TikTok for Business: 8 Reasons to Try It
1. Use TikTok Shop
Before getting into the specific benefits of TikTok for business, let’s look into why you should consider using TikTok Shop to sell more products and connect with the TikTok community.
If you plan on selling products via TikTok, the TikTok Shop commerce platform allows for a more seamless buying experience that benefits shoppers. Customers can complete the checkout process right from within the app, keeping the buyer’s journey smooth and painless.
At the same time, you can use TikTok Shop’s various promotional tools and campaigns to promote all types of products.
Another benefit of TikTok Shop is the ability to collaborate with many creators on the platform, enabling you to develop relationships with influencers who can help you sell.
Ultimately, TikTok Shop is potentially the best way to use TikTok for business.
Using this platform and TikTok in general, the following are some of the main reasons to use TikTok for business.
2. Get Creative
The majority of TikTok’s content is light, whimsical, and entertaining.
It’s real people expressing themselves in creative – and often silly – ways. Even if you’re a serious B2B or SaaS company selling serious products or services, using TikTok for business to showcase your brand has some serious benefits.
Social media users are hungry for human connection and authenticity. While there’s surely a place for educational value on TikTok, positioning your company as one that’s conversational and easy to connect with will make customers feel more comfortable entering into a long-term partnership with you.
Of course, there is a time and place for certain things, but every business can lean into creativity and design to create short-form videos to help drive brand awareness.
3. Reach More People, Faster
Despite the app being launched in 2016, TikTok has been downloaded over 2 billion times on the App Store and Google Play.
This puts the platform ahead of others that have been around a lot longer like Snapchat, Pinterest, and Twitter. That’s no surprise as video content is king in 2023 and if there’s anything that TikTok excels at, it’s video.
It also means that TikTok is an ideal place to reach an international audience.
And contrary to popular belief, teenagers aren’t the only ones spending hours scrolling through the app.
What does all of this mean? Well, for one, TikTok is a well-populated platform. Chances are you know a teacher, a dentist, or an entrepreneur who’s an active user. And tapping into a tiny sliver of that audience is an opportunity for using TikTok for business that you could potentially be missing.
Here are some other stats that illustrate just how crucial it is to use TikTok for businesses:
- 18% of international users, totaling a billion, are active users on TikTok.
- In 2023, Brazil was the country with the largest number of TikTok downloads at 5.62 million, followed by Indonesia, Mexico, Pakistan, and the U.S.
- Although many users are teenagers, 24% of users are women between the ages of 18 and 24, with men in this age group comprising 18% of users. Meanwhile, 31% of users are aged 25 to 34.
- iOS users on their own account for 120.5 million monthly active users.
4. TikTok for Business: Endless Influencers
One of the most appealing aspects of TikTok is that anyone can go viral. It’s not entirely far-fetched that a person with 0 followers and 0 views can post a TikTok video one night that has a million views the next morning.
This ability to provide anyone with a massive following means TikTok has a limitless pool of influencers to choose from. If your brand is looking to target a particular group of people in a specific location, there is likely a perfectly suited individual who fits the criteria and already has a big following.
According to recent data, 1 in 4 marketers have used influencer marketing to generate sales or increase brand awareness.
However, sifting through influencers on TikTok can be an arduous process, and it’s unclear to determine whether a certain influencer is right for your product or service.
To address these concerns, TikTok created the TikTok Creator Marketplace, an analytics tool that helps brands find TikTok users to partner with. It lets you access the influencers’ engagement, reach, demographics, views, and much more.
If you want to get the most from influencer marketing when using TikTok for business, there are different types of influencers to consider and the benefits they offer for businesses:
Mega Influencers
These influencers have over one million followers and tend to be celebrities. Generally, if marketers want to get a celebrity endorsement, they would pay for these influencers.
However, it’s important to remember that these influencers are more famous than they are influential, and they don’t tend to have the same trusted expertise in niche areas as smaller influencers.
@kimkardashian @Jay Shetty ♬ original sound – Kim Kardashian
Macro Influencers
These are also big influencers, but many haven’t quite reached celebrity status, with these profiles tending to attract around 100,000 to one million followers. Typically, these TikTok influencers will have developed a name for themselves via social media more than any other channel.
If you’re working with a large budget to use TikTok for businesses, you may opt to maximize your reach with these influencers.
Micro-Influencers
These smaller influencers generate about 1,000 to 100,000 followers and are often in a niche category. They focus on a particular topic that interests a highly specific audience. If you want to connect with audiences who are within your target niche, micro-influencers can be the right partners.
People tend to trust endorsements and reviews that come from them over larger and less focused influencers.
Nano Influencers
A nano influencer may have less than 1,000 followers, but that following is especially loyal in many cases. These influencers are often influential within a specific community, such as a town or neighborhood.
If you want to use influencers to boost local marketing efforts, nano influencers might just be your go-to.
5. Opportunity for Repurposing Content
TikTok videos are capped at 10 minutes, but they don’t tend to get this long. They’re generally short, customizable, and can be repurposed across all of your social media channels.
