How to Advertise on TikTok in 2024 — 10+ Tips for Beginners

We guess there is no need to introduce TikTok since its popularity is on the rise and the entire world (while being quarantined because of COVID-19) follows trending TikTok challenges to boost spirits and cheer up a little.  

For case, if the app is still unfamiliar to you, here is a short outline. Initially, the app appeared in China as a video-sharing app Douyin (2016) owned by ByteDance, the IT company headquartered in Beijing. In 2017 the app was launched under the name TikTok for out-of-China markets. Later, another app, Musical.ly, was acquired in 2018. This is the origin point of the TikTok app you’ve heard about.

Since that time the new app has gone viral. This is the platform for fun and entertainment. It embraces music videos, stand-up comedy, pranks, dances, DIYs and crafts, fashion and make-up tricks, etc. Users create and upload their own 15-sec videos (up 60-sec video-stories). Some TikTok users are just lurkers (or passive viewers), so they just watch the provided content.

How to Advertise on TikTok

In terms of users’ numbers, TikTok bypassed Twitter, Pinterest, Snapchat, Reddit, and LinkedIn. The app was downloaded more than 1.5 billion times from the Apple Store and Google Play.

Yet, TikTok advertising is still under construction. Initially, TikTok created an ad pitch deck in 2018. The platform began showing ads in January 2019. The beta version of the ad platform was launched in April 2019. Well, currently the ad system is tested in the US and Europe.

As of now, the advertising possibilities on TikTok are limited to only several options:

• In-Feed Videos. Video ads of this time appear while scrolling the app.
• Brand Takeover/TopView. A large-format ad appears when a user opens the app.
• Hashtag Challenge. An ad campaign encourages TikTokers to generate their own, topic-related content.  
• Branded Lenses/Filters. Custom, brand-related filters for creating videos.

In-feed videos. In-feed videos are sort of native ads that are usually located at the bottom of TikTok videos or in between the video queue. Somewhat in-feed ads remind of Facebook and Instagram news-feed sponsored ads. In-feed ads are less expensive than Brand Takeover and can also redirect a user to a website or an app. Here you bid on TikTok ad slots. As of now, only self-service ads are available. You bid to place your video ad in the platform’s main feed.

Brand Takeover. This ad model is restricted to one advertiser per day. Being large-format ads, Brand Takeover ads pop up, when a user opens TikTok. Brand Takeovers may include both external and internal links. Many brands have already tested this advertising option attempting to increase brand awareness. For example, Grubhub, a food delivery service, ran this ad type to encourage users to install the mobile app.

Hashtag challenge. Challenges represent a characteristic feature of TikTok, so the platform uses this entertaining activity as an option for paid advertising campaigns as well. Challenges often appear with a #name, so TikTokers take up a new challenge, create and upload their short videos. One of the brightest examples is a #tumbleweedchallenge from Jimmy Fallon, a US TV presenter. Jimmy challenged TikTokers to upload videos demonstrating users falling to the ground and rolling as tumbleweed with a western music background. As a result, there were more than 10.4 million engagements and 8 000+ submissions. Hashtag challenges might be useful for the promotion of brands via their own channels or with the assistance of influencers. When a hashtag challenge is kickstarted on TikTok, users can join the challenge just with a couple of clicks. To run a hashtag challenge ad, a TikTok representative stays in touch with the brand for 6 days (the typical length of a campaign).

Branded lenses. This ad model allows creating custom filters that include branded content. Branded lenses are similar to AR filters of Instagram and Snapchat. Advertisers can use their own face filters, lenses, and 3D objects. TikTokers like using various filters on videos as filters are captivating and engaging. So, if they like your branded filters, your brand will become more recognizable across the platform.

How Much Does the TikTok Ad Cost

As of now, TikTok ads might be a nice solution for large brands (Disney, Nike, etc.), but for small businesses, the ad rates can be inaccessible and out-of-reach. Why? The costs are pretty high: the cost of large campaigns may vary from $25 000 to $150 000 (it depends on the type of campaign). The minimal budget for self-service ads is $500 for a campaign, with a minimum of $20 for an ad group. According to some TikTok sources, the minimal budget should help in getting the required results and reaching the objectives.

