6 tips to succeed with TikTok influencer marketing

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TikTok influencer marketing | Ensure you have the right audience & content | Land on a content type | Create a clear campaign brief | Send your campaign brief in time | Price creators fairly | Collect results at the right time | Final takeaways

The guide to TikTok influencer marketing 💃🏻

There’s no question about it: TikTok is the social media channel that keeps skyrocketing. As of 2024, TikTok has been downloaded over 4.7 billion times. They have 1.1 billion monthly users, with the average person spending 95 minutes of their day on the platform (75% increase from 2022).

So there’s plenty of opportunity for you to reach and engage a massive audience.

But like any channel you’re unfamiliar with, you may find it intimidating to navigate. And because TikTok’s infamous algorithm works a bit differently from other channels like Instagram, it can also seem pretty unpredictable.

This makes it hard to understand what you can expect from influencer marketing on TikTok. How do you know what videos perform best? What are you supposed to ask creators for? How different are collaborations on TikTok compared to other channels?

If these questions are stopping you from hopping on the channel, this guide will help. You’ll find 6 tips to succeed on TikTok based on insights from 431 creators that were surveyed by inzpire.me.

Tip #1: Ensure you have the right audience and content for TikTok 🤳

Before you dive head first into collaborations, you need to understand how TikTok works as a channel for influencer marketing. Here are a few key learnings to get familiar with!

As you’ve seen, TikTok has experienced massive growth over the years. It has gone beyond its image as an app exclusively for teenagers, and increased the presence of 25-34 year olds rivaling the 18-24 age group. 

Below, you’ll find a breakdown of TikTok’s user demographics, according to updated advertising data. 

But most users on TikTok are still Gen Z — a group that’s getting harder to reach through other platforms.

And it’s only getting harder.

These younger users are flocking to TikTok from other platforms like Facebook and Instagram. In 2022, Facebook’s daily active users dropped for the first time in its 18-year history. Growth among this group of users has also stalled the past couple of years.

So if you want to reach a younger audience, you can’t just rely on Facebook ads. TikTok needs to be a part of your marketing strategy.

But what makes TikTok so popular and addictive?

Unlike other social channels, content on TikTok is unpolished, creative, raw, and often, a little quirky. And with the way TikTok works, it can be consumed endlessly.

That’s why TikTok content gets considerably more engagement than other social channels.

This includes ads and sponsored content. In fact, 80% of creators surveyed said that sponsored content on TikTok gets similar or better engagement compared to other social channels.

The raw content on TikTok might be a long way from the more formal, curated photos and videos you’ve used for ads on Instagram, Facebook, or Youtube. But if you want to thrive on TikTok, you need to have native-feeling, “less commercial” content.

While this might not necessarily be aligned with your branding, it’s consistent with the authenticity users love and expect on TikTok. And it’s an opportunity for you to show a more human side to your brand.

An easy way to get this content at scale is by partnering with creators.

You can then boost them using TikTok’s ad feature: Spark Ads. With this feature, TikTok is putting real focus on authentic content by making it a core part of their business.

TikTok’s Spark Ads: amplify creators’ organic content
With Spark Ads, you can tap into creators’ organic content and turn it into ads, either from a creator’s account, or your Business Account.

They’ll appear as TopView or native In-Feed ads, which look more authentic to users. Because these ads blend in with other content on TikTok, they drive better results.

According to TikTok’s research, Spark Ads have a 24% higher completion rate, which is the number of times an ad was played until the end, and a 142% higher engagement rate than standard In-Feed ads.

With Spark Ads, you’re able to join the conversation by creating relevant, native content with creators, and sharing them in ads with your audience. Doing this makes influencer marketing an integrated part of your marketing strategy, rather than just an add-on.

Now that you know how influencer marketing works on TikTok, let’s dive into some of the tips to run campaigns successfully!

🔎  Need help finding the right creators to work with?

Let our team of experts identify the right TikTok creators for you! We have exclusive access to first-party demographic information, such as follower age and location, pulled directly from TikTok. So you can feel confident your brand is getting in front of a relevant audience.

Schedule a chat with our team

Tip #2: Land on a content type for your campaign 📹

Like any other social channel, there are different types of content that perform better than others on TikTok.

Before working with creators, you need to know what to ask for to reach your goals!

Below, you’ll find a few examples of the most popular TikTok video types. You’ll notice that many types of TikTok videos cross over with one another, like entertainment content and challenges.

  1. Entertainment: This content type includes videos around specific niches, like comedic skits or pop cultural references, that are focused on entertaining an audience.
  2. Education: While there’s a lot of content focused on entertainment, TikTok also provides a range of educational and informational videos. TikTok has become the new search engine for the younger generations, actively used to find new products or inspiration. 
  3. Trends and challenges: You’ll find videos of users hopping on trends or challenges, these are video themes and concepts that go viral for a certain amount of time. Users recreate videos by for example using the same “sounds” and hashtags. 

While there are many different types of videos on TikTok, creators say that entertainment videos are liked and engaged with the most.

Entertainment content is successful because creators can easily leverage trends and really let their creativity flow.

And this is important if you want your collaborations and Spark ads to succeed. In fact, 65% of creators believe that creativity and originality are the core factors that make videos succeed or go viral.

Because of this, it’s really important to write a campaign brief that’s clear enough for you to get the content you want. But it shouldn’t be too set either, so that creators also have creative freedom!

🤔  What TikTok content is best for your campaign?

Let us help you create a strategy tailored to your business goals, whether it’s driving brand growth or conversions.

Schedule a chat with our team

Tip #3: Create a clear campaign brief ✍️

If you’ve written campaign briefs for Instagram before, you’re in luck! 91% of creators surveyed believe a TikTok brief can be similar to an Instagram brief.

