11.2 Using TikTok for Business

Last update Jun 9, 2022

The platform has evolved into a global marketing hub as TikTok has grown from 133 million users in 2018 to over 1 billion monthly users in 2021. With a well-timed lip sync or a masterfully crafted dance video, any creator on the app has the potential to go viral because they’re given the ability to share their own original content. In 2020, TikTok Launched TikTok for Business, an advertising and marketing management hub that allows brands to manage campaigns at every step, from influencer outreach to optimization.

Through their creativity and willingness to express themselves, TikTok influencers (there were over 106,000 active in 2020) acquired many followers. Creators may easily get viral on the app because of in-app features like hashtags, music files, and duets. In fact, virality is embedded right into the TikTok algorithm. It's never been easier for marketing teams to raise brand awareness online, thus TikTok for Business is a must-have tool for businesses looking to engage with their digital audience.

7 Ways to Use TikTok for Business

Various types of marketing teams can benefit from TikTok. For example, TikTok videos can be educational, but for a savvy marketing team, it can mean both high-level awareness content for individuals unfamiliar with your company and a deep dive into the product that sales can send out to make a transaction. Examine how TikTok can assist your team in achieving existing marketing goals in content marketing, brand awareness, social media, HR and people operations, or other public-facing marketing channels.

Here are seven ways to use TikTok for business to get your creative juices flowing and help you see how your brand's TikTok account can help you in ways other than social media marketing.

1. Marketing Campaigns

TikTok marketing campaigns are hotbeds of creativity. Because TikTok content is always changing (a new challenge, sound, or hashtag becomes popular every other day), there are numerous opportunities for companies to join the global discourse. TikTok is a platform that rewards both authenticity and trend-followers. In order to guarantee that your videos attract the proper viewers, educate yourself with the TikTok algorithm and how it promotes content before designing your campaign, then devise a campaign strategy. What are the objectives of your social media campaign? Which social media analytics will you use to shape and measure the performance of your ongoing campaigns?

Later Media used TikTok as part of an ongoing marketing campaign to promote their blog. Fenty Beauty, a global beauty brand, used viral TikTok trends from the previous year to build a marketing campaign for TikTok beauty bundles, which included a popular hashtag among their audience, #TikTokMadeMeBuyIt, to increase reach.

2. Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Initiatives and Nonprofit Partnerships

In order to reach the largest potential audience, collaborating with organizations whose missions connect with yours will help you expand your total reach and campaign awareness. When the It Gets Better Project, a nonprofit dedicated to uplifting and empowering LGBTQ+ youth, wanted to promote their 50 States, 50 Grants, 5000 Voices campaign, they teamed up with brands like American Eagle and Aerie, as well as creators and TikTok themselves, and used the featured hashtag #favoriteteacher. This nonprofit marketing campaign successfully increased the It Gets Better Project's social engagement and following just after launch.

3. Promoting Company Culture

Remember that exhibiting your team and company culture is just as vital as advertising your items when setting up a TikTok account for your brand. You can ensure that you are showcasing all of the best aspects of working on your team and help fulfill recruiting and hiring goals by providing trendy content that supports your organization's winning business culture. Zoom, a video conferencing provider, uses its TikTok account to promote their business culture and team spirit by posting behind-the-scenes glimpses of their themed meetings. The typical user can have a look at what it means to be a team by scrolling through their newsfeed.

A few other ways to use your TikTok account to promote your company culture are:

A “day in the life” series for each department or role.
A countdown of the perks of working at your company.
How your team members reflect your brand’s mission in their daily lives.
Brief introductory C-suite interviews.
A tour of your office space.
Show glimpses of the #unfiltered employee experience at your company.

4. Showcasing Products

It’s clear that showcasing new and trending products is an essential aspect of harnessing the full power of your business’ TikTok account with 39% of users saying they first discovered brands they’d never heard of before on TikTok and 47% of users agreeing that they’d purchased something they’ve seen on the app. Tools like TikTok's in-app tool, Promote, allows users to effortlessly turn their greatest performing videos into reusable ads, in addition to creating material that corresponds to the biggest trends and challenges for improved visibility of your work.

When a popular video hosting site Vimeo started promoting their new feature, Vimeo Create, they took the risk of creating a TikTok page dedicated to the new product. As a consequence of developing content based on hot hashtags and challenges, the social media marketing team at @vimeocreate was able to attract over 325,000 followers and 1.5 million likes on their videos.

5. Influencer and Comarketing Programs

Many businesses use influencer marketing to broaden their audience or to introduce their brand to a new demographic. As previously said, TikTok is dominated by influencer marketing. The network was essentially intended to birth the next generation of influencers, according to an algorithm that rewards trend-setters and organic engagement. When a brand partners with an influencer on TikTok, brands gain exposure due to the large following of their influencer partner, users are more likely to trust a brand being promoted by a familiar face, and influencers’ followers are eager to experience the products and brands being promoted.

Adobe has long been regarded as a reliable name in the fields of virtual creation and photoshop. To demonstrate the numerous creative possibilities of their tools, they worked with TikTok photography influencer @stevenoclock to highlight the full extent of their software. When looking for the ideal influencer to be the face of your next campaign, remember to follow Adobe's lead and partner with someone who shares your brand's interests in order to ensure that their followers are members of your target demographic. There would be no photoshop in the first place without photographers, making @stevenoclock the ideal influencer for Adobe's campaign.

6. Recruiting Top Talent

One feature of TikTok that many brands have yet to discover is how effective the platform can be as a recruiting tool. Organizations interested in continuing to hire top talent are adapting their recruitment techniques as the way users interact with the online world evolves. But where did the idea of using TikTok for recruitment come from? TikTok arose organically when businesses noticed that their staff already used the app. Recruiters noticed that this similar strategy could be flipped in an effort to attract top talent on the app when groups of every profession, from nurses to delivery workers, began posting their own videos promoting their jobs.

The TikTok Resumes tool, which is an extension of their TikTok College Ambassadors initiative, makes it simple for potential employees and employers to locate each other. TikTok links users with open entry-level positions at top companies like Shopify, Target, and Chipotle after they upload their personal video résumé. Australian graphic design platform, Canva, uses their TikTok account to organically recruit top talent from around the world. Canva is able to naturally recruit new talent who are just as creative as they are.

7. Product Education

Businesses make TikToks for two sets of audiences, their target demographic and existing members of their team. While the majority of TikToks are made for the general public with the goal of becoming viral and increasing brand exposure, businesses are having excellent success using TikTok into their product education and adoption initiatives. Brands have capitalized on one of its greatest strengths, user-friendly interface, by embedding TikTok into their training processes and product education and product marketing.

For example, Microsoft easily shows a new use of Microsoft Word to improve their user experience, educate, and inform. Companies may turn new employee training or product demos into an easily digested, reusable, and easily accessed series of educational content by generating videos that illustrate product demonstrations, workflow best practices, and even software how-tos.

TikTok Metrics for Businesses to Track

Both TikTok Business Accounts and standard TikTok accounts have access to analytics, but the business manager has more detailed insights on audiences, post performance breakdowns, and marketing dashboards. Here are some of the top TikTok analytics for marketers that help teams to optimize their posts and engage more with their audiences. You can view metrics in a 7, 28, or 60-day period, or choose a custom timeframe.