4 ways to grow your business with TikTok.

TikTok is a fast-growing social media platform with more than one billion monthly active users in 2021, up from 680 million monthly active users in late 2018. You might be wondering if you should invest time and energy to learn how to use TikTok to promote your business. To answer that concern, consider some of the reasons why TikTok may be helpful to your company. (Note that the numbers cited in this post were current as of the summer of 2021 – specific numbers may change over time.)

Why TikTok may be helpful for your business.

There are a few reasons TikTok could be a way to grow your business.

• Audience size. TikTok has 130 million active users in the U.S. By age, the three largest groups on TikTok are: the 10-19 group (33% or 42 million users), the age 20-29 group (30% or 38 million users) and the 30-39 age group (17% or 21 million users).
• Potentially lower advertising costs. JungleTopp Media ran an experiment in 2020 comparing Facebook advertising costs to TikTok and found that TikTok had a cost per click (CPC) of 19 cents vs. 46 cents for Facebook. According to JungleTopp Media, TikTok ads may be less costly because it is a relatively new platform. 
• Access to TikTok Creator Marketplace. Currently in beta in the U.S., the TikTok Creator Marketplace makes it easy for business users to collaborate with content creators. A business can potentially save time searching for a content creator relevant to their business. For example, a business that offers women’s clothing might only look at TikTok content creators with a significant number of female followers. The TikTok Creator Marketplace helps business owners narrow the field because TikTok restricts which content creators can participate in the marketplace based on several criteria, such as engagement, age and followers.
• Advertising options with TikTok for Business. In June 2020, TikTok launched TikTok For Business which offers marketing services. This tool includes several advertising options: brand takeover, native ad, sponsored hashtag challenge and branded lens. For more details on TikTok advertising, see the “Advertise on TikTok” section of this article below.

Four ideas on using TikTok to gain customers.

1. Create your own content on TikTok.

Creating your own posts on TikTok is one way to get started. To illustrate the options, we found a few businesses with a large TikTok following.

• Chipotle. Chipotle has had a highly successful branded challenge on TikTok using the #GuacDance hashtag. As a result of this campaign, it is estimated the company sold more than 802,000 sides of guac. Chipotle also encourages TikTok users to join its loyalty program which drives the majority of the company’s digital sales.
• Gymshark. Founded in 2012, Gymshark is a fitness and apparel company with more than three million followers on TikTok. Gymshark’s TikTok account shows videos of people exercising and humorous videos. For example, one video with over 100,000 views is based on the idea of your gym crush walking into the gym and how you might react to that development by exercising more intensively.
• Magdas Hotel. Employees of the Magdas Hotel in Vienna created a video that has more than two million views. It imagines what a bored hotel employee might do to fill time, like playing with toilet paper and dancing at various locations throughout the hotel. The video is set to the song “Bored in the House,” adding entertainment value to the experience.
• Nominal. Nominal is a jewelry company with approximately 135,000 TikTok followers. One of the company’s most successful videos (about 1.5 million views) shows coworkers unwrapping a variety of presents. 
• The Silk Labs. Offering silk products, The Silk Labs has over 100,000 followers on TikTok. The company attracted over 20,000 followers through a single video. The 12-second video encouraged followers to earn a “hustle check” by starting their own business. Even more exciting, the company has generated 200 orders from a single TikTok post. Jenna Labiak, the founder of The Silk Labs, generally posts four types of content to TikTok: aesthetic videos, tutorials, business advice and behind-the-scenes content.

As you start to come up with content ideas for TikTok, keep in mind the limits imposed by the platform. Some sources suggest shorter videos (i.e., nine to 15 seconds long) perform the best on TikTok, but you can post videos up to three minutes in length. Finally, keep in mind that entertainment and dancing have historically been the most popular types of content on TikTok.

To inspire your next TikTok video, here are three more ideas from small businesses that have created successful campaigns on TikTok.

• Show how your products are made and packaged. Girls Crew, a jewelry company, started using TikTok in 2020 with videos showing how the company’s products were designed and packaged. For example, one video with more than 170,000 views features the song “Memories (Drinks Bring Back)” by Ajay Stephens and shows products being packaged.
• Explain how to do something with your product. Emme Essentials, a candle company based in New York, has a video called “how to clean a candle jar” that has attracted over 9,000 views. The video includes captions on the video so users can read along during the video. The video also includes the song “Feel the Groove” by Queens Road and Fabian Graetz.
• Create seasonally relevant content. Aldrich Landscape, a landscaping company based in Ohio, created a video with 1.7 million views that shows a person landscaping a garden with an edging tool. The video caption states, “Anyone else miss the warm weather and green grass!?” and features the song “Steven Universe” by L.Dre.

You might have noticed that many TikTok videos include music. You can find royalty-free music for TikTok videos for purchase on several websites like PremiumBeat, Epidemic Sound, or TikTok’s commercial music library.

2. Get TikTok inspiration by using the Discover tab.

Not sure what to say in your TikTok debut? Instead of starting from scratch, get inspired by using the Discover tab to see videos that are trending. You might be surprised by what you find. For a while, content based on singing sea shanties took off in popularity. You may be able to reach more users by creating videos around a popular content idea.

3. Advertise on TikTok.

There are several ways for a business to advertise on TikTok, including brand takeover, native ads, sponsored hashtag challenge and branded lens. Let’s take a closer look at each of the options.

• Brand takeover. A brand takeover is a full-screen ad that displays for three to five seconds. By showing in full-screen mode, this type of ad is a good choice to maximize exposure. Users can click anywhere on the image and be taken to a landing page. This ad type is exclusive because only one brand can take over a category each day. Brand takeovers are pricey and most popular with large brands. 
• Spark Ads (i.e., native ads). Launched in 2021, Spark Ads lets brands promote existing organic content. Costa Coffee attracted 18,000 fans on TikTok using this ad type at a cost of approximately $4.41 per fan ($1.89 per thousand).
• Sponsored hashtag challenge. A hashtag challenge is a way to encourage TikTok users to create content related to your brand. Marc Jacobs, in partnership with Rickey Thompson, used a hashtag challenge that led to six billion video views from approximately 864,000 video creators.
• Branded lens. A branded lens is an ad format that uses face filters and related effects to make your business more recognizable to users. This type of advertising is created by the TikTok team with an estimated starting cost of $45,000.

4. Promote your business with TikTok influencers.

A business can also work with a TikTok user who already has a following (i.e., a TikTok influencer). A few points to keep in mind when working with a TikTok influencer.

• Use tools to find potential TikTok influencers. You don’t have to search for TikTok influencers yourself—take advantage of third-party tools like Neoreach and Grin.
• Find out the cost per post. The cost to work with a TikTok influencer varies largely depending on the number of followers they have. According to Influencer Marketing Hub, a single TikTok influencer post could range from $5 to $25 for a nano influencer (i.e., 1,000 to 10,000 followers) to more than $2,500 for a post from a mega-influencer (i.e., over one million followers).
• Check the influencer’s followers. Ask the influencer to provide information about their followers. For example, TikTok provides information about the gender and country of a user’s followers. This information can help you determine if the influencer’s followers are likely to be relevant to your business.
• Brainstorm post ideas with the influencer. As you develop the marketing campaign with the influencer, develop a few different post ideas. 
• Measure the results of the campaign. Ask people to use a discount code specific to that influencer when they make a purchase. You can then track how many purchases are made related to a specific TikTok post.