That means you don’t have to go through the trouble of creating a whole new brief to use for TikTok. You’ll just want to be sure to include the core elements below to ensure creators know what you’re asking for.

After all, 9% of them believe an unclear brief is something brands should avoid to get the best results!

Introduction
Give creators an idea of what your brand, products, and values are to get them excited about the collaboration. Be sure to add any links to your website or product landing pages, so the creators can check them out.

Compensation
Specify what you’re paying creators. If you’re planning on sending them any products, you should also highlight how much they’re worth.

Campaign & content guidelines
Let creators know what your goals are, and if there are any first steps they need to take before creating content! This can include sending you an address or phone number, or picking up a product to promote.

You’ll also want to share your expectations and guidelines for the collaboration and content.

This will give creators a clear idea of what you’re looking for, such as hashtags to use, type of content to create, or minimum video length to be aware of.

If your goal is conversions and you have discount codes for the campaign, be sure to indicate where the creators should add them. According to the creators surveyed, sharing them in a pinned comment or video description gives the best results!

Deadlines
Add any timelines or dates the creators should post by, so they can plan accordingly. Be sure to give them more time if the collaboration is demanding or during a busy season, like Black Friday or Christmas.

Deliverables
If you need to approve the creators’ content before they post, let them know how to send you the content, when it should be sent to you, and when they should expect your approval.

You should also share instructions on how you expect content and results to be shared with you.

Content usage rights
If you’re planning on reusing the creators’ content for social media or ads, add a clause with the usage rights you’d like.

For Spark Ads, creators give you authorization to promote their content. This authorization can last 7, 30, 60, or 365 days, so be sure your usage rights cover the time period you select.

And that’s it!

Remember, be as clear as possible in your brief, and stay away from guidelines that are too strict or aren’t aligned with the creators’ profiles. That means you shouldn’t be sending scripts for creators to use in their videos, or writing captions for them.

It’ll make the creators’ content inauthentic, which is a huge mistake on TikTok.

In fact, 52% of creators believe this is something brands should avoid to get the best possible results in collaborations! Below is the overview of mistakes our creators think it’s important to avoid. 

‼️  It’s critical to promote native content on TikTok to make your brand memorable!

To achieve this, our team can help you work with creators to create impactful content, and promote the best-performing ones in Spark Ads.

Schedule a chat with our team

Tip #4: Send your campaign brief on time ⏱️

With any collaboration, you always want to be sure you’re sending your campaign brief to creators on time.

According to creators, 9% of them believe short timelines are one of the top mistakes brands make. And doing this can affect results! It’ll also give both you and the creators you work with a lot of unnecessary stress.

Because creativity and originality are such important elements for TikTok videos, creators need enough time to come up with creative ideas, and make the content for you.

Ideally, creators need up to 1 week to create 1 TikTok video once they’ve received your brief.

You’ll also need to consider how many videos you’re asking for, and whether you need to ship them any products to use. All these factors will require more time!

Tip #5: Price creators fairly 💸

More and more creators are prioritizing paid collaborations over unpaid ones. 16% of them say that offering unfair or no monetary payments is the second biggest mistake brands should avoid making.

This is because creators are seeing the value of the work they do, especially in content creation. It takes them a lot of time and effort to do right.

In the survey, creators were asked to rank the factors they take into account when setting their prices, see their responses below. In addition to the size of their following, time and effort to create a TikTok video came out on top.  

Because of this, creators expect to be paid “fairly” for collaborations. They believe gifting or offering only products for their work is unfair, which is why only 18% of creators surveyed said they’d be willing to accept product-only offers.

But when there’s some monetary payment involved, 82% of creators are willing to accept collaboration offers.

Paying creators fairly has its benefits. You’d:

  • Save time onboarding creators. Creators are more likely to accept paid collaborations. So you wouldn’t need to go through the trouble of finding even more creators to add to your campaign.
  • Leave creators with a good impression of your brand. They’d feel you’re valuing the work they do, and think more positively about their experience with you.
  • Be able to book higher performers. Experienced creators in high demand will have plenty of collaboration offers. They’ll choose to spend their time on the paid ones.

Tip #6: Collect your results at the right time 📊

Similar to YouTube campaigns, it can take some time for videos on TikTok to accumulate views.

Most creators get the majority of their views within the first 4 days of posting their videos. But there are many who also continue to get views after a month has passed, as you can see below. 

To get an accurate picture of how your collaborations did, you should wait about 2 weeks after a video is posted before collecting results, and check back in after 5 weeks to see if it has improved.

Because TikTok videos can get spikes in views even months after you collect results, it helps lower your CPM and drives long tail awareness. This is especially relevant to educational and informational videos, when users are searching for specific keywords or products, they can appear in the search feed for months after it has been published. 

For example, take our campaign with Batiste. At the end of the campaign, it received over 1.2 million views and had a CPM of €19.29. Because of the increase in views over time, the CPM is now €13.10, 32% lower than before!

 

Final takeaways 🙌

TikTok is no longer just a channel to reach Gen Z; the entertainment platform is growing rapidly and is now the channel setting market trends. Being visible on the platform can be crucial for the success of B2C brands this year and sharing the right content on the channel will get you results. Creators are the ones who can help create the raw, honest and entertaining content you need to reach your audience in an engaging way. 

This year, you should integrate TikTok into your wider marketing strategy and have a clear plan for how you want to utilize the creator content and optimize it through Paid Ads (Spark Ads). Clearly define content rights in the influencer brief to avoid misunderstandings after the activation.

To succeed with influencer marketing on TikTok, keep these tips in mind, and you’ll be able to launch highly effective campaigns!

😊 Need help running ROI-driven TikTok campaigns?

Or just want to learn more about influencer marketing and TikTok? Let’s have a chat! 

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