Tik Tok

Tik Tok is a video sharing, a social networking platform that has become increasingly popular over the past two years. Social media has become a growing industry with billions of users. This industry has grown tremendously and opened doors for opportunity. The growth of Snap Chat, Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp is phenomenal and now we get to witness the growth of a brand-new social media platform known as TikTok.

About TikTok.

TikTok is owned by ByteDance which is a company that is based in Beijing, China. The company was founded in 2012 by a man by the name of Zhang Yiming. TikTok is a platform that is used to create videos that showcase lip-syncing, talent and comedy. I am sure that you have come across a video with the TikTok watermark on, on other social platforms. The application known as TikTok was launched in 2017 and was conveniently created for both iOS and Android Operating systems. This was not the first app which was launched by the tech company, the company has also launched another app (Douyin) in 2016 which was built specifically for the Chinese market. TikTok and Douyin are very similar to one another, although TikTok is not available in China and both applications are hosted on different servers around the world.

Did you know that TikTok was the most downloaded app in the United States of America, in the year 2018? It was the first app made by the Chinese to achieve this amount of success. The social networking platform is available worldwide and is available in a number of different languages. The application has reached a global market and as statistics show, it is the seventh most downloaded mobile app for this decade.   

Five reasons to add TikTok to your marketing strategy.

1. There is an insane amount of users on the app already!

Majority of TikTok users are between the ages of 18 and 35, this age group makes up a huge percentage of the number of users on the mobile application. As we have seen with the launch of almost every social media platform, the youth dominate this space and later share it with the older generations. The application now boasts more than 1.5 billion users, why wouldn’t you take advantage of this platform?

• The users on the mobile application are not passive.

Users know what they are signing up for when they download the application. They are committing to an immersive experience. The only type of content which is allowed on TikTok is video. If you are creating an account for the benefit of your business ensure that you are offering value; users use the mobile application for entertainment purposes so ensure that they are engaging with your video and that they will be entertained by what you are showcasing.

• Grabbing the attention of your audience is easy.

TikTok has a number of features but its most valuable feature is the way in which the content is laid out. As you may know, on other platforms, often impressions are counted even if only a portion of the post is visible. When you are using the TikTok platform for marketing, you will have a split second to engage with the user and entice them to watch more if your content is relevant and well thought out.  

• There is a considerable chunk of the population who are already using this social media platform.

Brands that target the younger people are already taking full advantage of it, stay ahead of the game and get your account started too. TikTok offers organic posting as well as paid advertising campaigns. In terms of paid campaigns, TikTok allows people to place ads in the form of hashtags, in-feed ads, brand takeovers or branded effects.

• Just do it, it’s fun!

Consumers want to connect with brands on an emotional and personal level and social media platforms have become a great medium for businesses to connect with their consumers.

As a business, you can monetize trending hashtags.

Having social media platforms in place for marketing businesses has become a must as it helps businesses reach their target audience and potential consumers. As a marketer, you know that you will need to implement marketing strategies across a variety of channels to reach the relevant market. For example, if you are looking to target the everyday consumer you may consider marketing on Facebook, however, if you are targeting a company or CEO you would consider a platform such as LinkedIn.

The mobile application known as TikTok grew popular due to the influence of celebrities. Jimmy Fallon started the #tumbleweed challenge which gained a lot of traction and yielded a lot of entries. TikTok challenges is a great way to promote brands due to the fact that they showcase the relevancy of the product or service and get the businesses potential share of the market engaging with their content. An example of a business using hashtags to promote their business is McDonald’s that created the #bigmactiktok challenge which not only helped promote the business but got a lot of engagement and traffic on all social media platforms.

Promote your brand through TikTok.

