TikTok has been dominating the social scene for several months now and businesses are sta
rting to notice. Over the past few months, I’ve had several clients reach out to me for advice on managing the platform, so I figured it’s time to address the subject en mass.
Although we pride ourselves on being up to date with all of the latest social trends, we haven’t been pushing content or management services for TikTok just yet for several reasons. First, because it hasn't quite started being utilized by businesses. If you’re old enough to remember when Facebook or Instagram started getting popular, you remember that it took time for the platforms to grow in popularity before business accounts started being implemented and it became apparent that these were strong marketing strategies. These days, Facebook and Instagram are massively effective marketing tools for businesses (which is why Millennial Marketing exists). At some point, it will be just as common to see businesses on TikTok as it is on Facebook or Instagram, but right now, it’s still the wild west out there.
That's not to say that it can't be effective right now. Unfortunately, another reason that we're not managing Tik Tok accounts just yet is because our team is so limited in creating the content for your business. Companies that sell physical products will have a much easier time creating video content on the platform as they get started. Those who are selling services need to be a little bit more creative.
TikTok is currently reaching a very young demographic- just like Instagram did when it first started dominating our smart phones. Gen Z’s aged 16-24 are the best people to reach using the new app, so if that’s your target audience, this is definitely something to start thinking about.
I know I’ve been saying it for two years, but video is KING, and video-based platforms like TikTok reassure marketers that video isn’t going anywhere. Rather, it’s gaining popularity. Luckily, everything you need to create an amazing video is built into the app. You don’t need a nice camera or any additional software to make magic happen. What you do need is some creativity.
If you’ve seen any TikToks at all, you know this isn’t the place to try to hard sell your products or services. Instead, try to incorporate as much personality into your videos as possible. Frankly, if it ain’t funny, they don’t care. Humorous content is absolutely dominating at this point. This is not a formal/professional platform, so if you’re going for that type of content, it’s not going to work.
The good news is that you don’t need to reinvent the wheel. The most popular content right now is challenges, by far. So just find existing content that is performing well and make it your own. A word of advice? Download the app. Start playing around with it personally to get a feel for it before your business jumps in with both feet. Talk to your highschool/college-aged kids about it and get some feedback on what they would respond to.
A few more quick tips:
Make sure you’re formatting your content correctly. Videos are vertical on this platform, not horizontal.
Hashtags are super effective on TikTok, just like Instagram. Check out some trending hashtag challenges and see how you can incorporate your team/products/services to make it unique.
Utilize UGC (User Generated Content) to have followers/customers use the hashtag you choose and post their own TikToks using your brand/services. This is a great time to start implementing Influencer Marketing!
For now, the only TikTok-related services that Millennial Marketing is offering is consulting. We’ll help you come up with some fun ideas and walk you through how the app works so that you can create the content yourself. As the app grows, our services for it will likely grow, but at this point we’re still focusing heavily on the platforms that are consistently performing well for businesses: Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and YouTube.