TikTok marketing: passing fad or long-term trend?
Contents · 8 sections
In just a few years, TikTok has conquered the world and become one of the most popular social media apps out there. Nobody can deny its power, but what does that mean for marketers? Is TikTok marketing a passing fad or a long-term trend worth investing in? In this post I look at how the platform works, who uses it, and how much marketing potential it holds. Read on to learn more about TikTok marketing and how you can use it to reach your target audience.
Where did TikTok come from?
The platform’s story is remarkable. The app was built in just 200 days and launched in September 2016. It took exactly one year to hit staggering success: by September 2017 it had 100 million users. That’s when it got its new name, TikTok, and went international. In early 2019 TikTok introduced its first e-commerce features. A year later, by mid-2020, it had 800 million users.
What explains this meteoric rise? The formats people use to express themselves on social media have been evolving for a long time. At first, text was the foundation and photos were more of an add-on. Then the focus gradually shifted. On newer networks like Instagram, the image took center stage and text faded further and further into the background.
That shift is hardly surprising. As the saying goes, “A picture is worth a thousand words,” and research backs it up. Studies show that 90% of the information we’re exposed to every day is visual. As a result, we’ve evolved to take in this kind of information much faster. In fact, the brain can process visuals a full 60,000 times faster than text!
Over time, video began to replace static images. That’s no surprise either. Posts with an image get 650% more engagement than text-only posts. But video on social media gets 1,200% more shares than text and image posts combined!
So why is TikTok leading this revolution, and not, say, YouTube, a platform with a much longer history?
The first reason is the app’s powerful video editing features and remarkably intuitive interface. They let anyone express themselves through video and make fun, interesting or informative clips that look good. You don’t need any editing experience to do it, not even the basics.
The second big advantage is its unique mix of creativity, humor and spontaneity. That style speaks directly to teenagers and Gen Z. It’s exactly why TikTok can rewrite the rules for companies that want to reach new audiences and engage the customers they already have.
In short, TikTok’s success comes down to a combination of strengths:
- an almost nonexistent barrier to entry;
- an exceptionally intuitive design with a gentle learning curve;
- rich technical capabilities;
- a unique culture of spontaneity and fun that it encourages in its users.
Where TikTok stands today
Today TikTok boasts 1 billion monthly active users. For comparison, Facebook has 2.9 billion, YouTube 2.2 billion and Instagram 1.4 billion. TikTok is clearly a serious player, and it has pulled well ahead of rivals like Snapchat (500 million users).
Based on Android app data, users worldwide spend an average of 95 minutes a day on TikTok. No official statistics of this kind are available for Bulgaria. However, according to a Eurobarometer survey on media use from 2022, 22% of Bulgarians use TikTok, while a Reuters study puts the figure at 25%. That puts the number of active users in Bulgaria somewhere between 1.1 and 1.25 million.
Who uses TikTok?
TikTok’s demographics are fascinating. Young people dominate, with 58.4% of content creators aged between 18 and 24. Across the whole user base, that age group accounts for 38.5%, and another 32% are between 25 and 34. That makes TikTok not only one of the newest social networks, but also one of the “youngest.”
Everything about this platform is unconventional, including its global footprint. TikTok is available in 154 countries, but five countries ban it nationwide: India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh and China. The last one may surprise you. TikTok’s home country has its own version, called Douyin, with slightly different features from the international app. Here’s another curious fact: the country where the social network is used the most is Saudi Arabia, where 87.9% of residents over 18 are active TikTok users.
As I mentioned, there’s no hard data for Bulgaria, but there are signs that most users here are between 16 and 30. Interestingly, Bulgarian men use the platform more actively than women, which isn’t the case globally. It’s hard to say how much time Bulgarians spend on TikTok. What we do know is that they spend 2 to 3 hours a day on social media on average, and about 37% visit TikTok regularly.
Types of TikTok content
TikTok owes much of its success to the sheer range of topics it covers. There really is something for everyone. By topic, some of the most popular areas are motivation and self-help, food, education, fashion, culture, sports and fitness. By format, a few big categories stand out: humor, educational videos, trends and challenges, influencer collaborations, and local content.
Humor
Humor is TikTok’s signature. It has a style all its own, often with a healthy dose of parody and sarcasm. Funny content hooks users, and brands that use it well can get closer to their audience, tell their story and show off their culture.
Educational videos
Many people think TikTok is pure entertainment. Far from it. The platform is full of educational videos. Some of the best examples are doctors who use their channels to teach followers about health care and prevention in their specialties. The best known include gynecologist Dr. Jones (@mamadoctorjones), family physician Dr. Mike (@doctormike) and dermatologist Dr. Adel (@dermatology.doctor).
Trends and challenges
Trends and challenges were around on social media long before TikTok. Remember the #icebucketchallenge, the 2014 campaign that got the world talking about ALS and raised $220 million for research? But TikTok takes them to a whole new level. A new trend pops up almost every week, and challenges come in every flavor: dancing, singing, cooking and more.
Influencer collaborations
As influencer culture grows, so do collaborations. Sometimes they pair two well-known online personalities. Other times a brand teams up with a celebrity who promotes its products. As on other platforms, the goal is to build trust in the brand’s products, grow its customer base and strengthen its reputation.