There are five different methods of marketing on TikTok namely:

• In-feed native ad: These ad types are similar to Instagram stories in full-screen mode. With in-feed native ads, you can add website links, and “order now” buttons to the ad which will help users land on the page. In-feed native ads are skippable and have multiple options when designing the overall advert. TikTok offers analytics on click-through rates, impressions, total views, the video viewing time, and the amount of engagement that the business received through the ad campaign.
• Hashtag challenge ads: As mentioned before this is a great way to market your business and receive engagement from your audience. With this type of ad, the user will get to see a specific banner ad that will take the user to a page that gives them instructions, and rules and regulations regarding the challenge. The hashtag challenge ad can give insights on banner views, clicks, number of user-generated content, stats on engagement, the number of views that the hashtag challenge has received and the trending slot.
• Brand takeover ads: Brand takeover ads are exclusive to a category, meaning that only one brand can take up a particular category per day. The impact that this ad type can be measured by impressions, click rates and unique reaches.
• Hashtag challenges. This is a good method to organically market your brand. The hashtag challenge ad types are generally ads that are organic and not sponsored, although, with content that is well thought through, they have the potential of trending and driving your marketing strategy. Usually, hashtag challenges work well when brands involve celebrities or influences because of their following. Ads that are put out by celebrities and influencers are generally more easily accepted by the potential market therefore, increasing the impact of your organic following and number of organic engagements. How would you execute this kind of campaign? You will need contacts of bloggers and influencers, ideas for challenges that will engage your potential audience, and a relevant message that is being portrayed by the campaign.
• Participation by the user. This is the most engaging and accessible of the ad types; the marketing strategy that is used here is user participation. User-generated content is used to engage with the TikTok user. The content will aim to promote the cause or the brand with tools and features that make it easy and enable the users to post content and ideas themselves by tagging the trending topic.

Seven things you need to know as a marketer.

1. TikTok is no longer just for ‘kids’. TikTok started off as a regular topic of discussion amongst teenagers. Statistics show that TikTok has the youngest user base when compared to all of the other popular social media platforms; two-thirds of the user base is under the age of thirty. With TikTok’s increase in popularity, the user base has now grown and includes a large number of adult users as well. If we look into the statistics of other social platforms, we recognize a similar pattern, for example, Facebook’s initial user base was made up of college students and Snapchat was initially mostly popular amongst teenagers.
2. Comical content does well on this social media platform. TikTok started off as an application that focused on musical content, music is still the heart of this application but TikTok is no longer restricted to music-related content. If you scroll through the feed, you will notice a trend in the video content and that is that each video has a comical element. The videos that have a reputable number of comments, the videos with the most views and the most liked videos are the ones that are going viral and the ones that make you giggle. From a psychological perspective, laughter is a great way to connect with your audience on an emotional level and help you connect with your audience. Creating comical content that your potential market can relate to will help you build cultural relevance, cognitive salience and consumer trust.
3. You don’t need to ‘cover-up’ with a filter. TikTok embraces reality and frowns upon the Instagram “photo perfect” look. Influencers of TikTok are ordinary teenagers who have built their following from the comfort of their bedrooms. Overall TikTok has built a very positive influence for itself and amongst its user base, many describing it as pleasant, with comments based on words of encouragement, a platform that embraces cross-cultural exchange, and offers a diversity of thought.
4. It is a platform that does not limit your creativity. TikTok offers you free range when you are creating your own content, it offers you a suite of video editing tools that assist you with creating unique content. An important aspect about videos to note is that easily produced, short-form, crowdsourced video content looks like the future of interactive media which is pretty much what TikTok stands for.
5. Insight into the youth culture. TikTok is an effective way for marketers to stay up to date with what is hip and happening. Most of the memes that you now see on the internet were first posted on TikTok.
6. Local tribes and global reach. TikTok offers the best of global reach and local engagement. Due to the impact that TikTok has on a global scale offers a unique opportunity for ambitious brands to penetrate the market.
7. TikTok cannot be judged this early in its lifetime as it is still early days for this rapidly growing social platform. TikTok offers a lot of potential for organic advertising at this stage but still needs to be developed to be a fully-fledged advertising platform.

In conclusion.

In conclusion, TikTok marketing has become a must for businesses due to its popularity, it has sets trends and reach capabilities that are increasing rapidly so make sure to set your account up today and start creating content!

Are you looking for a digital agency that will equip you with the services that you will need to market your business in order to succeed? Contact Right Click Media International today to upgrade your marketing strategy to include TikTok.

TikTok is becoming an increasingly popular social media platform, don’t get left behind! Contact Right Click Media International today to get your TikTok profile and marketing strategy sorted.  For more information visit their website to view the services that they offer https://rightclickmediaint.com/.