If you’re reading this blog, it’s probably because you’ve accepted that you can’t ignore TikTok anymore. TikTok has exploded onto the social media scene with 100M+ US monthly active users (Source: TikTok Internal Data) who spend more than a movie’s worth of daily time on the app (App Annie US, June 2021). Users of all ages and backgrounds are drawn to the app to connect with like-minded people, learn more about their interests, and discover niche content. 

What’s one of the most passionate communities on TikTok? The autophile community! That’s right, your audience is on TikTok. What’s even better is that they are ready to take action! 47% of TikTokers are in the market to buy or lease a new vehicle in the next 12 months (Source: Source: TikTok Marketing Science US, Custom Auto Survey via Suzy, June 2021, Base: US Monthly TikTok users, ages 18-55). Have we convinced you that your dealership needs to be on TikTok yet? Read on to learn how both organic and paid strategies on TikTok can rev up your digital marketing.

Getting Started

The best way to become familiar with TikTok is to download the app and become an active user! Start browsing your ‘For You’ page to understand better how TikTok’s revolutionary algorithm works. Get up to speed with current TikTok trends and popular sounds. Once you’re ready to engage with your community, make sure your dealership’s profile is fully branded. On your dealership’s public TikTok profile, you will want to include a clear and correctly size image of your logo as a profile picture. Make sure to include a detailed bio so that users know who you are and how to contact or visit you. Now that you have established your presence on TikTok, you are ready to build and interact with your community.

Best Practices

People use TikTok to have fun, so let your personality shine through! TikTok users want to see the real you. They want to see candid moments at the dealership, unpolished silliness and a peek behind the scenes. Need some inspiration for your TikTok content? Check out these stats:

Top 5 Reasons for Wanting a New Car*:

• More Modern Tech 45%
• Lifestyle Upgrade/Change 28%
• Growing Family 23%
• A Good Deal/Promo 21%
• Special Occasion Gift (e.g., Birthday, Graduation, Holiday) 20%
  

Popular auto hashtags on TikTok are: #CarsOfTikTok #Car #Cars #VanLife #ElectricCar #Truck #SUV

We recommend posting quality videos once per week. However, if you’re able to create quality videos more frequently, you can post daily.

Some other tips for creating attention-grabbing TikToks:

• Take advantage of your space and frame your video vertically.
• Overlay concise and informative text to tell your story and highlight the relevant information.
• You need to grab your audience’s attention quickly! Put your key messaging early.
• Break the 4th wall by addressing the viewer directly. 
• Capitalize on TikTok trends and popular sounds. For this, you need to act quickly and enable fast production turnarounds.
  

Maintaining an organic strategy on TikTok will allow you to foster a presence on the app while also building a community. However, launching your TikTok account is only the beginning. Amplifying your presence with a paid strategy will help you reach other TikTokers who want to hear your message. 

Paid Media

After you have established your presence on TikTok, you can amplify the content you are creating at scale with paid media by communicating with relevant marketers in your area. When looking at targeting on TikTok, there are several ways to target users in your DMA (please note that at this time, you are only able to geo-target at the State or DMA level). You can behaviorally target people based on the videos they watch on TikTok, or you can utilize your first-party data to either target customers from your CRM or TikTok users based on how they have interacted with your content. There are several different placements where your advertising can run as well. 

Placements where your ads can run: 

• Top View: First video a user sees when opening the app.
• Branded Hashtag Challenge: Engagement event that turns your community into co-creators.
• Branded Effect: 2D or 3D effects that drive user-generated content and allow them to interact with your brand.
• One Day Max: Appears in the 4th position of a user’s feed.
• In Feed Video: Appears seamlessly in the user’s feed.
  

Spark Ads allow you to boost your top-performing organic posts with paid media. These ads are 100% native full-screen top view ad units, One-Day Max, and In-Feed Video Format that see +142% engagement (TikTok Internal study 2021). This tactic is a great way to help launch a new vehicle in your lineup or new features rolling out on an existing vehicle. In addition, it allows for broad targeting to help extend your reach and spark conversation. 

Lead Generation Ads are In-Feed Video units that optimize for lead collection. The customizable instant forms are hosted by TikTok and prefill basic customer information when clicked. These TikTok landing pages load 9x faster than 3rd party landing pages (*TikTok Internal study 2021). These units are a great way to drive leads from audiences who have already shown an interest in your brand. Once you have an engaged audience, you can instead direct them to your website to learn more about your brand. 

Remember, don’t make ads; make TikToks. Content that blends in seamlessly with the user’s feed performs better than standard ad content. Whether you tap into our creators to create and share content or build custom content that is authentic to your brand, following our creative best practices will help make your content more effective. Contact the team at The Moran Group to learn if TikTok should be a part of your overall digital strategy.

Call The Moran Group at 225-769-1059 or schedule a meeting online today!

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*Source: TikTok Marketing Science US, Custom Auto Survey via Suzy, June 2021, Base: US Monthly TikTok users, ages 18-55