Marketing on TikTok: 5 Ways It Can Boost Your Business

TikTok is the latest hit social media platform, allowing for growing creative minds to successfully build a following.

Due to the explosion in popularity, brands are pouncing on the opportunity to advertise themselves, but because of its infancy, the competition is still growing. This leaves lots of room for smaller businesses or companies to jump in before the pool gets too crowded.

If you’re looking for a new way to market your business to a young audience, you should have TikTok on your radar. Here are five ways TikTok can boost your business strategy and increase your online presence.

1) Influencers

Companies have used social media influencers for advertisement for a long time now, seen mostly on Instagram, YouTube, and now TikTok. The premise is simple: you pay an influencer to promote your product or brand to their following in hopes of reaching a broader audience.

While Instagram is full of brands trying their best to get influencers to promote them, TikTok is new and hasn’t been saturated with many companies claiming their spot in an advertisement.

2) Ads

Tik Tok ads are similar to other platforms but vary in how they’re shown. There are five different types of ads to look out for while marketing on TikTok.

• In-feed Ads: the cheapest type of ads that appear in between posts while scrolling, similar to Instagram’s feed.

• Brand Takeovers: appear when the app is first opened and reaches a large audience at once. Costly, but worth it.

• TopViews: an in-feed ad that appears at the top of the For You page.

• Branded Hashtag Challenges: hashtags that link to the business’ page and allow content creators to be as creative as they like.

• Branded Effects: AR overlays similar to Snapchat filters that encourage participation from creators.

3) Diverse Content

TikTok has such a unique format compared to other social media that it allows for a diverse type of content to blossom. Because it’s video and sound-oriented, it’s important to have high-quality visuals and audio while making a post and tagging it properly so your target audience can find it easily.

Trending TikToks are comedic or dances with popular songs, but that isn't to say serious ones don’t exist. Most people are looking for short, to-the-point videos that don’t take themselves too seriously while still being informative.

4) Better Chances of Going Viral

Because TikTok has strayed from normal platform’s virality, focusing less on the creator’s popularity and more of a collage of videos that show up on the FYP. This gives everyone a chance to become an overnight sensation, whether you have one million followers or ten.

The easiest way to take advantage of this method is by hopping on trends, putting popular songs in the backgrounds of your videos, using hashtags to reach a wide following, and even creating your own tag if you’d like to.

5) Unsaturated Market

Few household names have moved to the platform for advertisement. This leaves space for you to get creative and innovative with your marketing in TikTok.

However, unsaturation isn’t a guarantee of success. It takes an adjustment period to understand the kind of content that gets popular and an innovative mind to become attuned to the culture while creating.

If you want to get the feeling of what to aim for in your content creation, watch some TikToks, see what’s thriving and what isn’t, and adjust your approach accordingly.

Because TikTok is still in its youth—barely four years old—many people are still apprehensive about what could happen to it and where it could lead. But even so, there’s plenty of opportunity in something new and full of potential.

The only way to find out if marketing on TikTok is for your brand is to download the app and learn firsthand.