TikTok has taken the social media world by storm, and brands must create high-quality, compelling, converting content to survive on this platform. But it’s not enough to simply lift existing Facebook or Instagram ads and post them on TikTok.
Rather, your social media marketing strategy needs to adapt to fit the unique demands of TikTok advertising so you can feature high-quality TikTok native content in your video ads.
Let’s break down what TikTok native content is, why it’s important, and how you can rely on the world’s best TikTok ad agency to help you create that content from scratch.
To make full use of the TikTok app and its advertising potential, you can’t just copy and paste videos or other content from other social media platforms like Facebook.
In a nutshell, TikTok native content leverages platform-specific elements, trends, or art styles you can only find or use on TikTok. TikTok focuses on short videos, so the best content is generally trendy, captivating, and digestible.
Given TikTok’s unique algorithms and video entertainment focus, TikTok native content is primarily about entertaining or informing your audience.
At MuteSix, our Creative, Paid Social, and Influencer Marketing teams work in conjunction with brand-aligned content creators to generate creative content for your target audiences. We work with those creators step-by-step through both pre-production and post-production to ensure that they deliver high-quality, brand-aligned content that helps clients reach campaign goals.
In other words, we make sure that TikTok native content is both engaging enough to “stop the scroll” and compelling enough to convert users into purchasers/subscribers.
High-quality TikTok native content isn’t just informative. It also represents the best aspects of the platform and the type of content it draws. Specifically, TikTok native content is:
Modern consumers have a very good sense for when content is inauthentic or overly salesy. In other words, if a TikTok user feels like they’re being blatantly advertised to, they might very well decide to pass on that brand in favor of a more authentic-feeling company.
This is one of the primary distinctions between TikTok native content and content on other marketing platforms like Facebook, where people are used to seeing traditional ads.
TikTok, partially due to its age, is different. According to some surveys, 90% of consumers indicate that authenticity is crucial when they decide which brands they choose to support and patronize.
Because of this, brands should not create ads in isolation. Instead, they should involve influencers and content creators in the ad creation process and make use of trends like branded hashtag challenges, duets, and other content types that are unique to TikTok.
By partnering with creators on TikTok, brands may see improvements to ad recall of up to 27%. Your brand can and should use influencer-created, brand-aligned content wherever possible to maximize its perceived authenticity on TikTok.
“Lo-fi” or “low fidelity” content requires minimal production effort, feels authentic and “real,” and is particularly effective on TikTok. Even coming from a business account on TikTok, your content should feel like something someone put together because they had an interesting or engaging message to share — not because they wanted to sell something.
Of course, toeing the line between seeming lo-fi and seeming cheap can be tricky. That’s why professional ad agencies like MuteSix are so crucial for creating TikTok native content.
TikTok native content differs significantly from the “native” content on other platforms, such as Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. Below, we’ll dive into several key distinctions and explain why they’re so important.
For starters, native TikTok content typically features signature elements you can only find on this app. These include:
Using these native content features will let your audience know that your content was designed first and foremost for TikTok, not for another platform or as part of an overly corporate marketing push.
Remember, TikTok is all about entertaining and engaging users. So it’s no surprise that good TikTok native content makes heavy use of music and sound effects, especially top-of-the-chart pop songs.
Unlike other platforms, all TikTok content is supposed to be viewed with the sound on. To that end, your brand should create native TikTok content with this in mind. You’ll always want to include a soundtrack, a few sound effects, or a licensed song that you feel fits your brand and its identity.
Like Twitter content, native TikTok content capitalizes on hashtag challenges, trends, and social movements. You can and should lean into this tendency to:
As you can see, there are a lot of considerations for creating high-quality, TikTok native content. This native content is highly important for your brand’s success for several key reasons.
For starters, native TikTok content can help keep your brand relevant. This can be harder than you think on a platform like TikTok, where trends change weekly and where users are constantly on the move for the next engaging video.
Creating TikTok native content is also crucial for reaching audiences of all age groups. While a plurality of TikTok users belong to Gen Z, and most TikTok users are between the ages of 18 and 34, TikTok also draws millennials, Gen Xers, and beyond.
People young and old come to TikTok to see entertainment, influencers, and more. If your brand wants to reach as much of the market as possible, you must create engaging and compelling native TikTok content that fits the platform.
Perhaps most importantly of all, native ads on TikTok allow you to showcase your brand’s personality in an authentic, rich way that you can’t emulate on more corporate-feeling platforms like Facebook. When made to fit with native content styles, TikTok content can help people understand your brand more fully and earnestly.
One of the main challenges of developing TikTok native content is that you can’t simply copy and paste content from Facebook or Instagram and assume it’ll perform well.
You can’t make a short Instagram ad, for example, and put it on TikTok and expect it to receive a positive response. It’ll miss out on many of the TikTok-specific elements, like text overlays and a soundtrack background, that make TikTok native content work so well.
Other entertainment platforms, including Instagram with its Reels or YouTube with its Shorts, are trying to compete with TikTok’s unique, engaging video format. But even with those efforts, TikTok remains at the forefront of this new advertising industry.
MuteSix is the go-to advertising agency for brands that need to create native TikTok content that feels authentic and converts viewers from the start. Our team can help you create compelling TikTok native content in a variety of ways.
The core element to MuteSix’s success on TikTok lies in how we optimize your TikTok content.
Specifically, our Creative, Paid Social, and Influencer Marketing teams work in conjunction with brand-aligned creators on every piece of content your brand puts out. This alliance then ensures that all the content your brand creates is TikTok native, authentic feeling, and compelling to its audience.
Our marketing experts work with influencers and TikTok creators throughout the pre-production phase, offering talking points and direction to keep content focused.
They also work with content creators in the post-production phase. Think of this as the quality control step of the process. Our experts make sure that our content creators’ material is:
As a final step, MuteSix infuses best-in-class direct response elements for each piece of content we publish. This helps to guarantee that each post is engaging and compelling enough to convert users into purchasers, subscribers, or anything else you may need.
This multistep process ensures native TikTok content optimization unlike anything you’ve seen before. As a result, your brand’s TikTok native content will outperform competing content, even if you’ve just started building a presence on the platform.
MuteSix doesn’t stop there. We also take great pains to make sure we partner with the right influencers. Authenticity is the key to success on TikTok and in modern digital marketing overall, and that means ensuring that we only partner with influencers who are aligned with your brand.
Specifically, MuteSix’s Preferred Creator Roster allows your brand to partner with high-quality influencers who:
MuteSix, meanwhile, uses these partnerships to:
Lastly, MuteSix can help you scale your native TikTok videos and other content based on your ad spend limits. Once you get started with a partnership and begin producing content, we’ll make sure that your content goes to work for you and maximizes every marketing dollar spent.
We also heavily leverage A/B testing to make sure we deliver winning content to TikTok all the time. We refresh our A/B testing frequently — usually every 2 to 5 weeks — to counteract the rapid-fire content fatigue on TikTok, which tends to happen faster than on any other platform.
Ultimately, TikTok native content is vital for your business’s success both on this platform and for future marketing efforts. But while making TikTok native content can be tricky, you don’t have to do so alone.
MuteSix is the ideal TikTok marketing agency for your needs. As the first ad agency to partner with TikTok, we’re well-equipped and ready to help your brand not just survive but thrive on this unique entertainment platform like never before.
Check out our TikTok case study and our TikTok Service Page to learn more about our offerings. Or, contact us today for a free consultation to learn more.
Sources:
Survey Reveals How Consumers Really Judge Brand Authenticity (and Influencers) | Social Media Today
Global TikTok User Age and Gender Distribution 2022 | Statista