Why Brands are Turning to TikTok to Reach New Audiences

By now, you have inevitably encountered the TikTok storm of video trends, but what is all the buzz around the latest TikTok frenzy? The short video-based social media platform has exploded and reached new heights over the last couple of years. The brand has seen such prolific success that they tout about 100 million + users in the United States and hundreds of millions worldwide. Brands are just now discovering the platform’s true potential and how they can leverage the new platform as part of their marketing strategies. 

As we witness a shift in the social app ecosystem, brands that have jumped on the TikTok wave early on have experienced how effective the platform can be when executed efficiently with their campaigns. We have reached a point of no return, where the brand should prioritize a strategy for TikTok in a digital marketing era. Whether showcasing an event or promoting your latest products, TikTok is the future of social media marketing. 

The beauty of TikTok comes from the ability to grow immensely and reach millions in a single shot regardless of how large your following is, which cannot be done with other platforms like Instagram or Twitter. FGPG will walk you through the importance of adding TikTok into your marketing, why a platform is a powerful tool for brands, and how procrastinating a TikTok strategy can leave your brand behind your competition.

How did TikTok rise to popularity? 

The video-based application first made headlines in 2016 as the infamous lip-syncing app, musical.ly. The app rose to prominence, and in the same year, China also released an app named Douyin, which was eventually renamed TikTok in 2017. At the time, the musical.ly platform attracted attention from the same market as TikTok; therefore, the creators of TikTok agreed to integrate the apps in 2018. Since then, TikTok has exploded in popularity in a brief period.

Its prolific success has forced Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and other major social media platforms to live in its shadow. At the same time, they all scramble to catch up to the innovations of TikTok. Many know TikTok for its silly dancing and videos, but the platform has branched off to other avenues, in which many users have also found success. According to Eventbrite data, TikTok provides more than just viral trends, dances, and singing videos. Savvy brands have tapped into their true potential by turning to tutorials and informational videos that share valuable tips and tricks for various subjects.

Eventbrite’s platform captured valuable information, and data on their platform shows a massive rise in events focused on leveraging TikTok for business marketing purposes. We saw a 67% year-over-year increase in events about using TikTok for business marketing (Feb 2020 vs. Feb 2021). During that same time frame, we saw 57x more attendees engage with these events on their platform.

Benefits of TikTok in Your Marketing Strategy

Changing the dynamics of marketing

It is evident that consumer behavior has shifted, and consumers have grown more aware of ads and promotions that lack authenticity. Audiences follow trends, and today, they buy products based on trends and products used by their favorite TikTok influencers. We live in the era of content creators and influencers, who now hold consumer buying power. According to a recent survey, TikTok influencers have a 17.96% engagement rate, while the equivalent figures for Instagram and YouTube are 3.86% and 1.63%, respectively. Influencer marketing gives brands leverage to encourage consumers to be part of a community.

Influences your target audience 

Although TikTok does not primarily target older audiences, it’s still important to note that people between the ages of 16 and 24 are the most active users of TikTok, accounting for 60% of the entire user base, per Statista. However, according to TikTok, 80% of all users are between the ages of 16 and 34, pointing out that this isn’t the platform for marketing to the older demographic. If your audience is a younger crowd and requires creative marketing tools to engage the audience, TikTok is the best platform to promote your brand.

Useful features and additions

The app has a wide range of editing tools and offers more variations than other platforms to create intuitive content. This allows brands to develop distinguished and captivating content that drives consumer engagement for events. The videos on TikTok are fast-paced as compared to YouTube and other platforms, which has the potential to reach a wider audience faster than other platforms. Check out how TikTok’s SEO is changing how we engage with content in the video below by @lacedmedia.

@lacedmedia Google SEO is boring 😒 TikTok SEO is going to dominate🔥😜 #socialmediamarketingtips #tiktokmarketingtips #tiktokseo #contentmarketingtips #businessowner #entrepreneur ♬ Pieces (Solo Piano Version) – Danilo Stankovic

Effective Ways To Use TikTok For Experiential Events

Collaborate With Influencers

When launching a brand activation, trade show, pop-up, or any other experiential event, brands must understand the positive effect that influencer marketing can have on your brand. Like Instagram or any other social media platform, influencer marketing can work in your favor as another channel of marketing and brand awareness. Trust is significant between your brand and your audience. Influencers create an authentic word for your business, product, service, or event, making your audience confident enough to believe in what you sell and provide.

Encourage Audience Participation

Before your event launch, sharing and promoting the event with your audience is essential. Especially if your followers have been acquainted with past events and campaigns that your brand has held, make it engaging by encouraging them to share their experience, post content with a customized hashtag, and tagging their account with your TikTok handle to increase engagement and participation. Your direct followers’ attention is far more powerful and reaches a broader audience, which is impossible without their participation. This increases your event’s authentic reach, bringing potential engagement to your event marketing over TikTok.

Display TikTok Social wall at Events For Better Audience Engagement

Live engagement from your audience is a priority for all event managers. Therefore, invest some time researching and building content for your TikTok audience entertained during the event. Event organizers try their best to reach their event success, whether it is the script, presentation, guests, or any other. But it can only be achieved if your audience is well engaged during the event. You can display a TikTok social media wall to engage your audience in live or virtual events, enhancing the event experience with interactive, engaging, and interesting TikTok feeds. 

Make Viral Trends Your Content Inspiration

If one of the goals for your event is to reach a broader and more diverse audience, developing content inspired by viral TikTok trends can be your lottery ticket. For instance, talking about the prevalent TikTok trend, the #TumbleweedChallenge got, 8000 video uploads and more than 10 million views just after Jimmy Fallon published the favorite videos on his Tonight Show. Promoting your event with trends grows the reach of your marketing content and increases impressions or views in the feeds of larger audiences. Whether it is a challenge or a popular trend on TikTok, if planned and executed accordingly, it will be a success for your event marketing campaign.