By Katie Englishmen, Social Media Strategist
2020 taught us several important lessons—empathy, patience, the importance of self-care, and how to call someone via Zoom. Seeking an escape from reality, many turned to social media during the coronavirus pandemic to find a renewed sense of community. TikTok saw the largest growth—bringing with it a sense of authenticity and creativity on a global scale.
With over 800 million active users worldwide, TikTok has been downloaded more than two billion times worldwide, (as of April 2020). Of course, as we all know, where there are eyeballs on a screen, opportunities for digital advertising are sure to follow.
Are you thinking about leveraging TikTok for your digital marketing campaign? Here our top tips for a successful campaign:
Determine your audience
The first step in determining whether advertising on TikTok makes sense for your clients should focus on an evaluation of your target audience. What is the age range of your core consumer? Are they active on social media? What are their interests?
Keep in mind, the demographic of users on TikTok skews largely towards GenZ with over 32.5% of the app users falling between the ages of 10-19. However, with the plot twist that was 2020, TikTok saw growth in U.S. users ages 25-34 rise at the fastest rate out of any age group during the quarantine.
Develop creative content
The bite-size format of the 15 to 30-second videos make TikTok content ultra-consumable, allowing viewers to very quickly recognize messaging and brand if it’s done correctly. Video is an excellent vehicle for storytelling and the combination of music, video, hashtags, challenges and more make marketing on TikTok extremely efficient and effective. Content on TikTok should be creative but relatable to your brand.
Insider tip: Check out the TikTok Video Creation Kit to develop your own ads. The kit provides video and image templates with over 300+ options for background music. This is especially helpful if you don’t have a multimedia team to create content for you.
Create a campaign in TikTok’s self-serve platform
Now that you’ve determined your audience and ad content, you can set up your campaign. TikTok rolled out their self-serve advertising platform in the summer of 2020 and it quickly took off. While ads for TikTok have been around for some time, the offering was somewhat limited. There was initially no self-service platform for brands, requiring access to a representative and a signed contract or insertion order (IO) to run ads.
With this new platform, agencies and brands of all sizes have access to create and manage their own advertising campaigns on the platform. Any user who wishes to get started with ads can access the platform for a minimum spend of $20 per day.
Insider tip: Make sure you leave ample time for verification and approval when setting up your brand’s ads. The platform UI requires specific documents such as an IRS certificate to be approved and this verification can sometimes take up to a week in our experience.
Set your campaign targeting
With an interface somewhat like Facebook Ads Manager, you can create campaigns based on specific goals including traffic, conversion, and reach. Think about what your goals are for your brand or client. Are you looking to drive brand awareness? Video views? Purchase or signup? Establish your goals and choose the bid objective that aligns. Select your audience through targeting that includes demographics, interests, and geography. You can also target with custom segments based on users who have engaged with your web or social properties.
Insider tip: The TikTok pixel is necessary for all segment builds and conversion tracking so make sure you place this magical piece of code wherever you can.
As digital marketers, we are constantly looking for the latest and greatest in advertising capabilities and offerings. If you are looking to diversify your digital spend and are ready to get creative with authentic, engaging video content, TikTok might just be for you!