The TikTok Business platform implements a bidding system for advertising. As an advertiser, you compete with others for audiences. If your bid is $2, and someone set a bid at $2.1, your competitor will get the placement.  

Three levels of TikTok ads:

• Campaign. This is the top level. You can determine campaigns with a single goal and a budget.
• Ad groups. Here you select ad groups with relevant target audiences, budget, placements, and a schedule.
• Ads. Here you create ad-containing videos for the targeted audience.

On average, rates vary from $0.2 to $2.5 per action, and you should spend at least $20 per day per ad group. 

TikTok offers 3 pricing models optimized for the ad’s objective: CPC, CPM, and CPV (cost per view).

• Click. The target here is to get as many clicks as possible.
• Impressions. The ad will be shown as many times as possible (the pricing model is CPM).
• Conversion. In this case, the ad will be shown to TikTokers who are the most likely to make the required action (i.e. fill out a form, download an app, etc.)

Let’s hope that the future will bring more advertisers and lower costs for TikTok ads. Currently, for minor marketing campaigns, this platform isn’t the best option.

TikTok Ad Campaign: Step-by-Step Guide

As with any social platform to run ads on TikTok you need to create a business account. Then, you can setup your ad campaign.   

Step 1. Open the TikTok For Business page and select Start Now. Then, specify your:

• Country (region).
• Time zone.
• Business Name. Business Name should be the same as the legal name of your Business otherwise you will not pass the account review.
• Currency. Select the preferable currency for billing.  

Once you have shared all the required information, click Register.

Step 2.  To complete the account setup, you have to provide Business Information.

You need to add some details related to your business, such as company’s website, official address (postal code, state, province, and street), business description (industry and niche) and contact details.

Step 3. Payment Method.

You can select Manual Payment or Automatic Payment.

Note that Automatic Payment is not available across all regions.

Step 4. Submit Account Info.

Once you have filled in all the required fields on the Account Setup page, go to the bottom of the page and click Submit. Account review usually takes up to 24 hours.

Then, you can move further and create your first TikTok campaign.

TikTok offers the following structure for ads: Campaigns, Ad Groups, Ads. The hierarchy of ads helps you set up objectives, target audiences and even plan the budget.

Step 5. Create your Ad Campaign.

To run ads on TikTok you need to create a new campaign and determine the results (goals) you plan to achieve. On this stage, you need to select:

• The campaign objective: Awareness (reach), Consideration (app installs, traffic, or video views), or Conversion.
• The campaign budget.
• Create an Ad Group.

Within a campaign you can create several ad groups to facilitate optimizing and measuring the performance of your campaign. Do not forget to add your profile image and display name. For each ad group you can select specific audiences, placements, budgets, goals, schedules, and bids.

As we’ve mentioned already, TikTok ads cost more than some other social media ads. For example, you’ll pay an average $10 per CPM (1 000 views) and $100 per a Brand Takeover. Anyway, the price may vary as it depends on your total ads package. However, if the TikTok audience represents your target and suits your objective, your brand will get more recognition and popularity.  

Every ad group may contain one or more ads. Several ads within a single ad group allow comparing the performance of different ads.

Ads. On the Ad level you create the content that will be delivered to the selected audiences.

TikTok allows including and excluding audiences based on specific characteristics. You can build your custom audience based on your previous campaigns or website traffic. To create a custom audience you will need TikTok pixel installed on your site.  

The process of working with ads includes the following stages:

• Ad name. You select names for your ads.
• Ad format.
• Ad Details. You upload the image/creative for the ad; add description and call-to-action.
• Add tracking.

Now you are ready to launch your first TikTok ad campaign. 

TikTok Audience

For a while, marketers stayed unaware of the app as it’s targeted mostly at youth, 13-25. As of now, the age frame is extended and includes people under 30.  So, if you target a young audience TikTok is the right place for you as 66% of TikTokers are under the age of 30. 

Just give a look at some statistics! Numbers speak for themselves.