Think about how much adding one of your TikTok videos to an email would spruce things up for your customers and amplify their curiosity about your future emails.
Or, if you’re still trying to build your community across multiple platforms, you have the option of sending that TikTok video directly to your Instagram Stories. You could also publish it on your website or use it in presentations or onboarding videos. The more creative you get, the more brownie points you’ll earn with users.
However, you want to make sure you’re conveying the same message on each channel. While TikTok may be ideal for lighthearted content, having images and messaging that differ completely may be confusing when someone encounters you on another platform or visits your company website.
In any case, try to keep your videos short and to the point. In learning how to use TikTok for business, you’ll find that short-form video tends to be best for connecting with people on TikTok and other social media platforms.
Using short-form videos that are a minute long or shorter, you can attract more viewers, give product demos, describe your services, give people a glimpse behind the scenes of your business, and more. Short-form videos can also boost rankings in TikTok.
6. Great User Engagement
When it comes to using TikTok for business, you simply cannot overlook the engagement rate. The average TikTok user spends 95 minutes per day on the app, and this increased screen time means that there’s ample opportunity for advertisers to reach their consumers.
With the sheer variety of content on TikTok, this isn’t unexpected. Whether you’re a clothing brand, restaurant, or transportation company, there’s space for anyone to increase visibility for their products or services.
And due to TikTok’s unique delivery algorithms, you’re able to get higher engagement on your videos with much less effort.
7. TikTok for Business: Budget-Friendly
Many brands are still apprehensive about investing time and money in advertising on TikTok, thinking it will be too difficult to set up campaigns and keep track of yet another app’s data. But perhaps the most attractive part of TikTok for business is that it can garner success within any sized budget.
Plus, compared to more established platforms, it’s still relatively easy for lesser-known brands to achieve organic reach without breaking the bank.
If you’re not sure how much to spend on TikTok for business, some experts recommend starting with $500 per campaign, which is the minimum seeing as TikTok ad costs begin at $10 per CPM, or cost per 1,000 views. Over time, you can grow this budget as you scale your campaigns.
8. Versatile Ad Formats
If you want to learn how to use TikTok for business, the good news is that there are a variety of ad formats to choose from, including:
TopView Ads
This TikTok ad placement is arguably the best, unmissable spot and pops up 5 seconds after the user opens the app.
As the longest video ad format, TopView videos can be up to 60 seconds long and are full-screen with both sound and autoplay. You can also add links to internal or external pages to drive traffic to your website.
In-Feed Ads
Similar to the ads you see on Instagram, In-Feed Ads are 9-15 seconds long and appear in between user videos as you scroll through the “For You” page.
The best part is that you can include multiple call-to-actions to increase conversions. Brands can encourage users to shop, download their app, or visit their website straight from TikTok.
Another feature of In-Feed Ads is that users can like, comment, share, follow, and shoot videos within the same TikTok video.
Brand Takeover Ads
These are the TikTok ads that appear immediately when someone opens the app.
Similar to TopView, this is a full-screen static or dynamic display that delivers a stronger visual impact. These ads are comparable to unskippable YouTube ads or bumper ads.
However, users don’t have the ability to like or comment like they do with In-Feed Ads. We recommend using this format in tandem with other formats available to give your ads the widest reach.
Branded Hashtag Challenge
This engagement format taps into user passion for creative expression.
Featured in TikTok’s Discover Page, Branded Hashtag Challenges give users the ability to participate and build content around a specific campaign theme.
When a user clicks on the sponsored hashtag, they’re immediately redirected to a landing page that features the sponsor’s logo, website link, challenge description, and the most popular videos that are currently using the hashtag.
Branded Lenses
Branded Lenses is a format on TikTok that utilizes augmented reality to bring 3D objects, face filters, and similar effects to users.
These are similar to Snapchat lenses for faces and photos and help make your business more recognizable to the masses.
Spark Ads
These TikTok ads function much like in-feed ads, only brands can use them to convert their TikTok videos into ads. They can also turn other creators’ videos into ads, but they must obtain the creators’ permission first.
When using TikTok for business, you may find that this is the perfect way to repurpose your existing content on the platform for ads, saving you time and effort.
Search Engine Rankings
Social media platforms like TikTok are actually replacing search engines for many younger users.
In fact, according to recent stats, 40% of Gen Z has replaced Google with either TikTok or Instagram when searching online.
This means that if you want to connect with younger users online, you can use TikTok for business to reach them when traditional search engines aren’t.
FAQs About TikTok for Businesses
1. How does TikTok’s algorithm work for businesses?
How does TikTok help businesses through its algorithm, exactly? The algorithm on TikTok works much like those on other social media platforms, prioritizing four main factors to rank content:
- Engagement — These metrics include everything from likes and comments to saves and shares, with videos ranking better on the platform if they generate high engagement.
- User interactions — The people your target audience interacts with could also affect what appears in their feed.
- Video details — The information you include for videos could factor into the algorithm, such as captions, the original source of the video, and other details.
