TikTok - we've all heard of it, but how can entrepreneurs use it to benefit their business?
TikTok spans 150+ markets! TikTok users are already primed to consume content from creators and brands either as organic videos or ads. Statista reports that 38% of followers will watch ads on TikTok. Great news for businesses seeking to promote their service or product to a wider audience!
‘TikTok exploded with love for our designs, and we ended up starting the business with our life savings—and all of the traffic to our website was organic from TikTok. We had zero experience as ground-level entrepreneurs and built this business from the ground up!’ - Lala Hijabs founder
As a proud partner of TikTok, PATTRNS's TikTok team can tell you everything there is to know about your advertising options on the social platform, alongside, how to measure the success of a TikTok ad campaign.
To begin, let’s start with your ad options.
In-feed ads on TikTok seamlessly integrate into the For You Page (FYP), mirroring the look and feel of user-generated content. This seamless integration captures users' attention, fostering organic discovery and authentic engagement.
The comment section is open, as such, engagement is encouraged.
And, with a call to action (CTA) button linked to a landing page of choice, it’s useful for transferring traffic to a site, social or shopping page of choice.
TikTok Top-View ads are premium, high-impact ads that command the top spot on users' For You Page, capturing immediate attention. As the first content users see when they open the app, these ads guarantee 3 seconds of undivided viewer attention, making them incredibly effective for delivering impactful brand messages and driving engagement.
As the most popular TikTok ad choice, research conducted by Material reveals brands benefit from 1.5x more users recalling this ad than other adverts.
After 3 seconds, the native in-feed video format is re-introduced, and people can interact by liking, commenting, and sharing the video with links to the brand and music home page.
A brand takeover ad features a full-screen, 3-5 second, high-impact gif or image with sound and, if desired a headline.
Takeover ads appear immediately on opening TikTok and only one business can buy a brand takeover ad per category, per day.
As such, brand takeover ads are expensive, attracting bigger brands like Too Faced and Samsung to invest.
Ad creators can also add links to direct prospects to a landing page or hashtag challenge.
A TikTok ad format designed to blend in with UGC, the branded hashtag challenge requires businesses to create a challenge for TikTokers to interact with.
Compelling hashtag challenges inspire people to participate, by making videos responding to the challenge and sharing on TikTok. With that, the popularity of the challenge spreads.
Inviting people to share in the quirky nature of a hashtag challenge is a savvy way to increase brand recognition, and let people find out more about your business.
Fun and immersive content is what the TikTok community thrives on, so brand effects are ideal for businesses wanting to play up their creative side with personalised brand effects.
Think fancy filters, effects, branded stickers and beyond. Make it catchy to generate interest and inspire Tiktokers to use it.
Pairing branded effects with other ads like the Hashtag Challenge can bolster your business's marketing efforts.
Spark Ads are ideal to use on in-feed or top-view adverts.
To make one, creators source UGC on TikTok relating to their business and then contact the creator for permission to use that content in their ad campaign.
At Pattrns, we make this process easier, by maintaining a catalogue of in-demand creators to utilise in content creation for clients.
With the creator's permission granted, simply edit your ad with a new sparky caption and call-to-action (CTA).
1 in 4 TikTok visitors are primed to purchase during TikTok live campaigns Why? Because viewers see the product in action, from all angles, as opposed to a still photo.
The best thing about live campaigns is, that hosts and viewers participate in real time.
If you’ve got a product to showcase, and your presenting skills are palatable, you could launch a live stream advertising your product to the TikTok community.
That’s your TikTok ad choices covered, and here’s the takeaway so far alongside some handy tips;
Next up, we present TikTok shop, so you can see if it’s a viable option for your business.
A digital marketing expert commenting on Grail's Success on TikTok shop said;
TikTok shop has been by far the most successful channel we’ve worked with. Sales have grown 100x over 9 months. - Edward Winters Ronaldson, Founder
Grail generates over 800k in revenue each month, an attractive stat for any business wanting to sell its products.