• The total number of active users is 800 million (Feb 2020).
• The total number of TikTok downloads is 1.65 billion (Feb 2020).
• The number of video views per day is 1 billion (Feb 2020).
• 41% of TikTok users are 16-24 (66% are aged below 30).
• 56% of TikTok users are male.
• 50% of the global TikTok audience is under the age of 34.
• TikTok is available in 150 markets and 75 languages.
• It is the 3rd most downloaded non-gaming app of the year 2020.
• Global user spending on TikTok in Feb 2020 is $50.4 million (Statista).

Celebrities like Jennifer Lopez, Jessica Alba, Tony Hawk, and Justin Bieber joined the platform increasing its influence, so the fan base has grown significantly. Simply, TikTok can’t be ignored!

So, even if a TikTok audience doesn’t fit your marketing objectives, it’s always useful to learn the new platform and its potential, so as to be ready in the future.

Yubo

 Launched in 2015, Yubo is a new growing friendship-building app for young people aged 13-25. Currently, it is a social network with 25+ million users. It is focused on socializing and creating a space for building friend communities with live stream discussions (with real-time moderation for the safety of users). Yubo turned to TikTok to expand its user base and drive new downloads.

So, Yubo ran biddable (in-feed) ad campaigns with the focus on converting views into downloads. TikTok ads platform allows uploading creatives and using audience targeting with control over expenses.

As a result, Yubo’s campaign has generated 238 000+ downloads and 13.3% conversion.  

Guess

The objective of the campaign was to raise the brand attractiveness for the Gen Z and millennials and promote Guess Denim Fit Collection.

So, the company used a hashtag challenge option on TikTok. The #InMyDenim Hashtag Challenge invited TikTokers to show their denim style. Guess used the slogan "Transform your outfit from a mess to best-dressed! All you need is denim!" to make the campaign namable. Additionally, Bebe Rexh’s "I’m a Mess" as background music for official videos played its role in the general success. Add here the Brand Takeover for the first day of the campaign and four videos from influencers to promote the challenge.

The challenge went viral: millions of views, multiple exited comments, and thousands of user-generated videos.

The results of the 6-day ad campaign: 10.5 million views, 5 550 user-generated videos, more than 12 000 new followers on TikTok, and the 14.3% engagement rate.

Universal Pictures

The film studio launched the #FindYourMagic campaign to promote its new film The House with a Clock in its Walls.

All kinds of pranks and magic tricks are very popular on TikTok. Within the scope of the challenge, Universal Pictures offered TikTokers to interpret the slogan in their own way and reveal their magic, including classic ‘rabbit out of a hat’ or card tricks.

To make the campaign noticeable, the company made deals with 10 influencers, who showed their ‘magic’.

And the magic worked pretty well! The #FindYourMagic challenge received over 1.3 million likes on videos from the influencers and over 19 000 user-generated videos. Additionally, the company got more than 11 000 new followers.

Balenciaga

The fashion brand is known as innovative, offering ready-to-wear trends. The company decided to introduce its collection to the TikTok audience. Naturally, Balenciaga launched the TikTok campaign during the Christmas period — TopView (Brand Takeover) ad format for the UK and France. This format allows linking to external websites. As can well be imagined, Balenciaga redirected TikTokers to its shopping pages. The campaign was so successful that the company expanded it and included two Brand Takeovers (for the UK and Italy).

As for the total results, they significantly outweigh the advertiser’s expectations: 23+ million impressions (the UK, Italy, and France); the average CTR was 18% (20.6% in Italy); more than 4.5 million clicks to the Balenciaga landing page. Impressive, isn’t it?

Tips for the Beginners

Ok, you CAN advertise on TikTok. Now, the question is: Whether the TikTok advertising platform is suitable for you or not?  Since we know that the TikTok advertising platform exists, we’ll share some recommendations on how it works and how to join it. Besides the paid ad platform, we’ll also provide some tips on advertising via TikTok with no investments. Ok, let it roll.

• As of now, the minimum budget for a TikTok campaign is $500 for a campaign and $50 for the ad group level. Supposedly, it should ensure that ad goals can be reached. Unfortunately, companies and advertisers with smaller budgets should wait till ads cost will decline. Usually, price reduction happens when more advertisers enter the platform. Another variant is to promote your own TikTok account, getting free traffic.  
• Then you decide on ad groups within your campaign. Apparently, you’ve guessed by now that at this stage you choose the targeted audience and ad placements. Well, you may have several ad groups targeted at different audiences. As for the ad placements, TikTok provides access to the cluster of applications, including BuzzVideo (Japan), News Republic (worldwide), Vigo Video (India), Babe (Indonesia), and TopBuzz (US and BR). You may cover the entire cluster or limit your campaign to TikTok audiences.

