Marketing on TikTok: Best Practices for Organic Posting and Paid Advertising

How to use TikTok for marketing businesses

You don’t need to compete in the latest dance challenges to have a successful TikTok presence (unless you want to.) Instead, the following tips and video formats can help you build a following that’s true to your branding and earns likes, comments, and follows.

Show "Behind The Scenes" Footage

TikTok’s quick, casual formats can help you show your customers the faces and names behind their favorite brands.

"Behind the scenes" content of employees at work or having fun is especially popular and provides a way to connect with existing clients and draw new customers.

Keep It Relatable

While expensive production values might thrive on YouTube or Instagram, TikTok users prefer more accessible, “relatable” content.

That usually involves filming with a standard smartphone instead of expensive equipment, preserving imperfections rather than editing them out, and, above all else, staying authentic and earnest. So, your customers get to know and trust your brand.

Create Educational Content

One of the easiest ways to draw new viewers involves teaching them something new.

For example, a baker might instruct beginners in different icing techniques while a woodworker might explain how to use power tools. Educational tutorials or quick tips that relevant to your business can help you build trust and earn followers looking for quality information.

Encourage User-Generated Content

Beyond posting videos yourself, you can also encourage other TikTokers to show off your products.

When nearly a quarter of TikTok users enjoy showing off their favorite products on the app, sharing user-generated content provides an excellent way to connect with your customers and build trust through social proof.

How Do TikTok Ads Work?

In addition to posting videos and building a following organically, TikTok also offers businesses the opportunity to pay for advertising, which promotes a select video in other users’ feeds.

If you’re already familiar with Meta Business Suite or Google Ads, TikTok’s system works in a similar way. You’ll choose your campaign goals (like new follows or click-throughs) select the video you want to promote, and set either a daily or lifetime budget for the campaign. Your ad will then compete in an “auction” with other relevant videos for a chance to appear in a target user’s algorithm.

Many brands combine both standard videos and targeted ad campaigns to maximize their reach. Although, it’s possible to build a branded presence without paid ads.

Types of TikTok Ads?

TikTok currently offers the following paid ad formats.

• In-Feed. A video placed in a user’s personal feed.
• Top view. The first ad a user sees when they open the app.
• Spark ads. Turns user-generated videos into paid ads.
• Brand Mission. A way to recruit eligible creators for ad campaigns, with the opportunity to turn the best results into paid ads.

If you’re just starting out, in-feed ads are usually the best option to try first. The other options can come into play once you build a larger following or brand presence.

How Much Does TikTok Advertising Cost?

TikTok allows you to set either a daily or lifetime budget at the beginning of your ad campaign. You can optimize for traffic or conversion.

TikTok recommends a minimum daily spend of $30 for North American ad campaigns and for campaigns to last between 7 and 14 days for best results. With those numbers, a beginner TikTok ad campaign costs between $210 and $420.

But of course, you can always run a shorter campaign or choose a lower daily budget.

How To Advertise On TikTok: Best Practices For Beginners

Running paid advertising on TikTok often involves a lot of trial and error to understand which videos and connect with your target audience. But the following key points can help you when you’re just starting out.

Get A Strong Hook

According to TikTok, 90% of a video’s ad recall comes from the first 6 seconds of a video. So, come in with a strong, attention-grabbing hook that gives users a good first impression of your brand or product.

Choose The Right Goal

TikTok offers several different goals for ad campaigns, from engagement to click-throughs. Choosing the right goal for a campaign is crucial, as the algorithm will optimize results towards the users most likely to choose your select action.

If a current ad campaign doesn’t seem effective at first, changing the campaign goal and call to action (CTA) could help it better connect with the right users.

Keep It Short

While a paid ad can be anywhere from 5 to 50 seconds long, the optimal length of an advertising video is on the short side. TikTok data suggests that the best performing ads on the platform are between 9 and 15 seconds long.

Use The Right Bidding Strategy

TikTok offers two main bidding strategies for paid ads, which are:

• Cost Cap. The algorithm optimizes towards the cost-per-action you define when setting up your campaign.
• Maximum Delivery. Optimizes for the highest number of conversions within your budget.

TikTok suggests cost cap when your main goals are app downloads, community interactions, or conversions, and Maximum delivery for traffic, reach, and video views.

Bring In A Rhode Island Videographer

If you’re unsure where to start with filming videos or building your video marketing presence, McVeigh Media is here to help.

As experienced Rhode Island videographers with experience creating content for brands like Jaguar and AAA, we understand how to film videos that make a great first impression and build trust with new customers and clients. Contact us today to tell us more about your video marketing goals and learn how we can help you find your audience!