TikTok Marketing: How DTC Brands Can Attract More Customers

TikTok has taken the world by storm since its launch in the global market in 2017. It was the most downloaded app in 2021, ahead of other popular apps like Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp. TikTok also overtook YouTube in average watch time.

Businesses and marketers have taken note of its meteoric rise, and as a result, TikTok marketing has become the new craze. TikTok is particularly well-suited for viral marketing, making it the perfect marketing channel for DTC brands. 

Below, we’ll look at some of the benefits of TikTok marketing for DTC companies and explore three brands that successfully use this social media platform to grow their brand. We’ll also share a TikTok marketing strategy that you can use to attract more customers.

Navigate this article:

  1. Benefits of TikTok marketing
  2. Examples of DTC brands using TikTok marketing to grow their business
  3. How to create an effective TikTok marketing strategy

6 reasons why you should start using TikTok marketing

Here are a few reasons why you should start using TikTok marketing to reach more customers and grow your DTC brand.

1. Large audience base

At the end of 2021, TikTok reportedly had 1.2 billion monthly active users, and it is expected to grow to 1.8 billion by the end of 2022. In contrast, the annual rate of Twitter growth actually slowed down from 2021 to 2022. Meanwhile, Pinterest decreased from 478 million users at the start of 2021 to 433 million in Q2 of 2022. 

It’s no surprise that Tik Tok is growing at a faster pace than many other popular social platforms.

With such numbers, advertising your DTC brand on TikTok not just allows you to place your products in front of this massive audience but also connect with millennials and Gen Z – the audience segment that frequents TikTok and also forms a large consumer for most DTC brands. In fact, 60% of TikTok users are from GenZ. 

2. Lower costs 

Platforms like Meta’s Facebook and Instagram prioritize ads and sponsored posts over non-promoted content. This makes it almost impossible to reach your audience (including your followers) without paying for it.

In contrast, TikTok’s algorithm favors engaging content rather than promoted content. If you put time and effort into creating engaging videos, your content can quickly go viral and reach millions of people without paying a dime. This is why TikTok marketing is an excellent option for DTC brands that don’t have huge marketing budgets.

3. Great user engagement

According to a study by Social Insider, TikTok is the top social media platform in terms of engagement, with an average engagement rate of 5.96%. In contrast, Instagram only has an average engagement rate of 0.83%, while Facebook and Twitter have 0.13% and 0.05%, respectively. 

For DTC brands that want to reach the right customer and drive engagement with potential customers, TikTok is likely to be their best bet. 

This high engagement rate is also very useful when building a marketing funnel around your TikTok channel and collecting first-party data from potential customers. After collecting your leads, you can feed them into your CRM and move them down the funnel. This is especially easy when you have a VoIP phone system, which allows you to send emails, texts, and even docs directly to your customers. You can expect to pay at least $19 per month for a quality VoIP phone system. This is a clear example of DTC marketing, where you communicate directly with your customers, and thus can result in higher engagement. 

4. Not affected by privacy challenges

In the recent past, customers have raised concerns about the privacy of data. As a result, various companies have introduced changes that allow users to take more control of their privacy. For instance, with iOS 14, Apple made it mandatory for apps to ask users for permission before collecting and sharing their data.

Platforms like Facebook and Google rely on this data to target users with ads. Now that users can opt out of this data tracking, it becomes more difficult for these platforms to target users with personalized ads. Therefore, advertising on these platforms has become less effective for DTC brands.

TikTok, on the other hand, doesn’t rely on such tracking to target ads. TikTok targets its ads based on information that users provide through their profile and in-app activities. As a result, TikTok will not be affected by these privacy-related challenges, so it’s still an effective marketing platform for DTC brands.

5. A high number of influencers

TikTok’s focus on short, authentic videos has attracted tens of thousands of creators to the platform, many of whom have built a huge following and become influencers. For DTC brands that want to partner with influencers to grow their reach, there is no shortage of influencers to pick from, regardless of your niche.

6. Huge opportunity for content repurposing


Most of the videos shared on TikTok are typically short, making them suitable for repurposing for other social platforms. For instance, after creating a video for TikTok, you can easily share the same video on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube Shorts. This allows DTC brands to grow their brand on multiple platforms using the same TikTok video.

 

3 examples of DTC brands using TikTok marketing to grow their business

E.l.f Cosmetics

E.l.f Cosmetics took advantage of TikTok’s viral dance challenges to grow its brand awareness and increase its followers. The cosmetic brand commissioned a song titled “Eyes Lips Face” and used it as the focus of the #EyesLipsFace dance challenge, which required people to show their eyes, lips, and faces with the tune playing in the background. The challenge was a huge success, boasting over 9.5 billion views.

The #EyesLipsFace challenge was successful because of its simplicity. All one had to do was record their face. People engaging in the challenge didn’t even have to use cosmetic products in their videos.

Crocs

Crocs leveraged TikTok marketing to reignite consumer interest in its casual sandals. The shoemaker partnered with celebrities like Post Malone to launch the #ThousandDollarCrocs challenge, encouraging people to customize and enhance their Crocs. Within the first week, Crocs had gained over 100,000 followers on TikTok. The challenge attracted over 3.1 billion views.