• TikTok helps to calculate the cost-efficient campaign and provides recommendations on the best placements.
• How to design your TikTok ads. Naturally, TikTok ads may include videos and images (vertical, horizontal, or square). TikTok ads platform provides advertisers with a Video Creation Kit to facilitate the process of ad creation. The kit includes customizable image and video templates, as well as 300+ music options.  
• Automated Creative Optimization is one more useful tool: you can upload up to 5 videos, 10 images, 5 ad texts, and 1 ‘call to action’. The provided materials are combined in various ways into ads, so the system then tests them and later uses the most effective ones.
• One more useful instrument is the Landing Page to Video tool. This instrument captures images from a landing page (you provide an URL directly in the form) and combines given images with music, generating video ads automatically.

• TikTok ads platform allows adding up to 20 terms for the description of your application or a website. Consider thoroughly all the keywords because they will be used for showing the product to the audience.
• The target audience. Here you set the criteria, such as age, gender, location, devices, language, etc. Hopefully, TikTok will add targeting by interests and behavioral patterns.  Custom audiences, white lists, and blacklists are available. For remarketing campaigns targeted at the specific group of people, an advertiser can arrange a custom audience by uploading the list of TikTokers IDs (TikTok Pixel is a very useful tool in this case).

Now, with the TikTok Ads explained, let’s see how marketers and webmasters can make use of TikTok in some other ways.

 TikTok and Affiliate Marketing

As of now, TikTok is testing the option of adding external links to user-generated videos. Let’s hope, in the foreseeable future marketers will be able to include affiliate links to their videos. Currently, you can add only social links to your Youtube or Instagram account. Adding your social profiles to your TikTok account, you can call out your TikTok audience to follow you on other social platforms. This way you’ll take their attention to other content with affiliate links. Promo codes represent another marketing option. You may agree with your affiliate manager to provide a special ‘promo code’ for your audience. So, you share the promo code in your video content on TikTok. It stands to reason that the code should be easy to pronounce. Don’t forget to link the promo code to your affiliate ID!

 We recommend you consider the following aspects before using TikTok for your affiliate business:

• Affiliate program restrictions. Discuss with your affiliate manager whether it is permitted to advertise on TikTok. Since the platform is rather new and not widely used for marketing, many affiliate programs do not include TikTok traffic as permitted.
• Mobile optimization. To run ads on TikTok, landing pages and all the content should be mobile-optimized because TikTok is a mobile app.
• The marketing vertical. Keeping in mind TikTok’s major audience (young people under 30) you can filter verticals, products, and services that might catch the interest of TikTokers. E-commerce, fashion, and lifestyle products might work well, while finance, b2b, and real estate aren’t likely to get much attention.
• Flexibility. TikTok ad platform is still tested; so many aspects (such as advertising options, pricing, and policy) can be changed. If you have your eye on the TikTok ads platform, you should be flexible and adaptive to any possible changes.

How to Monetize TikTok

Things are pretty easy. Some quick-witted marketers have already guessed how to reap a harvest. It’s a straightforward process.

• Choose your vertical or specialty that you can create short videos about.
• Create your TikTok username related to your specialty.
• Connect your TikTok account to your similar Instagram profile (or create a new Insta profile).
• Make several engaging 15-sec videos that will keep the attention of TikTok users till the end (Important! TikTok algorithm considers several factors: engagement rate, video completion rate, overall account ranking, and the time of posting).
• Send your TikTok followers to your Instagram (call-to-action can be used in your TikTok profile, ‘bio’).
• Now, sell products to your Instagram followers via dropshipping stores.

You can sell goods for $1 000 per week with no need to touch the products, ship products, or leave the comfort of your chair.

