How to Use TikTok to Create Viral Content for Your Business

By utilizing the many features of TikTok, you can create viral content to boost your business. TikTok has more than 1 billion monthly users − making it one of the biggest social media platforms in the world.

You might think it’s just a fun app for Gen Z or young teens, where they dance, sing, and do weird challenges. But, it has brought a storm to the advertising world. Changing the way brands market themselves in the online age.

In this article, we’ll show you how using TikTok is a form of content marketing. And why it should be a vital part of any marketing strategy from here on out − if you want to get into this untapped market and create brand awareness.

Let’s dive in.

Why TikTok?
Sure, the majority of the content on TikTok is pranks, challenges, and dance clips. However, that isn’t only what TikTok is. In the U.S., almost 47.4% of TikTok users are under 30. And half of them are teenagers. So, if your target audience is young, it’s a goldmine.

Depending on the niche, these teens will grow up and soon turn into your ideal consumers. And TikTok will heavily influence their buying habits.
Plus, the other 52.6% consisting of people 30 and older are there too. So, that’s another dormant marketing waiting to be explored.

The biggest pros of running a TikTok account for your business are:

Raised Brand Awareness
Hashtags, ads, influencers, challenges, and so on. There are many strategies to promote your brand and create an online presence. There’s also the chance of going viral with engaging content.

Seamless Product Promotion
An excellent fact about TikTok marketing is that it doesn’t seem like marketing. If you’re creative, you can sneakily slide in products through influencers without looking desperate or pushy.

Expanded Audience
As mentioned previously, TikTok has more than a billion monthly users. And they have audiences in 154 countries. Creating content on TikTok gives you a chance to go after them. And remember that some of these are exclusive users − who don’t use any other platform.

You Appear More Human
TikTok is the newest platform out of all the major players, so it still feels “human” compared to the rest of them. Because of this, you can create special bonds with your customers.

How to Use TikTok for Marketing
Moving on from the benefits, let’s look at how you can use TikTok’s many features and tools to market your brand to its millions of users.

Here are some ways you can put TikTok into your marketing strategy.

Step 1. Create Relevant And Helpful Videos
After opening the app, the first thing you’ll see is a feed of what seems like an endless stream of videos. You want to be here. However, you also want to set yourself apart from the loads of content out there.

And for that, your content needs to be:
• Relevant − You need to know your target market and what they like.
• Attention-grabbing − It needs to stop the target in its tracks through shock.
• Helpful − Actually deliver something that’ll make the target come back again.

You want your content to be specific, relevant, and helpful, like “How to start a mobile mechanic business” instead of something more generic.

However, the content also needs to be:

• Fun − TikTok is a fun place for dancing and singing. You must adapt to that culture to stay relevant. So, learn to be entertaining but don’t abandon your brand voice in the process.
• Unscripted − The more human you feel, the greater you’ll perform. You won’t even need high-end production. Just a good phone and adequate lighting are enough if your content is up there.
• Human − Give a behind-the-scenes of your office. Show off workstations. Show the office pet. Show the game room. Show users that your business is run by people like them. Make a human bond. This can’t be stressed enough.
• Trendy − There are always multiple trends going on every month. Meaning it’s easy to fall behind. Just look up the trending hashtags and jump in. Just add your twist to it to make it yours.

Step 2. Optimize Your Videos With Features
TikTok’s specialty is letting you add music to your videos. You can also add a variety of creative effects. Here’s a rundown of these features:

• Add music − This is what made TikTok blow up. Add catchy and trendy music to complement the mood or make the videos more entertaining.
• Add filters − Apply many of the different filters available to change color and contrast to make your videos more attractive.
• Change speed: You can increase or decrease the speed of videos to make them more interesting.
• Beautify − TikTok also has an abundance of beauty filters to change facial features to your liking.
• Effects − There is a myriad of overlays, background changers, voice changers, face transformation effects, interactive effects, and more.
• Templates − There are pre-made designs or templates to make content creation fast and easy. You can edit everything to your liking later.

