Social media sites have long been a place where advertisers could promote their products through posts and sponsored content. The long and short-form blog format became less popular after Instagram’s focus on photographs and advertisers moved to shorter and more visual content.
Now TikTok is taking over and leaving other sites in its wake, with the advent of short video content. TikTok is one of the fastest-growing social media platforms in the world.
In this blog post, we’ll look at some of the reasons why TikTok might be your favorite new ecommerce marketing channel.
Fast Growing User Base and High Engagement Rates
TikTok is one of the world’s biggest social media platforms. It currently has over 800 million users. Significantly, a large proportion of users are young people between the ages of 25-34 (millennials) and a smaller proportion between the ages of 18-24 (Gen-Z).
Studies show that over 75% of millennials shop online. This makes TikTok a great platform for sellers to reach more millennials. Furthermore, TikTok has a higher engagement rate than other popular social media platforms like Twitter and Instagram.
TikTok continues to grow every month. It is available in many regions and languages. Since 2020, it has shown a year-on-year increase of over 50%.
Additionally, its rapid growth has seen an increase in the variety of content on the platform. Now creators are not only lip-syncing popular songs, but they are also making DIY videos, fitness videos, and even educational videos. This means there is more opportunity for sellers to find customers that are interested in their product.
TikTok’s Algorithm
The TikTok app has two main tabs. The first is the “following” feed. Here users can see videos from creators they follow. The second tab is the “For You” feed. Users can discover new content on this feed.
The “For You” feed works on TikTok’s recommendation algorithm which matches users with new content that suits their interests. It ranks videos based on factors such as user interactions, video information, and device and account settings.
TikTok’s algorithm considers user interactions like which videos they share and like. It also looks at a user’s comments and the accounts they follow.
Next, it analyzes the videos a user has already seen. It looks at captions, music, hashtags, and video titles.
Finally, it checks a user’s device region, language, and also device type (Android vs IOS).
TikTok’s algorithm weighs all these factors for each user, so this means that no user has the same For You feed. Additionally, a creator does not need thousands of followers for their videos to go viral. Videos appear on a user’s For You feed only based on the above factors, not a creator’s follower count.
Hence, sellers can create content curated for users based on region and language or based on a hashtag. This makes it simpler for sellers to reach their target market on the platform.
Partnership with Shopify
TikTok has ecommerce features built into the app. In China, sellers can add a “shop now” button to their videos. This has proven extremely popular in the region.
Furthermore, sellers can add external links to their bios. Meaning that sellers can link to their websites straight from the site. TikTok has also partnered with Shopify to add even more ecommerce features to the platform.
Shopify is an online store builder. It allows sellers to create online stores without needing any coding knowledge. Sellers can integrate their existing websites or social media pages to Shopify. This includes TikTok.
Shopify’s biggest features include dropshipping, and Shopify Payments. The first allows sellers to directly request stock from their suppliers instead of needing to keep a minimum amount of stock. This gives sellers the opportunity to scale their business according to the demands for their product.
The second, Shopify Payments, is the platform’s built-in payment tool. Here sellers can keep track of completed and pending transactions. Also, buyers do not need to use a third-party payment application to make purchases.
Accordingly, TikTok’s partnership with Shopify gives sellers an easier entry point to ecommerce on TikTok, but also more tools to reach new consumers.
TikTok For Business
TikTok also has its own tool for advertisers, TikTok For Business. It includes an Ads Manager that helps sellers create advertisements on the application.
Sellers can make the following advertisements:
TopView ads
These advertisements appear once a day when a user opens the app. They can be up to 60 seconds long and allow sellers to advertise content that might need a longer time span to advertise like a new TV show or movie.
In-Feed Ads
Here the advertisements appear on a user’s For You feed. The TikTok algorithm determines which ads users see on their feed. In-feed ads are the fourth video that users see.
These advertisements are suitable for sellers looking for higher sales conversions. The ads can include links to a seller’s website or a prompt to download a specific app.
Branded Hashtags
Next, sellers can create a brand-specific hashtag to promote their business or advertise a product. Only sellers can use this branded hashtag, but they need to pay for it. It ranges from $150 000 for six days.
Brand Takeover
Here a seller could take over the entire platform for one day. TikTok exclusively features this seller’s brand with branded hashtags, TopView, and In-Feed advertisements. It starts from $50 000 a day.
Sellers big or small can use a combination of these ads on the TikTok platform. It is varied enough that every business size has an opportunity to advertise their product.
Conclusion
TikTok is a fast-growing social media platform. With engagement rates higher than Twitter and Instagram, it is the perfect channel for sellers to find millennials and Gen-Z’ers who do most of their shopping online.
TikTok’s algorithm allows sellers to reach a wide audience without the need for thousands of followers. The platform has also grown to include more ecommerce tools that will benefit ecommerce marketing in the long run.
GoDataFeed makes it easy to feed your product catalog to TikTok. Book a free consultation or start your free trial today.