With TikTok's tools for businesses making growth scalable, logistics manageable and customers cared for, TikTok shop is a popular choice for businesses.
Briefly, here are four ways customers can use TikTok shop:
Creators and influencers add a fresh spin to TikTok shopping experiences, building trust between audiences and brands. By partnering with popular TikTokers, we enhance the success of our clients' campaigns, ensuring their products reach a wider, more engaged audience.
Now you’re up to date with TikTok ad options and shop choices, let’s look at how you can manage and measure the success of each ad.
So whether your business’s goal is to:
It’s possible with TikTok - so long as you know how to use it.
With your goals and ads in place, it’s time to hold them up against your KPIs (key performance indicators). This part is paramount for reflecting on ad performance and zoning in on what’s working and what isn’t.
Deciphering a business’s key performance indicators (KPIs) is vital for determining if an ad is reaching its intended goals.
With TikTok analytics tools, Ads Manager and Pixel, retrieving data is simple and with these tools, you can view;
Collecting data on, for example, followers, revenue and profit accrued throughout the campaign will reveal whether your adverts are working and meeting your business’s goals.
Next up, you need to interpret the data.
Here are a few questions PATTRNS TikTok experts consider to determine if a client campaign is working:
The ultimate goal of analysing social advertising data is to spot where there's room for improvement to refine and optimise ads to yield better results.
Other avenues we take care of include testing ads, which we touch on below.
To assess the effectiveness of an ad, we like to use A/B testing to observe the popularity of each ad variation.
TikTok has optimisation tools to adjust adverts based on a business's KPIs. Plus, TikTok ad budgets, bidding methods (a set amount advertisers will pay to display their adverts on TikTok) and tools can be refined to increase return on ad spend (ROAS) and reduce cost per result (CPR).
Lastly, ongoing analysis of ad campaigns on TikTok is necessary to measure their effectiveness and make amendments where needed. Continuous testing, analysing, and improvements will ensure businesses achieve the best results from their TikTok ads and those results can be tracked against their KPIs.
With your newfound TikTok knowledge of ads and how to manage their success, underway, here are a few motivating success stories to inspire you and put what you know into action.
In 2023, Dasha Derkach turned to TikTok on a marketing mission to offer and sell an assortment of scrunchies under the name - Enchanted Scrunchies.
Over time, Dasha's video views went from 15k to 3 million views! Today, Dasha has over 500k followers, and her scrunchie business earns six figures.
Next up, we have Cafe Emporos, a small coffee company, that made viral content with a simple slogan ‘Make the world your cafe’. Rubens's strategy to attain 38.1k followers comes down to this: creating coffee-making videos to ambient music.
He kept his content basic and consistent and looked over the comment section of his videos to source requests and ideas for new videos.
The founders of Woobles selling beginner's crochet amigurumi kits used TikTok spark ads to share their stories about their business.
Equally tapping into audience targeting and campaign budget optimisation (CBO) to leverage their campaign and achieve an 18% decrease in CPA (cost per action).
Be sure to discover more success stories, for motivation and inspiration to develop your adverts.
TikTok provides a platform of entertainment attracting millions to watch daily.
To keep ahead of other social platforms, its community is being increasingly encouraged to harness creativity through the lens of vulnerability and imagination. In a bid to make content that evokes feelings and connections with TikTok users.
So keep this in mind when creating a new TikTok campaign for your business!
As a TikTok partner, Pattrns has been working the digital dance floor since its inception. Thus, connecting businesses like yours with a catalogue of creators on TikTok to collaborate and produce authentic content that looks less like an advert, and more like the kind of original content generated organically by its creative community.
After all, people don’t want to see ads on TikTok. They visit to see entertaining bursts of creativity, comedy, and culture. Provide that in an advertisement, and you're on your way to securing your intended audience.
So, if you're thinking about utilising the power of TikTok for your business, but you're unsure where to start, reach out to us - Pattrns, a full-service digital marketing agency - to discuss your business's ideas for growth through TikTok ad campaigns today.