- Device and account settings — The type of device, location of users, and the language settings they use can impact the content that people see.
2. What role does user-generated content play on TikTok?
How can TikTok help your business through user-generated content (UGC)? This is content that people create on the platform, often featuring a specific product or brand to help promote the user and the brand together.
With the help of UGC, you can expand your reach and connect with people in fun and exciting ways. For example, you could create a contest with a giveaway or discount to users who post the best videos showing creative ways to use your products. These videos would get your brand out there while also providing you with content you can repurpose for other campaigns.
3. How effective are TikTok challenges in boosting brand visibility?
One way to use TikTok for business and UGC is to engage in TikTok challenges, which entail encouraging people to create content where they perform a particular task.
For instance, users can create videos where they showcase a talent, perform a routine, showcase a unique product use, or apply a unique filter.
Using hashtags and highly engaging content connected to your brand, you can maximize brand visibility with these challenges.
4. How do you navigate TikTok’s ecommerce features for business?
TikTok offers ecommerce businesses different features to help them grow. So, is TikTok good for business in the ecommerce industry? Yes, and here’s why:
- You can drive sales with product links that direct users to your website.
- Connect people with your products with video shopping ads.
- Answer questions about your brand and offerings with the Q&A feature.
- Use promoted posts to reach more potential customers.
5. What are the key metrics to track for TikTok marketing success?
There are many metrics you can track to gauge success on TikTok. The specific metrics you choose will depend on your goals, whether you want to boost awareness, engagement or sales.
Some examples of metrics include:
- Engagement rate
- Hashtag performance
- Follower growth
- Likes
- Comments
- Video views
- Average playback time
- Impressions
6. How do you incorporate TikTok into a multi-channel marketing strategy?
You can easily integrate TikTok business marketing efforts into a comprehensive marketing strategy that uses other channels.
For example, you could direct people on your website to follow you on TikTok, with a button in your site’s footer. You could also connect your TikTok to your website, encouraging people to visit specific product pages or other landing pages right from TikTok.
You could also convert longer YouTube videos into shorter, bite-sized content for TikTok, encouraging users to watch the full video on your YouTube channel.
7. What is TikTok for Business’s creative solutions and how do you leverage them?
To get the most from TikTok and produce top-quality videos, the platform gives you access to a Creative Center for content creation.
Using the Creative Center, you can produce videos based on the latest insights, trends, and more. The platform also enables you to connect with creators for influencer marketing campaigns based on which creators have the best match.
Meanwhile, the Creative Exchange allows you to connect with a professional creative service provider to develop your video ads to your specifications.
8. How can small businesses specifically benefit from TikTok marketing?
Why use TikTok for a business that’s smaller in size? Well, there are multiple reasons why TikTok is good for business advertising regardless of business size.
Even if you’re working with a tight budget and can’t harness the power of macro influencers, you can still connect with nano and micro-influencers who have loyal followings and potentially even more effective influence.
Also, you can launch campaigns that create user-generated content, potentially going viral on TikTok and drawing more attention to your brand. Hashtag use can also go a long way in building awareness.
9. What are the best practices for collaborating with TikTok influencers?
The following are some specific steps to take when connecting with TikTok influencers:
- Identify the right influencer based on your target niche and location
- Reach out to the prospective influencer, introducing yourself, detailing your campaign and goals, discussing your budget, and requesting information about the influencer’s audience and other insights.
- Develop a statement of work that details your campaign goals, theme, payment, content deliverables, and deadlines on both ends.
- Allow the creator to do what they do best and promote your brand in a way that’s organic for them, which will help you resonate better with audiences.
10. How do you ensure your TikTok content aligns with your brand voice?
When using TikTok for business, ensure your content on the platform matches your brand voice.
You can do so by using the same language in your videos as you do in other content, expressing the same values and overarching message, and incorporating color schemes, logos, and other design elements that are uniquely yours.
11. What steps can you take in developing a TikTok marketing strategy?
As you learn more about how to use TikTok for business, you can take the following steps to begin developing a strategy:
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- Take a look at existing trends to see what other brands in your niche are doing.
- Figure out your specific target audience and what they’re all about—what kinds of content appeal to them most?
- See what your competitors are doing on the platform, including what’s working for them and what isn’t driving as much engagement.
- Establish clear goals for your campaigns, whether they revolve around reach, sales, or other end goals.
- Develop high-quality content that reflects the quality of your brand and offerings.
- Connect with other users to integrate into the TikTok community.
- Measure the results of your campaigns and make any necessary improvements.
Take TikTok for Business to a New Level
What does the future of TikTok and business hold? With the platform continuing to gain more traction, businesses big and small should be experimenting, optimizing, and showcasing their content in hopes of converting avid TikTokers into loyal customers.
Ignite Visibility has you covered, ensuring you get the most out of TikTok for your business. We’ll help you:
- Manage your social media
- Design eye-catching creative assets
- Create short-form video
- Run social media ads
- And more
Let us help you ignite your social media strategy today. Let’s chat about TikTok for your business.
