How to Promote Your Event on TikTok – We all might have heard about video-sharing apps, such as Vine, Dubsmash and other similar apps, but TikTok has taken it to another level. In fact, TikTok is included in the top 10 most downloaded non-gaming apps of the decade, making it a very popular platform among millennials. Attracting over 800 million active users worldwide, TikTok’s popularity skyrockets as the demand for entertainment has risen significantly due to the current global pandemic.
If you’re one of those people who want to take this opportunity to grow your business and have been wondering, “Is there any way to market your event on TikTok?” Well, the answer is absolutely yes. It’s not unusual to find brands using TikTok for business nowadays as it is actually one of the best marketing tools in social media. If you’re not familiar with TikTok before, this is indeed a good chance for you to jump into the bandwagon. As the title says, in this article, we’ll cover some information about ways to market your event on TikTok.
Well, to begin with, let’s start with some facts about TikTok. TikTok is simply a platform for sharing short videos developed by ByteDance, a Chinese software developer and it’s now available in more than 150 countries worldwide. Just like any other video-sharing app, it allows its users to express their creativity in a short clip. The average length of the video is up to 15 seconds. TikTok’s logo comes in such a minimalist design which represents its simplicity and creativity.
Indeed, the reason behind its success by all means lies in its user-friendly features and simplicity of the application. As the popularity increases, TikTok stock in the U.S. becomes everyone’s target, including big companies, such as Walmart, Microsoft, and Oracle. The acquisition of the app would benefit each company as it could help building impression on younger costumers and also growing their business and marketing.
Before marketing your event on TikTok, you need to understand how it works. According to statistics, average Tiktok users in the U.S. spend about 46 minutes daily on the app, and they would at least open it eight times a day. That is such a great amount, right? The chance of getting your page discovered is high. Also, TikTok is mostly dominated by relatively young people aged 16 to 24, which is why you need to speak their language and be well-informed about the ongoing trends in order to get their attention. Now it’s all on you to be in the spotlight. If the marketing is done well, you can gain exposure from the audience which makes it even easier to promote your event and gain more sales.
Create or join a challenge
A challenge in TikTok usually creates a huge engagement for TikTok users. A lot of brands on TikTok are making use of its popularity as a tool to promote their product. You can either create your own challenge or participate in a challenge. To see the ongoing popular challenge on TikTok, you can press the search button and discover various hashtags which become the current trending topics at the moment. At this point, users are encouraged to create a video based on the challenge theme; it can be TikTok dance or other attempts that are related to the challenge. The posted videos are usually followed by the hashtag of the challenge itself, for example #whistlechallenge.
Post quality content regularly
Making some out-of-the-box contents on TikTok is a must, if you want to attract users to follow your page. Aside from unique contents, it is recommended for you to post the content frequently. The key is to be consistent with your image as a brand which might result in leaving good impressions to your audience.
For starters, you might want to learn users’ preferences by taking a look at typical most liked TikTok videos. This allows you to understand your target audience’s video preferences. After that, try making videos that are helpful and relevant to your event or product. For instance, if you want to promote your online beauty class, you might want to consider posting videos related to beauty hacks in a step-by-step videos or teasers of the upcoming event. Engaging content can be informative and interesting videos, and it doesn’t always have to be a TikTok dance. Find your brand’s true color and immerse your brand’s image in every content you’re making.
Use TikTok Ads
How does TikTok make money? One of its sources is from ads. Having an attention-based business model, TikTok has several advertising objectives, whether you want to reach more audiences, traffic, or conversion. Users are also able to calculate their revenue using TikTok money calculator or analytics, for example Exolyt.
There are various types of ads offered by TikTok:
Brand Takeover
This kind of ad appears when users open the application and it will display your ad in the entire screen. It is quite beneficial for gaining impression and reaches since your ad will be the very first thing people see when they go online on TikTok. However, this type of ad can only be used by one advertiser per category per day, and it costs $50,000 per day.
