TikTok is the fastest-growing social media app and is pretty hard to ignore when it comes to marketing. There are so many case studies of the amazing TikTok reach and virility that the potential for sales is abundantly clear. This blog will cover why you need a TikTok strategy even if you don’t want to post on the app.
Using TikTok
Going viral or having a campaign that takes off on the platform is by no means a given. And engagement and reach very rarely translate straight into sales. A tried and tested sales funnel is what does that work, not usually social media.
Yet, TikTok is an attractive platform given that so many people are using it, which means definitely your ideal audience.
But we’re thinking about TikTok all wrong. TikTok isn’t a social media platform. It doesn’t show you videos from your friends and family. In fact, it shows you videos of things you like or have shown an interest in. And it certainly doesn’t show you content from the people to who you’re connected. So in this sense, it’s not really a social media platform at all.
It doesn’t work like all the other platforms. It doesn’t show you that video from your best mate, or that funny incident your sister filmed last week. You don’t need to follow or be connected with anyone to access content on the app.
TikTok is an SEO platform
More and more, I’m suggesting a TikTok strategy as part of a wider SEO strategy to clients. When you take away the link between content and your connections, what you are left with is search.
And there is plenty of evidence to back this up.
Take the Simply Roasted campaign as an example. They had a pop-up shop in Soho where you could go and get pick ‘n’ mix crisps. Sure, they’d get some curious people passing by and trying it. It’s in Soho – there is heavy footfall past the location.
What the brand did exceptionally well was get a TikTok travel content creator to make a video about the pop-up. This one video got traction and resulted in queues around Soho to get in, and people travelling from across the country to hit the store.
What’s interesting is the brand didn’t go for the obvious food influencer but instead decided to look at travel influencing instead. London is the tourist destination in the UK, so by going down this angle, they were able to catch a specific local audience.
Simply Roasted essentially used local SEO to market their event. By catching people who were searching on TikTok for London events, they were able to reach a larger audience than had they simply posted about food.
In this way, they tapped into TikTok being a search engine. Perhaps then it’s not surprising that TikTok has now ended Google’s 15-year dominance as the go-to search engine.
And TikTok knows this
That’s why they’ve been running TV ad campaigns to let you know that they are the search engine for your life. It would be misguided to think of this platform solely for Gen Z. Older people are using TikTok to answer their questions.
And TikTok is keeping people on the platform. So while you may get the reach and engagement for providing good quality engagement, your difficulties start when you need to move that person along their lovely customer journey.
On a Google search, you hope that your metadata is helpful enough that they click through to your website for a longer explanation. And from there, they sign up for your newsletter, get your regular content and buy. But how to do this from a fast-moving platform whose sole CTA is to swipe up?
User-Generated Content and TikTok
This is where UGC comes into play. UGC is the marketing acronym for user-generated content. Or influencers. People don’t necessarily want to be sold to or marketed at, so getting people to show your product in use is a better way to raise your brand awareness.
UGC on TikTok puts the product second to the content. Showing the product in action as part of life means you can see yourself using it. It’s why you’ll get The Oreo Challenge or the Tortilla Challenge. Generally, these viral experiences are family fun that is intergenerational. Stuff you’d do at the family party with your Nan and niece.
And it would be remiss not to mention Prime here. Prime has entered into a virtuous circle of viral content. A viral circle? You’ve got a product created by an influencer, promoted by more influencers, and then it becomes so highly sought after that it sells out. And this is when it really gets exciting because now you’ve got more content from people going to lengths to get the drink and creating content from it – making it even more sought after.
You want to be part of the club? You need the drink. Want to get the joke? You need to do the challenge.
How does TikTok work for a service business?
This is all well and good for products. You can see the attraction of marketing your product on TikTok. And it’s also worth having a read of Cory Doctorow’s Enshittification of TikTok to understand what the future of the platform might be.
That aside, can TikTok work for service businesses?
Here, I believe there is an opportunity to use TikTok (also YouTube shorts and Pinterest Ideas) for SEO. You take the usual SEO terms you want to rank for and answer your customers’ questions around those terms. Much as you would with a blog.
But here you need to consider hashtags as your SEO function. You’re building brand awareness, so while you’ll have to work extra hard to get your potential customer to leave TikTok and head to your landing page, you’re still putting yourself in front of more of your ideal clients. TikTok is your cold audience in the same way that anyone hitting your site from Google is.
The time between discovery and the next step might be a bit longer, but if you’re putting out the right content, it could be a valid SEO option. If you go into this aware that it might be a time suck, then you’re prepared.
TikTok isn’t without its issues (what platform isn’t?,) and it’s certainly the most polluting of content because it relies solely on plentiful short-form video created at speed. Videos carry a higher CO2 emission than words. But if you can be strategic with this, the payoff might be worthwhile.
Okay – what about not using TikTok?
Rounding back to my title about how you can use TikTok for search even without posting on the platform. In the same way that you’d do a Google search when creating blog or podcast content, you can use the TikTok search function to see what your ideal client is talking about or what other people are saying about your subject.
This can give you better insights and quality research to create your own content. Knowing what your customer is asking is half the battle. Putting the answer in front of them is the rest. You can use TikTok to understand what your customers want, even if you never want to put yourself on video.
Treat TikTok as another research point
Either way, TikTok isn’t going anywhere, and neither is the use of video. That’s not to say people don’t enjoy getting written content. They absolutely do still want and need blogs and newsletters. You’re reading this one, aren’t you?
It’s about understanding how you can leverage the platforms to inform your own content strategy. This all depends on what you enjoy, how much capacity you have and what your customers want.
You don’t have to use TikTok at all. You can roll your eyes at it and wait for the next thing to come along (my bet is a phoenix-like resurgence of Snapchat).
Most of all, I urge you not to run off to the shiny new thing attracting your attention. Test things and see if they work, but focus on your main strategy. Adapt the strategy when you need to – like including a short-form video strategy – but keep that sales journey front of mind for any big changes.