The shoemaker also partnered with Afterpay to launch the #StrapBack challenge, which asked customers to engage “sport mode” on their Crocs by pushing back the strap on the sandals. The challenge attracted over 7.4 billion views on TikTok.

Croc’s casual and fun approach to the challenges is what made them so successful. Asking people to customize their sandals or switch them to sport mode created a fun aspect that encouraged many to join the challenge.

Guess Jeans

Guess Jeans was among the first DTC brands to achieve massive success with TikTok marketing. This started with the #InMyDenim campaign. Guess Jeans partnered with several influencers to launch the challenge, which specifically was for people to convert their old denim clothes into stylish outfits. The campaign attracted over 53 million views. The brand followed that up with the #LoveGuess challenge, where customers could talk about products from fashion company Guess, and generated another 24 million views. In other words, the campaign allowed Guess to use everyday customers as marketers to help spread the word about their clothing and outfits. 

The secret behind the success of Guess Jeans’ TikTok campaigns was their decision to partner with multiple TikTok influences who helped create traction for the challenges.

 

7 tips on how to create an effective TikTok marketing strategy

1. Understand your audience

The most crucial aspect of successfully marketing your DTC brand on TikTok is ensuring you’re targeting the right customer segment. A good understanding of your target audience makes it easier for you to create the kind of content they’ll find interesting.

To identify your audience segment, consider the people who buy your products. Under which demographic do they fall? What are their interests? What kind of content do they prefer? How do they engage on social media? Once you answer these questions, creating DTC content that will resonate with your target audience becomes effortless.

 

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2. Competitor research

Your TikTok marketing strategy doesn’t operate in a vacuum – your competitors are also on TikTok. Since you are targeting the same audience, it’s important to research what they are doing and what’s working for them.

Find your direct competitors who are marketing themselves on TikTok and try to figure out the following:

  • What video formats do they use? Which format tends to drive more engagement?
  • How often do they post on TikTok?
  • What kind of message do they use to promote their products?
  • Do they only post promotional videos, or do they have non-branded content?

Once you identify what’s working for your competitors, you can focus on how to do it better. For instance, if they post three videos a week, can you get better results posting a video every day?

3. Follow current TikTok trends

Riding on trends is a very effective way of increasing your reach on TikTok. Trends also allow you to show the fun and entertaining side of your DTC brand, which can help endear you to potential customers.

One way to ride on trends is to research trending audios and use them in your TikTok videos. When you use a trending sound on your video, it will be shown together with other videos that contain the song, allowing you to reach users searching for the trending audio.

Another way to ride on trends is to keep an eye out for trending hashtags. You can then create videos that relate to that hashtag and benefit from all the views it attracts.

Remember TikTok trends are dynamic – they come and go within a matter of days. So, as a DTC brand, you need to keep an eye out for new trends and have a flexible strategy that lets you modify your content to match whatever is trending.

4. Connect with TikTok influencers

Partnering with TikTok influences is another effective way of generating buzz around your brand. By sharing your content, influencers put your brand in front of their huge audiences and give you the possible algorithmic boost to go viral. For instance, using influencers played a huge part in helping Guess Jeans’ TikTok campaigns to go viral.

5. Take advantage of TikTok ads

You can also increase your reach on TikTok by complementing your organic content with paid ads. TikTok supports four kinds of ads: in-feed native ads, top view ads, hashtag challenge ads, and brand takeover ads.

A good way to make the most of TikTok ads is to use ads that rely on user-generated content, such as hashtag challenge ads. Research shows that TikTok ads with user-generated content perform better than most other kinds of digital ad placements. 

A TikTok ad, for example, is capable of reaching 50.3% of all adults in the United States. That doesn’t mean that your ad is automatically going to reach that many people, but it gives you an idea of the vast reach that TikTok offers. 

6. Create and engage with a community

Ultimately, TikTok is still a social network, so don’t forget the social aspect of it. Engage with your followers and reply to their comments on your videos, comment on other people’s videos, etc. This allows you to create a community and start conversations with potential customers. It also humanizes your brand and makes it easier for potential buyers to engage with you, which translates into customer loyalty. 

7. Track the right kind of metrics

Like with any other kind of marketing, it is important to track the performance of your TikTok marketing efforts. Tracking lets you know what is working and what is not and gives you insights that you can use to optimize your TikTok marketing strategy.

Some of the metrics you need to track include:

  • Video views
  • Follower count and follower evolution
  • Average engagement rate per post
  • Audience demographics
  • Popular videos
  • Hashtag growth for branded hashtags
  • Average watch time

Conclusion

TikTok has rapidly grown to become one of the leading social platforms, and if you want to grow your DTC brand and attract more customers quickly, you cannot afford to ignore it. Marketing on TikTok offers you several benefits, including a large audience base, great user engagement, a large influencer pool, and excellent opportunities for content repurposing.

Fortunately, creating an effective TikTok marketing strategy is not complicated. To achieve success on the platform, all you need is to know your audience, research your competitors to get content ideas, ride on trends, and partner with the right influencers.

 

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