TikTok Social Media Marketing

In the age of technology, social media is pretty much inescapable. We are constantly exposed to social media, whether it be on our own phones, from our children, or even in the workplace. And marketers are nothing if not opportunists… so we capitalise on this plethora of media coverage in our campaign strategies. 

Learn why Social Star believes social media marketing is so important, and how we achieve this with our clients. 

Whilst many think TikTok is limited to dance challenges and video memes, it can be a very powerful tool for digital marketers to infiltrate a younger demographic and create an online presence for your brand. TikTok is one of the fastest growing social media platforms of today, and continues to provide a space for smaller accounts to gain popularity and create ‘viral’ content. As marketers, this is useful as it means we do not have to have a large following on our brand’s page to be able to reach a large audience, and we can increase brand awareness without directly promoting a product, helping to build a personality for the company.

‘JUMPING ON THE TREND’

TikTok marketing is not so much centred around promoting your product, as much as creating awareness for your brand. This has been done successfully by many companies who have created videos related to their brand, but centred around viral trends of the moment, notably Duolingo. Duolingo’s TikTok account was only launched in February 2021, but now boasts more than 3.9 million followers and 76 million likes. Their popularity comes from creating comedic videos based on trending sounds or content, which feature the brand’s mascot, Duo, a green owl. Most of their videos have some connection to their brand purpose of learning a language, as seen in this video; the effect of this is that not only is Duolingo’s Tik Tok gaining profile traction from producing relevant and amusing content, they are able to subtly promote their product.

ALGORITHM & AUDIENCE

Most people spend their time scrolling through the For You page, not who they’re following. This means that most creators trying to increase their video views need to rely on the algorithm to get their videos seen. There are many factors which contribute to helping videos go ‘viral’, including post time, sounds used, and content. All videos are shown to a smaller audience’s For You page to see how they perform, and this is what determines how many other people’s pages the video will appear on. Finding your brand’s niche, video style and popular content is essential to building a consistently popular TikTok following. The audience you are trying to target is also a very important factor to consider when creating a TikTok marketing strategy. Users on TikTok are generally millennials and Gen Z, so if your target audience is older than this, TikTok may not be the leading strategy for your marketing campaign. However, if your target audience is within this age bracket, it is a powerful tool for reaching young people in a subtle and casual way, without coming across as blatant marketing tropes. This is because they will see the videos as regular content first, and see your brand as the source second, meaning that your growing popularity relies heavily on the quality of your videos.

TIK TOK VS INSTAGRAM REELS

Short videos are the way of the future when it comes to social media content… and TikTok has a big competitor in this market: Instagram Reels. However, these two platforms should not work in competition, but in tandem with each other when it comes to your digital marketing strategy. Reel creation is less popular, meaning there are less videos, and more potential for yours to gain views. Therefore, this is usually better for accounts with a smaller following to gain initial traction. Tik Tok’s algorithm is a bit harder to navigate… With so many creators, and over 1 million different videos viewed each day, it can sometimes be harder for smaller accounts to get their foot in the door with producing viral content, and relies largely on luck. This is why it is a good idea to do both. The same content can be used across both platforms, and doubles your chances of having a hit, whilst also increasing your reach.

We hope this blog post was insightful #foryou to learn more about how and why Tik Tok can be a powerful digital marketing tool.

To learn more about how we are using social media, and specifically Tik Tok to create successful marketing strategies for our clients, contact us today for a consultation.