Happy Holidays! As the new year approaches, it’s important to start scheming strategies for the next year, especially on social media. Last week, we discussed the best practices for Instagram to look out for in 2023. As impressive as Instagram is though, it’s not the only platform to keep an eye on. TikTok has quickly taken over the world in the last few years, becoming everybody’s favorite addiction. Specifically, TikTok had over 1.5 billion active users in the third quarter of 2022 and is quickly on its way to catching Facebook’s 2.9 billion users.
Everyone is on TikTok: every age group, every interest, and every possible demographic has a specific area of TikTok that they inhabit. Because of this, it’s essential to keep TikTok at the forefront of every social media strategy. But there are certainly better ways to utilize the app than others. This is what we’re here to discuss: TikTok’s best practices to carry into 2023.
Hook ‘em in
Similar to a story, essay, or anything else, if the beginning of a TikTok offers nothing of interest, people aren’t going to stay. Explain the value of TikTok in roughly the first three seconds, otherwise, you’re getting scrolled into the abyss. It’s important that users know the exact value they’re getting from the video they’re watching. There are examples of this not only with businesses on the platform but creators as well. Everybody uses this technique, and so should you.
The best way to execute this is by essentially giving the video a title. For example, if your TikTok is about 3 skincare ingredients that every skin type should use, put that as text at the beginning of the video. You can do a voiceover and say it at the beginning of the video as well. There are many options for executing the hook, as long as it does get done.
Comment Call-To-Action
The best way to get on the “For You” Page (fyp) is to have high engagement. But how does one achieve that? It can be hard to get engagement when you’re starting from scratch with few or no followers. One of the easier ways to get engagement is by simply asking for a like and comment. In the 3 skincare ingredients example, you could say at the end “Comment your favorite skincare ingredient below!” to drive engagement. Putting those Calls-to-action in the caption or pinned as a comment are other great ways.
Pinned comments actually have a lot of use for driving engagement. Something that we frequently see in comments of larger creators is a pinned comment from them stating something like: “Comment your state down below!” or “Take attendance in this comment thread”.
Interact with Audience
Always, always ALWAYS interact with your audience on TikTok. The primary base of TikTok users is Gen-Z. This younger generation doesn’t like to be preached at, but rather loves having conversations with brands and businesses. It’s because of this that user interactions are vital to your Tiktok success.
Reply to your Comments
There are a number of ways to interact with users on your videos. One of the easiest ways to do so is to reply to comments. Not only does this strengthen your relationship with that one user, but your entire follower base recognizes your effort and appreciates you all the more for it. Even outsiders who are happening upon your video on their fyp will recognize someone that interacts with their users.
Video Reply to a Comment
Another stellar option is to reply to a comment with a video. If somebody asks a question about your business, or product, or just says something you find interesting, you can make a video responding to it. That person gets boosted, and it really benefits you. If you do this consistently on most or all of your videos, you can create a web of videos. People can access the new video from the old video whose comment section you replied from. People can access the old video from the caption of the new video.
There are very few limitations to this as well: you can create a video response from multiple comments on the same video. You can even make a video response to a comment in a thread, not just one of the original comments. This option fosters a lot of opportunities for engagement, and for linking around TikTok
Do a Q and A
Creators have the option to post a Q and A sticker or button where their audience can ask them questions, which they answer in a video response. This is similar to the Q and A sticker from the Instagram Stories, but these don’t disappear in 24 hours and can stay on TikTok as long as you’d like.
Use Trending Sounds
Like Instagram Reels, TikToks are made using sounds (it’s actually where Instagram got the idea for Reels). There are some that are popular, and some that are not. Some stay trending for a very long time, may be even years (this tends to be more for the background music to a voiceover) and some sounds may only be in for a few weeks (these are more of the trends). For example, As It Was by Harry Styles was trending for a few months at the beginning of 2022, and slowly faded out. There was also the famous “It’s Corn!” song that originated on TikTok and overtook the entire platform for about a month.
The reason that it’s so important to keep up with trending sounds (and to use them) is that TikTok will boost videos that use those audios. Another reason is that users can click on the sound and look at all of the videos that use that same sound. The more trending sounds you use, the likelier you are to end up being seen by someone.
If you want to learn how Ascent can take over your social media, learn more here.
Use Hashtags… And use them well
Hashtags, like on Instagram, are extremely important for reach. There are always a number of different hashtags that are trending across the entire sphere of TikTok, but each specific niche of TikTok (and there are hundreds, if not thousands) also has its own set of trending sounds all the time on TikTok. The best suggestion is to do a little bit of both: pull some more universal hashtags, and pull mostly from those trending in your area.
Utilize pinning videos
Did you know that you can pin your favorite or best videos at the top of your TikTok account? Well, now you do! This is something that has been on TikTok for a while now, and it’s still a helpful tool to use. Similar to Instagram, you can pin your top 3 videos on the top of your page. These could be your most viral videos, maybe an introduction video, or really whatever you want!
Have fun!
The most important way to be successful this next year on TikTok is to always have fun with your videos! People can tell when there’s no passion behind what you’re doing. It comes through in the quality of the work that you put out, not only on TikTok but in any situation. So, always be sure that you’re having fun with the content you’re putting on the internet. And if it begins to feel mundane, that may be a sign to try a new video format. TikTok is supposed to be fun, so feel free to experiment with what you’re putting out there.
If you don’t have time to post on TikTok for yourself, see how Ascent can help you here.