Creating Your Own TikTok Channel

Brands and companies can create their own channels to promote products and services via relevant videos. User-generated content might be very useful in terms of brand promotion. Keep in mind the TikTok audience: generation Z (aka "zoomers") avoids passive experience and prefers active involvement.

Some brands successfully use this feature. Through your brand channel or via influencers you may encourage TikTokers to share videos showing how they use your products. This leads to higher brand awareness and buy-in. One Chinese restaurant, Haidilao, gained an advantage from its menu with a DIY option. Restaurant customers, who choose this menu option, can create their own unique dish and record their experience and the result. The restaurant offered and encouraged its guests to share their experience on the Chinese version of TikTok (aka Douyin).

After several customers uploaded their creative recipes, so many people flocked to Haidilao to make up their exotic dishes and videos. As a result, more than 15 000 people asked for DIY menu options, 2 000 of them uploaded their videos to the platform, and 50 million users watched the videos.

Influencer Marketing

The idea isn’t new at all. Daily we see influencer marketing utilized on such platforms as YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, etc. Despite being quite a new app, TikTok has its own well-known influencers. For example, Loren Gray is the most followed TikTok influencer (34 million followers in 2019).  

First of all, you need to consider whether your product or service matches the specific influencer.

Next, allow the influencer to create the video. Influencers know very well what their audience likes to watch and what sort of content it reacts to. Don’t forget that influencers are followed for their authentic content, so they don’t want to lose their followers. Sometimes it’s enough to let the person just wear or use a product. According to some sources, the partnership with TikTok influencers may cost you from $500 up to $5 000 per a single post (the rate depends on the influencer and the campaign).

How to Make Your Videos Popular

TikTok offers all user-generated content by stages (or “pushes”). The first stage is a sort of testing of your video. If your content is highly ranked (considering above mentioned parameters), it will go to the second stage. The key feature to pass successfully through all stages is the video completion rate, which should be higher than 95%.  How to entice a user to watch your content till the end? Headings, mystery, and intrigue will do well (ok, only in case the content is indeed interesting). By the way, if users watch your videos multiple times, the completion rate might overpass 100%.

In 2020 TikTok added the "Virtual Items" of the "Small Gestures" feature. It is based on social gifting practice, which is very common in China. Many beauty brands joined TikTok to advertise this new feature that was launched due to the global lockdown, so "to build a sense of support and encouragement with the TikTok community during these tough times." Moreover, in February 2020 TikTok launched a "family safety mode" for parents to control their kids’ online activity. This feature includes a restricted mode, limits on direct messaging, and a screen time management option.

Important: TikTok audience is interested in original entertaining content, not in the high-quality, studio-made professional videos. Always remember that while creating videos for your brand channel, making hashtag challenges, or marketing via influencers.

The way of online interaction between people is changing: personal updates seem to be uninteresting and unamusing. This is one of the reasons that social channels are redirected more into entertainment. This recent trend is more known as “passive browsing”.

Why Does TikTok Stand Out

The app brings together a wide international community, trends, creativity, and entertainment: numerous hashtag challenges go viral and urge TikTokers on creating their own video content.

Since last year and particularly during the lockdown times, many brands consider TikTok as a great way to capture attention, build brand awareness, and acquire new customers. TikTok is very likely to join the group of the leading social media channels.  The application has already stolen the scene and attention of numerous celebrities and well-known brands, such as the NBA, Will Smith, The Washington Post, etc.

Just imagine! UNSW Sydney extends its social media presence via TikTok to get more recognition and acquire new students!

Kroger’s challenge is another example of a successful marketing TikTok campaign. The company organized an involving back-to-school hashtag challenge, #TransformUrDorm, with the assistance of several TikTok influencers. But the best part of the challenge was that users could participate in the challenge with Kroger products, which they could buy from the Kroger website still within the TikTok application (just by clicking on the additional discover tab). Although the feature is still in beta-testing, we all hope that the app will have its shoppable future, which means that it will become a fruitful garden for affiliate marketers.  If you’re not familiar with the platform, it's high time to get to know TikTok.

Conclusion

As TikTok is still gaining popularity and expands its reach, the platform needs more content from users. What does it mean? It means the platform provides you with an opportunity to create your own unique content and generate organic (aka free) traffic to your business.