The popularity of TikTok catches the attention of brands and marketers that they cannot even blink. With the overwhelmingly positive feedback from users all over the world and the selling point that stole the hearts of consumers in this era which allows consumers to freely express themselves and create online content on social media, TikTok causes the flow of change in the advertisement industry to become creative storytelling. In this article, Sirinit Virayasiri, Head of Business Marketing at Tiktok Thailand, will talk about TikTok that can serve as a marketing tool through short video clips that can directly get to the target group quickly as well as create engagement between brands and customers effectively.

Introduction to TikTok, the social media platform of Gen Z

Sirinit talked about consumer behavior in mobile phone usage and internet nowadays that Thai people use the internet up to 10.22 hours per day which is more than that of 2019, in which, 91.2% is spent on social media and watching videos and listening to music for 71.2% From the mentioned behavior, this makes TikTok one of the highly popular platforms of this era. TikTok was launched by the end of 2016 and came to the Thai market around the end of 2017. It serves as a platform that ignites creativity and passes the happiness in form of video clips with more than 50% of main users are people at the age of 16 – 34 years old and more than 80% are students and people who just started working and are of high buying power that marketers pay attention to.

According to the statistic, 5 most popular content among Thai users are:
 

1.      Lifestyle: contents relating to traveling, cooking, family, and pets

2.      Talent or Performance: the special ability shows that people are interested and want to follow

3.      Entertainment: singing or dancing shows that bring joy to the audience

4.      Beauty & Fashion: as the majority of users are women, there are a variety of beauty and fashion contents

5.      Education: fun facts ranging from technology, languages, marketing, education and, nowadays, it was observed that more scholars has started to create educational contents on TikTok

Don’t make ads. Make TikToks.

For business people who still have no idea what kind of content they want to create on TikTok, Sirinit suggested that, in reality, it is not necessary to create content according to the popular categories mentioned above. However, they should create content according to the trends that Thai people are following. Also, Sirinit said that people often asked her about what kind of content should be created for TikTok and she would answer “Don’t make ads. Make TikToks.” This simply means the story about the business, not the advertisement, should be told with A B C D E technique as followed:

• A: Activate share or CTA (Call to action) buttons to create interaction between business and customers
  
  
• B: Bridge the created content and other contents on TikTok to make the audience enjoy the content without feeling that they are watching the advertisements
  
  
• C: Collaborate with content creators or influencers to increase the rating on TikTok
  
  
• D: Draw attention by creating memorable and attention-catching contents that are straight-to-the-point since TikTok allows just 10 – 15 seconds per video
  
  
• E: Evolve contents with the evolving consumer behavior of Thai people and observe the trends and interests of the market and create content according to those

Apart from that, SMEs can expand their market on TikTok through TikTok for Business that is a tool for business people and marketers to manage and evaluate marketing campaigns on the platform effectively and helps businesses to get to target groups easier. Moreover, TikTok for Business allows businesses to create engagement, control advertisements, and follow the process. The examples of what can be done for marketing and advertisements on TikTok are as followed:

• Brand Takeover it is the very first advertisement on TikTok that can create up to 100% awareness on 3 – 5 second video clip
  
  
• Top View it is the very first advertisement on “For You” page and can have a duration up to 60 seconds long
  
  
• In-Feed Video it is an advertising video up to 60 seconds long that will be flashed between contents and blend in with the contents, creating positive experience to audience as they do not feel that they are forced to watch the advertisements
  
  
• # Challenge is a form of advertisement that allows engagement between users and brands, leading to UGC or User Generated Content
  
  
• ฺBrand Effect is a form of advertisement that can decorate lights and sound and allows users to use those effects on their contents to create awareness
  
  
• Self-Serve Platform it is a self-serve advertisement creation that SMEs can design advertisements or markets by themselves

 The reason SMEs choose to do marketing on TikTok

Even though there are many varieties of social media platforms that people can choose to do marketing on, why do people have to choose TikTok? Sirikit answered that the first strength of TikTok for Business is that it is very easy to install. Interested individuals just have to register on www.tiktok.com and they can immediately start doing marketing. Secondly, it is flexible on the budget that businesspeople can set a budget that is suitable for their business needs. Thirdly, it is able to search for various target groups according to demography and interest with customization that allows users to select desired target groups as well as having a “Look-alike” function for users to choose the similarities of desired target groups. Fourthly, TikTok provides creative tools to help users to create videos easily such as templates, captions, and songs. It also offers a system that allows users to automatically upload up to 10 videos and instantly choose the video that suits the target group. Last but not the least, it allows users to customize the setting whether they want awareness or conversion to happen according to their business needs.

Sirikit concluded that TikTok is a platform for all that is ready to open the opportunity for entrepreneurs, regardless of their business sizes, who might not have many team members to do marketing by creating a campaign on TikTok themselves to search for target groups on the platform. More importantly, creativity is the gist of marketing on TikTok. Thus, users have an equal opportunity to bring their business into the light. Whether the business is big or small, if they can create contents that catch the audience’s attention, their sales could go skyrocketing overnight.
 

Citation: “Digital SME Conference Thailand 2020: How to use TikTok to Promote Your Business” by Sirinit Virayasiri, Head of Business Marketing at Tiktok Thailand