Establishing a TikTok presence can be a powerful tool for driving engagement, building brand awareness, and reaching younger audiences, provided that your target market actively uses the platform.
TikTok’s place as one of your marketing platforms depends on whether your target audience spends time on it. If this answer is ‘no’, it makes the marketing strategy unsuitable and pointless.
Is TikTok really worth it for businesses? Well, we know it differs from traditional platforms: polished ads and corporate posts won’t cut it here. If you show up authentically and stay current with the fast-paced trends that the app demands, TikTok could be a game-changer for your brand visibility.
TikTok in a Nutshell
First off, we believe that to effectively use a tool to its best advantage, you need to start by breaking down what it is, how it works and how people use it.
That is why we have taken time to understand the ins and outs of how TikTok works from a business perspective, through trial and error of our personal accounts and by researching these assets. Here’s what we found:
- TikTok is a short video platform that consists of entertainment, education, trends and community
- It is best known for its algorithm, which personalises a ‘For You Page’ for each user based on their interests
- Each video ranges from 15-60 second clips and allows videos up to 10 minutes long
- Users scroll, like, comment, share, save, duet and can even go live
- It offers design assets like filters, text overlay, effects and transitions
- Audio snippets, also known as ‘sounds’, have become popularly used for fresh and engaging content
Why TikTok Works for Business
If you’re still sleeping on TikTok as a platform, it’s time to wake up: what used to be an unserious app of dance challenges and lip-synching has evolved into one of the most powerful marketing tools – that doesn’t require a massive budget either.
Here a just a few of the positive factors that TikTok has to offer:
- A huge and active user base offers strong potential for expanding your brand’s reach
- Use creative, relatable content to build authentic engagement organically
- A ‘For You’ page is created through algorithms, making it highly intuitive who sees your content based on engagement
- More Cost-effective than Instagram or Facebook, as no high ad spend is required
- You can share raw, behind-the-scenes content to build authentic and relatable customer connections
- Attract a younger audience demographic
- Participate in trends with sounds, hashtags, and challenges to keep your brand relevant and discoverable.
TikToks’ Drawbacks for Business
Despite all the exciting opportunities for brand growth, TikTok does come with a few challenges for B2B companies:
- Limited ability to target professional decision makers, the platform’s user base and content style are better suited to consumer-focused brands
- Requires frequent creative content, which can be time-consuming to plan and produce
- Trends shift quickly, making TikTok content rapidly outdated
- Casual, humorous culture may clash with corporate or technical brand identities
- Risk of diluting brand values or damaging reputation by joining unsuitable trends
- Even strong content doesn’t guarantee reach; performance depends on the algorithm
- Open comment sections expose brands to public criticism or trolls
Getting the Most out of TikTok
TikTok may be a more suitable fit for consumer brands, local businesses, creative industries, and service businesses. It can serve as a platform for businesses seeking to connect with a broad and engaged audience.
Consumer brands can leverage trends to showcase products, run user-generated campaigns, and use influencer collaborations. This increases brand discovery and builds community.
Service businesses can use TikTok to establish authority and trust through tips, tutorials, and educational content, positioning themselves as experts and encouraging engagement.
Provide short, digestible tutorials on a specific skill, quick tips for solving common problems in their field, or educational content that simplifies complex topics for their audience to demonstrate expertise and provide tangible benefits to viewers, ultimately converting interest into lasting client relationships.
Stats That Speak for Themselves
Before deciding whether TikTok is the right platform for your brand, it’s essential to understand just how powerful its reach and engagement truly are. The following statistics highlight TikTok’s growing influence among both consumers and businesses.
These prove that it’s no longer just a platform for Gen Z, but a serious app with wide demographic appeal:
- 30 million monthly active users: In the UK alone, over 30 million people use TikTok monthly, showing its reach across your home market.
- 1.5 million British businesses on TikTok: Shows competitor presence and proves that other firms are taking advantage.
- Average time spent on TikTok is 95 minutes per day: This highlights the high level of engagement users have with the platform.
- The largest global age group: Between 25-34 years old, following up with 18-24; however, more individuals aged 35-49 and 50+ are joining the user base.
Before you dive in: Final Considerations
In summary, the effectiveness of TikTok in generating leads for your business will depend on the content you create. How the platform is used should be tailored to your target audience, brand image, and commitment to staying consistent and engaging with your content.
TikTok isn’t a place to play it safe – but it is a place to be seen.
Develop TikTok plans through strategy, creativity, and execution, managing your account as follows:
- Research and define your target audience
- Identify top performing content styles (storytelling, educational, entertainment or culture)
- Keep your content aligned with your brand tone and values
- Monitor and jump on trending sounds, challenges and content formats
- Use relevant trending hashtags in captions
- Collaborate with creators who fit your mission
- Manage ad spend for best ROI
- Engage actively – reply to comments, duet and follow relevant creators.
- Post consistently to stay visible
- Track performance through insights (views, engagement, demographics)
- Benchmark competitors and learn from what’s working for them
By managing points above, you can identify what’s working and what needs to be adjusted in your content; continuous improvement only allows for more effective results.
We think that with consistency and a well-thought-out strategy, TikTok is a tool which could drive your business forward and build authenticity to drive customer engagement.
We don’t believe any benefit would come out of using the platform to show off your business unless you are ready to experiment with quality, tried and tested videos.
Good things take time; be patient while continuing to serve your audience.
It’s not about being perfect – it’s about being real and relevant.
If you are looking for support with social media or want to learn more about whether TikTok is right for you, get in touch.