Should You Be Advertising Your Ecommerce Brand on TikTok?
Launched in September 2016, TikTok was initially seen as nothing more than a Millennial or Gen Z time-waster, a dark hole of dancing and dares to fall into when you’ve got nothing else to do.
Five years later, TikTok has been working to prove itself as a heavy-weight competitor in the world of social apps and as a legitimate platform for online advertising.
TikTok Has a Legitimate Potential for Ecommerce Advertising
Topping the app download charts for months, TikTok’s user base is growing every day, with its primary audience being a younger generation that is already heavily engaged with the world of online shopping.
The app has recently reported that 39% of its users have discovered a new product or brand on TikTok, and 77% of its users have bought something they saw on TikTok. A further 47% of users have noted that TikTok is likely to inspire a gift idea this year.
A bonus claim that TikTok is a legitimate platform for ecommerce advertising comes from the fact that Douyin, China’s version of TikTok, reports that one of the main uses of its app is for ecommerce retailer advertising and that their ads yield good results for their partners.
With this information in mind, TikTok advertising is definitely on the up and up, and it will be worth it for online retailers to take the time to learn how to use the platform to your advantage.
Advertising on TikTok is Effective Quickly
TikTok recently partnered with MediaScience to run a series of tests to see how users respond to ads on their platform. The study was conducted with 343 participants, and it replicated the typical user experience on both TikTok and their main competitors.
One of the most surprising results from this study was the revelation that on TikTok, users can effectively absorb information from ads quickly, more specifically that an ad on screen 6 seconds or less still delivered 38% of the recall compared to ads viewed 20 seconds or more. This means that your ad will still deliver a punch if the user swipes past it quickly.
This surprising find is likely to do with the format of the broader content on TikTok. Well-performing TikTok content is designed to capture the attention of users before they can swipe to the next clip, and users decide within the first few seconds whether or not they are engaged and will watch further or if they’ll swipe away, so users are tuned in early. As a result, users are leaned in and can recall more from a shorter exposure time.
The For You Page (FYP) delivers users content and ads related to their interests so consistently that users expect the content to be entertaining and applicable to their interests. They want to lean in and enjoy straight away, not swipe off.
Representatives of the app have said:
“Regardless of how long an ad stays on screen, TikTok draws early attention and physiological engagement in the first few seconds. In other words, ads on TikTok take less time to make an impact with their audience than similar ads on other platforms.”
Ads on TikTok Make Your Brand Look Good
Another positive finding that TikTok has reported on the back of their MediaScience testing is that even in skippable content, brands shown on TikTok were more memorable to the study’s participants than brands shown on competing platforms. Additionally, participants had a stronger brand perception and rated ads more likeable when shown on TikTok.
TikTok has quite a cool factor, and this rubs off on the brands that choose to advertise on it. Users associate the brands they see advertised with the app and its trends, especially when brands mirror existing TikTok content when creating their ads (which TikTok highly advises companies to do).
And we’ve seen the potential this cool factor has for driving sales for products.
“The TikTok made me buy it phenomenon has helped products of all kinds fly off the shelves - from leggings and milk frothers to cranberry juice, cleaning products, homewares, and everything in between. TikTok is so notorious for helping brands take off that's it's often covered in the news, and some retailers have created #TikTokMadeMeBuyIt sections in their stores, knowing that shoppers are looking to buy things they see on the app.”
Even Starbucks in the UK has recognized this, currently featuring the As Seen on TikTok Churro Frappuccino, a customer-developed recipe that was popularized on the app.
Starbucks As Seen on TikTok Churro Frappaccino
TikTok’s cool factor could have one additional benefit for companies advertising on the app, which was discovered during this testing. Because many products have become trendy thanks to their exposure on the app, users are more open to advertisements and promotional content because they don’t want to miss out on what could be the next big thing. They want to engage with featured products, and they don’t want FOMO, so they are primed to be more aware and more likely to engage with the products they see being advertised.
User-Generated Content Is the Best Advertising
All the above shows the potential TikTok has to be an effective advertising tool for ecommerce businesses. Still, even TikTok will admit that the results for how well an ad on the platform performs is down to many variables.
TikTok advises their advertising partners to make TikToks, not ads. If you can get your ads to feel like content, you will be rewarded with attention and engagement, which is not a concept exclusive to TikTok.
A recent data report from Stackla has revealed that user-generated content is one of the most effective ways to advertise your brand on social media. Doing so can improve trust and loyalty between brands and consumers. Additionally, their surveys revealed that 83% of consumers are looking for brands to provide a more authentic experience, with only 10% of consumers saying that influencer content did this.
What resonates as authentic then? The answer was clear— user-generated content.
From all the consumers surveyed, 80% said that user-generated content highly impacts their purchasing decisions, making it 8.7X more impactful than influencer content and 6.6X more influential than branded content.
The COVID-19 pandemic also affected the effectiveness of user-generated content. 56% of consumers noted that they are more influenced now by social media when online shopping than before the pandemic. Consumers are telling us they want the experience of in-person shopping to be translated online. User-generated content allows online consumers to recreate the experience of seeing, touching, and trying on items in stores.
It’s Worth the Time to Figure Out TikTok — Here’s How
If you’re looking to launch advertising on TikTok for the first time and you’re not sure where to start, TikTok has you covered. The app has released a variety of tools specifically designed to guide you through creating effective advertisements for their platform.
In July 2021, TikTok globally launched Spark Ads, an advertising platform that allows brands to create and boost organic videos that match their campaign objectives or create ads from organic posts published by creators (with their permission, of course). This tool allows your brand to capitalise on any existing videos that showcase your products and makes all your new ads feel like the typical TikTok content users expect.
Curious if Spark Ads could be the solution for your business? The app has released several case studies to show how ecommerce shops can be using Spark Ads to drive sales. These case studies include Vessi, a Canadian DTC brand known for its waterproof sneakers, and Isle of Paradise, a beauty brand known for its vegan and cruelty-free colour-correcting self-tan.
TikTok has also recently released their 2021 Holiday Guide to lend some insight on how you can use their platform to capture holiday sales.
Are you looking for more resources to get you on your way?
TikTok’s Creative Best Practices Guide