Local content
TikTok is a global platform, but plenty of local communities thrive under its umbrella. Content built on local challenges, references, contests and hashtags gets much higher engagement, so it belongs in every successful TikTok strategy.
Successful TikTok business accounts
TikTok is a platform that rewards content that is fun, original, high quality and authentic. Every top account on the network shares these traits. Brands use the platform to educate, entertain and inspire, and the content they create keeps viewers engaged and helps them stand out in an endless sea of videos. Here are some great examples of TikTok marketing done right.
@washingtonpost
This hugely popular channel proves that TikTok works for a truly wide range of brands. The Washington Post is a world-famous newspaper known as a reliable source of information, and it uses short videos to cover the day’s news with TikTok’s signature humor.
@crocs
The brand’s divisive design is often the butt of jokes, but Crocs has turned that into an advantage. Most of the videos on its channel showcase products and announce new models, but the brand uses partnerships in a clever, highly strategic way.
One standout is #ThousandDollarCrocs, which challenged customers to deck out their Crocs as lavishly as possible. Celebrities like the singer Post Malone joined in, and the campaign racked up more than 3 billion views.
@redbull
The energy drink maker has always pushed the limits of original marketing. On TikTok it stands out again, because it’s one of the brands that don’t use humor to attract their audience. Instead, Red Bull relies on gripping, expertly edited videos of stunts by top athletes in a range of sports.
@kauflandbulgaria
One of the most successful brands on TikTok in Bulgaria is Kaufland, the German supermarket chain. Its Bulgarian channel takes a more traditional approach: the videos rely on a balanced mix of humor, celebrity collaborations, behind-the-scenes stories, recipes and useful tips. At the time of writing it has 206,200 followers, an impressive audience for a country the size of Bulgaria!
@plasticfreelifebg
Next to Kaufland, Plastic Free Life is a fairly small Bulgarian company. Yet it has built a strong, recognizable brand with real success online. Its TikTok strategy is less conventional: its videos are more educational than entertaining. Even so, it has 163,700 followers. The brand mainly showcases its products while explaining the harm plastic does and offering alternatives that are easy to work into everyday life.
Can you advertise on TikTok?
You may already be wondering whether you can advertise on TikTok. The answer is yes. The platform’s first e-commerce tools appeared back in 2019, and today they’re available in many countries.
To work, a TikTok ad has to grab attention instantly and get a “Wow!” out of the viewer. The other key ingredient of a successful campaign is the story it tells. Storytelling has always been part of marketing, but on TikTok it’s a must. As I said, this network is very different from its competitors, in both its audience and its content. So if you plan to advertise your products or services here, my advice is to build a strategy and content specifically for TikTok, tailored to the way it works.
The ad interface isn’t very different from Meta’s, so if you’ve advertised on Facebook and Instagram, you’ll probably feel right at home. You can connect an online store and track conversions with a pixel. One interesting difference is that on TikTok you pay by topping up your account in advance, unlike Meta ads, where you simply add a credit card that gets charged periodically. This approach has an upside: it gives you tight control over budgets and monthly spend.
TikTok offers six ad formats. The first is in-feed ads, which you create in TikTok Ads Manager. The second is image ads, which appear in TikTok’s affiliated news feed apps: Babe, BuzzVideo and TopBuzz. They can include an image, text and an app or brand name.
Carousel ads work much like the familiar Meta format. They run in TikTok’s news feed apps and can include up to ten images, each with its own caption. Video ads appear in the For You and News Feed feeds and run from five seconds to one minute. Spark ads are similar to Facebook’s “Boost.” They let you boost impressions on organic content, either your own or another user’s. TikTok has said that Spark ads are 142% more engaging than regular in-feed ads.
The last type, “Pangle,” runs ads through the TikTok Audience Network. Early signs suggest it isn’t very effective yet.
Are TikTok ads available in Bulgaria?
As I mentioned, TikTok first introduced product advertising in 2019. Today it’s offered in many countries, including some of Bulgaria’s neighbors, like Greece, Turkey and Romania. But it isn’t available everywhere yet, and although it’s reportedly in the works, TikTok ads are not currently available in Bulgaria. If your company operates in countries where TikTok ads are available, it’s well worth testing for yourself how effective the youngest social platform can be.
If you operate only in Bulgaria, my advice is to rely on organic marketing that speaks TikTok’s language. Standard videos explaining a product’s benefits won’t get noticed here. On the other hand, campaigns built around laughter can bring you thousands of likes and shares within hours. Every brand’s ultimate goal is a viral post that users love to imitate and share. The digital agency SEOMAX already offers a TikTok marketing service you can use.
Is it worth it?
I hope I’ve convinced you that TikTok is a powerful platform with uses far beyond entertainment. Fads will come and go on it, but I believe TikTok itself will keep growing for a long time. That’s why every forward-looking brand should start building its own TikTok channel and audience now.
Petar Dyaksov
Entrepreneur and founder of a digital agency, in e-commerce since 2009. He grows online businesses such as Fragrances.bg and Timedix and shares his experience as a speaker, moderator and mentor at nearly 80 conferences and trainings.
More about me
