TikTok Marketing for Brands: How to Develop a TikTok Marketing Strategy?

TikTok’s Ticktacktoe in the Marketing World!

If you have your business targeted for the younger generation and yet you haven’t heard of TikTok, then it is high time that you understand what the hullabaloo is all about. Just like Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube have businesses rushing in to advertise their stuff on it, TikTok is the next big thing that you need to have your sight. Yes, if you believe the hype, then know that your business should care about it. TikTok marketing is something that you have to start right away now.

What Is TikTok and Why Should Businesses Care About TikTok Marketing?

TikTok is a short-form video-sharing app that allows users lots of music and dialogue options so that they can make, view, and share entertaining videos. Similar to Musical.ly but much broader in scope, TikTok, owned by ByteDance, offers users the option of special effects, filters, direct video upload from the phone, and many more.

Promoted as a video-sharing social network app, it has over 500 million monthly active users. TikTok specializes in 15-second musically oriented videos, and herein lays the real creative challenge.

TikTok has garnered support from the locals of different countries because it has widely used the help of celebrities to promote the app to local audiences. But unlike Instagram or Facebook, TikTok does not have any space for display ads.

The businesses can only go in for influencer marketing or paid celebrity promotion on TikTok. If companies have to grow organically, then they can cleverly start or participate in challenges and contests through hashtags so that they get noticed by users. TikTok marketing finds the best way for marketers to promote the business at realtime audience.

Who Uses TikTok Marketing?

• TikTok is a massive hit with the younger generation or the Gen-Z.
• 40% of the users are between the age group of 16-24 years.
• Named as Douyin in China, it has 500 million monthly users there wherein 75% are in the age group of 18-35 years.
• 40% of TikTok users are from outside China.
• 25%of the app downloads are of TikTok in India.
• In the USA, it has been downloaded 80 million times.
• Now you know, these staggering figures are precisely the reason why TikTok marketing is gaining popularity.

How Does TikTok Make Money?

Tik Tok Brand Partnership

TikTok makes money by collaborating with companies to start campaigns on the app. So be it a new launch or a new movie, companies can approach TikTok as a base for their product promotion.

In-app Purchases

Content viewers can purchase coins and stickers from TikTok to react to live streaming videos. Moreover, its popularity and the downloaded number is enough to increase its valuation in the market.

What is the Benefit of TikTok?

Brands using the TikTok platform for connecting to the audience have shown good sales conversion thanks to the growing popularity of this social media platform.

• For businesses that are targeting the youth, TikTok is where your marketing should be.
• TikTok for business can be used primarily by products and services that cater to fashion, health, fitness, arts like music and dance, hospitality like hotels and rooms, food, education, etc.
• Association with TikTok influencers helps you to reach the target audience
• TikTok advertising is the best platform for any new product launch
• You can have TikTok brand partnerships to promote your brand using this platform

Is TikTok Good for Business?

TikTok is suitable for businesses, just like other social media platforms. It has a niche audience, and if your business is into something that appeals to the younger generation, then TikTok advertising would be the best for you to build your brand.

It works best for some sectors of business like music, health, fitness, food, hospitality, films, arts, fashion and so on. But it is not best suited for the B2B model and financial services.

How Do I Promote My Business on TikTok?

Sell through Creativity

TikTok is all about being funny through innovation and creativity. Keep it short, sweet, and light. Whether you want to promote your fashion business or hospitality, there is room for everyone on TikTok.

Create short videos on hacks, tips, results, and so on. You can shoot candid videos or lip-sync and dance to famous movie songs. Experiment and analyze which works and which needs improvement. In short, there is a lot to be done through TikTok.

Trend through Hashtag

Trending on TikTok is through the clever use of hashtags and description. Businesses need to identify the hashtags that are apt to their products and services. Another way of trending is by creating your new hashtag, say around new product launches, and encouraging users to share it.

The branded hashtag challenge, in collaboration with the TikTok influencers, has gained prominence and gathers the highest amount of views that makes the effective use of  TikTok marketing.

Engage through Community

As we mentioned, companies and businesses must follow and engage with the audiences identifying the correct hashtags. Join the community of trending hashtags by commenting and liking and reach out to the emerging customers.

Creating a unique hashtag challenge and encouraging other TikTok users to participate and create videos using this same hashtag is one of the best ways to promote TikTok for brands.

Promote through TikTok Influencers

Just like in other social media platforms, TikTok brand partnership with influencers helps businesses to market their product to the intended demography. Many of the big companies use TikTok sponsors to run their marketing campaigns.

25 Steps to a Successful TikTok Marketing Strategy for Brands

1. Use the most appropriate eye-catching hashtags that can drive audience engagement.
2. Post the content on a specific time at which the audience is consuming TikTok most.
3. Hold the audience engagement by delivering the content in their preferred local language.
4. Try to share the most relevant content that can boost the sales of your business.
5. Make sure to involve your users or fans in your brand ad campaigns where it can easily find the other user activity at your brand.
6. Emotion is the most epic touch that melts the hearts of the audience to turn towards your brand.
7. Elaborate your business goals that mean plan your target audience on TikTok.
8. Make use of right and relevant hashtags that reach the appropriate customers.
9. Consider identifying your buyers who can be your leads to generate sales by referring their friends and family.
10. Create the most valuable and unique content on TikTok. Now it is the time to find massive boring content on it.
11. Make your audience participate in challenges and feature that in your business profiles.
12. Make an investment on TikTok ads, by the way, choose experts to create and deliver the content at an extreme level.
13. Collaborate with influencers who are most valuable to generate potential sales.
14. Launch a contest and offer gift vouchers for the winners can drive massive new audience engagement.
15. Keep an eye on finding the performance of your TikTok ad campaigns to know the most successful content and vice versa.
16. Launch the user-generated content helps in promoting your brand at millions.
17. Choose to launch the in-feed native ads that are similar to Instagram stories where you can add a call-to-action button and website URL.
18. Use Brand Takeovers on TikTok, which lets the users visit your business website when open the app.
19. Feature the celebrities in your ad campaigns that let their fans to become your customers.
20. Create the tips and tricks that genuinely helps and solves the issues of your audience.
21. Host the interviews of leaders or celebrities that give an emotional or inspirational touch to your audience.
22. Partner with other top brands that partially pull up your brand reputation.
23. Push your content on significant days like Thanks Giving day and Boxing Day etc.
24. Generate useful content on Quarantine time to make your audience safe, and it let them know that you are taking much care of your customers.
25. Try on launching the most fun generating videos that entirely expose your brand.

Conclusion

Instagram and YouTube were mostly used by teens early during its launch. It was much later that it caught the fancy of the entire world. While it might be too early to predict the actual effect of TikTok for brands, it is better to jump into the bandwagon and get a smooth transition rather than being late and left out. Isn’t it better to try and reach your audience rather than dismissing it outright without even giving it a try? TikTok marketing is one of the best ways to reach the exact audience.

Use TikTok sensibly and creatively; it is sure to reap in the benefits for your brand.