fun with your video content. Go all out! But also be mindful of how your content affects your viewers. Be careful not to trigger, hurt or offend anyone.
Read Also: Must Know Social Media Trends of 2019 | SeedX Inc.
Best Examples of High Quality TikTok Marketing
1. Send A Friend
Send A Friend is a store that lets you send cute stuffed animals anywhere in the world. Through the “Link in bio” feature, they were able to grow to $5 million in sales in just two years.
2. Beardbrand
Beardbrand has a significant following on Instagram and YouTube. However, what makes it special is utilizing the captioning and thumbnail title effects.
3. Starbucks
This Starbucks how-to video which explains how to turn their famous pink drink into a frozen treat, has more than 116,000 views, 19,800 likes, and over 450 comments.
@starbucks DIY Pink Drink pops. 🍓☀️ #Starbucks #PinkDrink #IcePops ♬ original sound – Starbucks
4. Levi’s
This Levi’s fashion video, which teaches about Levi’s impact on pop culture during the 1960s, has more than 420,000 views, almost 40,000 likes, and around 180 comments.
@levis this is why our new Grateful Dead collab ✨just makes sense✨ #liveinlevis #history #gratefuldead ♬ original sound – Levi’s
5. Red Bull
Red Bull is a famous energy drink brand that posts racing content on TikTok with clever commentary. This particular video received 191,000 views and over 34,300 likes in just three days.
@redbull they be moving mad 🌝 #redbull #givesyouwiiings #rallycross ♬ original sound – Kira Kosarin
Conclusion
TikTok is a great social media platform to leverage right now as it provides all businesses with a level playing field in terms of reach and engagement. You can easily blow up your business with short, catchy video content that doesn’t take much to create. The viral nature of the algorithm gives you a great chance to be discovered by millions of people worldwide.
However, TikTok marketing requires a skillful balance of professionalism and fun that ensures you are not too stiff but don’t lose your brand voice when entertaining your audience. It’s not as straightforward or as easy as it seems. Remember, posting your corporate brand messaging won’t work– look for creative ways to communicate your message, and you’ll soar.
If you need help getting started, we’d love to help you. Simply contact us, and we’ll work with you to amplify your brand message in a fun, creative, and impactful way that makes your audience say, “I want to be a part of that!”
We hope you enjoyed this blog and found insightful tips to help you improve your TikTok marketing.
If you need help getting started, we’d love to help you. Simply contact us, and we’ll work with you to amplify your brand message in a fun, creative, and impactful way that makes your audience say, “I want to be a part of that!”
We hope you enjoyed this blog and found insightful tips to help you improve your TikTok marketing.