Step 3. Use the Publishing Features
TikTok offers quite a few content publishing tools, and you need to use them properly to attract an audience, rack in the eyeballs you deserve and go viral.

• Add descriptions − Write short and funny descriptions under the 150-character limit.
• Add hashtags − The correct hashtags will take your content to the correct people. Also, focus on the latest famous hashtags and choose the ones that your audience is using.
• Tag − While collaborating, remember to tag the other brand in the descriptions with the “@” symbol. You can also do this while reposting to credit original creators.
• Enable Duet/Stitch − This will allow other users to edit or add something else to your clip to agree, criticize, or respond to your content.
• Add links − Keep your business link in the bio to make it easier for users to go to your website.

Step 4. Figure Out Your Audience’s Timeline
How often and when you post depends on your audience.
If you post when the majority of your audience is asleep, you’ll miss the initial algorithm boost you could’ve gotten and lose out on quite a bit of traffic.
Tap into TikTok’s built-in analytics to figure out when your audience is active, on which days, and in which time zones, etc. − just switch to a business account in the settings to access this.

Step 5. Make a Challenge
There are always multiple challenges happening on TikTok at any given moment. These easily go viral, bring in millions of views, and are very entertaining.

For example, Colgate created the hashtag #MakeMomSmile. It was a simple challenge to make your mom or motherly figure smile during Mother’s Day. It raked in more than 5.4 billion views.

Before starting a challenge, ask yourself − why are you doing this? Decide whether your objective is to:

• Increase brand awareness − So when it’s time for users to buy a boat ladder or sell their junk car, they’ll think of you.
• Promote an event − Boost turnout for your upcoming sales event, festival, or celebration.
• Increase sales − Entice more people to buy your product or service.
• Promote a new product − Get the word out about your latest product to hit the market.
• Once you know your goals, there are many ways to get started and boost your challenge on TikTok:
• Sponsor your hashtag − Partner with TikTok to do a sponsored hashtag challenge. It costs about $150k for six days. During this time, TikTok will put your hashtag in people’s feeds as they scroll through the app.
• Launch a contest − Announce prizes for videos with the highest views to increase participation. Add mandatory rules like “follow our Instagram to participate” as well.
• Collaborate with influencers − Having influencers participate in challenges creates hype and makes other users want to participate. People are more likely to jump in when they see their beloved influencer doing one. Research your niche and contact influencers in your subculture.
• Or, you can take part in ongoing challenges and get some traction that way.

Step 6. Advertise On TikTok
TikTok doesn’t focus much on monetization. However, it does have ads, they’re just seamlessly mixed in with the other content. A few types of available ads are:

• In-feed ads − These are a maximum of 60 seconds and show up in the user’s feed between videos. You can increase engagement by using different formats like an interactive card, voting card, or display card.
• Brand takeovers − These ads show the moment someone opens the app. It can be a 3-second photo or a 3.5-second video. Just one advertiser can run this ad per day per category. So, these are worth quite a lot.
• TopView ads − A more enhanced version of brand takeovers. These can be between 5-60 seconds and have more engaging features, including the option to “like,” comment, and share.
• Here’s how to make an ad on TikTok.

Step 7. Collaborate With Influencers
Anyone with a sizable following is an influencer. And you can sponsor them to promote your products. But to do this, you must:

• Find the right influencer − You can choose an expensive influencer with a huge following or a nano-influencer with a small but loyal following, depending on what you want from them. Are your influencer’s audience and your potential audience the same? This is important if you want to reach your goals.
• Have a goal − What do you want? Brand awareness? Increased sales? Increased followers? Keep a clear goal in mind, otherwise, you’re just wasting money.
• Don’t micromanage − The influencer knows how to interact with their audience. Don’t be too controlling and ruin everything.

Wrapping Things Up
TikTok isn’t going anywhere and will only continue to grow. If you still aren’t using it, you’re missing out.

So, implement TikTok in your social media marketing strategy. After all, by creating viral content on this popular platform, you’re meeting your customers where they are.