Branded Lenses
Similar to Snapchat and Instagram, TikTok also provides unique AR filter for its users. Branded lenses allow you to create AR filter that can be used in making videos. This way, you can feature your product in a more engaging animation or filter form. If your filter goes viral then the chance of reaching more audiences is also high. Depending on the complexity of the filter, branded lenses cost around $80,000 – $120,000.
In Feed Native Ads
This type of ad appears in users’ feed as they are scrolling down to watch video in the For You page. Your ad can be 5-15 seconds long and you can include CTA (call to action) which appears in the form of link that redirects users to your page. It costs $10 per impression and it requires you to spend $500 minimum per campaign.
Hashtag Challenge
Different from any other ads, hashtag challenge basically encourages TikTok users to participate in a challenge by creating a content which somehow displays your brand on it. It can be a TikTok dance or other entertaining videos. Your hashtag challenge will appear in the discovery page, thus making it visible for everyone to see it and join it. Anything that encourages participation will certainly have more appeal. This campaign costs $150,000 per six days.
One of the famous brands that have successfully run this challenge is Crocs with its #ThousandDollarCrocs challenge which has reached three billion views so far. This is a huge success for them as they gained 18% increase in followers within 24 hours after releasing the challenge, and more than 45,000 videos had been created in less than 36 hours. What a great way to promote your business, isn’t it?
Always connect with your audience
Building engagement with your audience is really important as it is one of the secrets to reach a greater brand awareness. Be a part of the community by holding live streams and interacting in the comment section. Knowing what your audience wants is also important, so make sure you have studied them well. For the record, engagement in TikTok is relatively higher than other social media, such as Twitter. In Jennifer Lopez’s case, she has more followers on her Twitter, but she gained more views and likes on her TikTok account by the same video. The numbers showed are definitely beyond expectation: 2 million views on Twitter with 45 million followers, and 75 million views on TikTok with only 5 million followers.
There is a massive opportunity to grow your business there and staying connected with your audience will be very much helpful in developing your brand’s name.
Multi sharing
Sharing your event in just one platform is not enough, especially if you plan to make a great impact to your marketing. It is recommended to post your TikTok videos on other platforms as well, for instance YouTube and Instagram. That way, you allow people who are not on TikTok to stay updated with your contents while promoting your event in your other social media. You can also bring your audience over to your other platforms by mentioning your social media on your TikTok. Going multi-channel will help you gain insights of which platform works best for your business.
Utilize Tiktok influencers
Partnering up with TikTok stars is also one possible way to get your event discovered by people. TikTok stars, also known as TikTok influencers, are people who notably gain so many followers from their TikTok videos. After all, they are called TikTok influencers for a reason—to influence people through their contents.
How do influencers make money on TikTok? Just like social media celebrities, TikTok stars generally have thousands or even millions of followers. Some of the very popular ones with a bunch of followers often appear in TikTok search and top recommendation. This is a perfect opportunity for brands to gain more exposure on their products or events by partnering up with them. For one single branded video, brands can pay them for about $200 to $20,000 depending on their influence level or engagement rate.
It is also common for them to hold TikTok meet and greet in their region. In fact, there is even a website which promotes such event, such as TikTok Meets. At the current situation which encourages people to stay at home, it won’t rule out the possibility that the meet and greet sessions would take place in virtual event platforms, such as Zoom, Cisco Webex, Omegle, and other platforms.
However, be wise in selecting the influencers as they can also affect your brand’s image. Choose the ones that create relevant content for your need. Let’s say, you’re about to hold a make-up event. It surely doesn’t seem right to trust food bloggers for it, does it? They have their own target audience and so do your business. If you choose the right influencer, chances are you’ll market your event successfully.
Looking back at #InMyDenim challenge which is one of the very first branded hashtag challenges ever launched, Gucci worked with top TikTokers, such as @ourfire and @madisonwillow, making the hashtag even more popular and successfully became a hit.
All in all, TikTok does stand out for a reason, and marketing your event on TikTok is totally worth a try. It can be an effective marketing tool, particularly when your target audience is younger generation.
