TikTok had enjoyed meteoric success in the short time since its creation in 2016. Over the past four years, it has become one of the world’s most popular social media platforms; resting in ninth place at the time of writing with over 800 million monthly users.

It owes its success to the enthusiasm of under 24-year-olds who make up the bulk of its users. This is a core demographic which any social media manager should be trying to attract the attention of. Generation Z as they are called are not only voracious consumers of online content, but they are also massive consumers full stop generating an aggregate income of $463 billion.

You ignore this youthful, expanding customer base at your peril. If you are not already investing some of your social media budgets in the growing platform where they are consuming much of their media, then it is high time to make a start. This article will aim to help you on your way.

Be clear about your marketing objectives

As with any marketing campaign, it is important to first set out what you hope to achieve with it and decide if you are using the right platform to achieve those goals. Every post should have a purpose and should be in line with your brand’s voice and tone. Assess your existing brand elements and see how well they chime with the content that exists on TikTok. Then set clear goals, targets, and metrics by which you will measure your success and always keep yourself on message and on-target while accepting that these goals and metrics may shift as your campaign evolves.

TikTok is good at building trust, bridging the gap between brand and customer, and boosting brand awareness. If these are things you care about, (and all marketing wisdom suggests that you should) then TikTok may well be for you.

TikTok does not currently support advertising, but that doesn’t mean you cannot get your brand out there and build awareness by engaging potential customers socially and appealingly. Also, videos on TikTok are one-minute-long maximum which can make communicating complex and involved messages challenging. Again, this is not necessarily a bad thing as the shorter the video, the higher the completion rate and so the more likely customers will absorb your entire message. Try rehashing some content from a different platform with some royalty-free videos as a cheap and easy way to get started.

Hashtag challenges

Many brands, notably NBA, Chipotle, and E.L.F. are enjoying enormous success through hashtag challenges. Inspired by the success of the #icebucketchallenge of 2014, brands have launched a series of hashtag challenges seeking to boost brand awareness, increase engagement with their products, and connect with customers.

Two types of hashtag challenges are sponsored and organic. Sponsored hashtags are developed by brands and then the company pays TikTok to host the hashtag on their Discover page, whereas organic hashtags go viral of their own accord or as a result of an influencer engagement.

Chipotle is a brand that has fully embraced this marketing method and enjoyed massive success with its #GuacDance challenge which resulted in 250,000 video submissions and coincided with Chipotles biggest guacamole day ever, with 800,000 sides of guac served.

What is so effective about hashtag challenges is that they are an excellent way to get a large amount of user-generated content. The most successful to date has been Elf cosmetics with their #eyeslipsface campaign which gained them over 3 million user-generated videos and over 4 billion views. User-generated content is authentic and has undeniable social appeal, fostering increased interaction with your brand.

Influencer marketing

Influencer marketing has been successful across platforms because it makes us feel connected with the product through our existing connection with the influencer. Marketing these days relies on nurturing these connections by building trust and an emotional connection to a product. Leveraging influencers’ existing trust and reputation can be an excellent way to achieve this and the larger the influencer’s following, the more power they have to influence TikTok users to use your product.

It is important to set clear goals and guidelines when engaging an influencer whilst still giving them creative freedom. Clearly then, choosing an influencer whose style and existing content is in line with your brand’s image and tone is crucial for a more genuine and authentic partnership.

Key takeaways:

• Keep your message on brand and set out a roadmap of goals for your campaign.
• Aim to build connections and engagement with your product rather than bombarding your people with advertisements.
• Build partnerships with people and companies whose brand message aligns with your own.
• Repurpose videos from different platforms to build up your content quickly

TikTok is a rapidly growing platform and reaches a demographic which is not only active but likely to remain active for a long time, so if you are trying to market to Generation Z and the young millennials then TikTok is the way to go. TikTok is relatively young compared to other platforms and hasn’t yet become saturated, so get started soon. We would hate to say we told you so.