How can you create a successful influencer campaign on TikTok?

TikTok involves planning, creativity, & understanding the platform's unique culture. Clearly outline campaign objectives - brand awareness, traffic to your website, sales? Understand your target audience on TikTok. Look for influencers who have a genuine connection with their audience. Consider engagement rates, follower demographics, & the influencer's content style. Develop a creative brief that outlines the key messaging, tone, & guidelines. Allow influencers creative freedom to showcase your product in a way that is natural to their content style. Leverage TikTok trends to make content more shareable and engaging. Interact with users who engage with ur campaign by responding to comments & participating in conversations.

Look at the intersection between your brand and theirs. The creative should feel exactly like every other piece of content in the influencer's feed, it just happens to be in partnership with your brand. A fantastic example of this is Pitch partnering with Rob Mayhew. I would say a not-so-great example is Pfizer partnering with Travis Kelce. The content feels so disconnected from everything else he posts about, it screams #ad.

In my work at Verizon, where influencer campaigns were a key strategy, finding the right influencer was always step one. It's not just about numbers; it's about alignment with your brand's voice and audience. At Verizon, we often collaborated with Captiv8 to source influencers, but often I'd dive into TikTok myself, exploring trending hashtags to discover influencers who resonated with our campaign and message. It's crucial to approach potential collaborators clearly, outlining your vision, expectations, and terms. This clarity sets the stage for a successful partnership. Then, echoing a timeless sentiment, empower the creators to do what they do best – create.

Identify the Right Influencers: Research and identify influencers whose audience aligns with your target demographic and brand values. Look for influencers with an engaged and authentic following. Consider metrics like follower count, engagement rate, and content quality. Understand TikTok Trends and Culture: TikTok is known for its trends and challenges. Familiarize yourself with the latest trends and understand the platform's culture. Your campaign should feel native to TikTok and resonate with its user base.

Before approaching influencers, clearly define your campaign objectives. Are you aiming to increase brand awareness, drive website traffic, or boost sales? Having clear goals will guide your influencer selection and campaign measurement.

Once you've teamed up with the right influencers, creating content becomes a seamless, creative endeavor. At Verizon, we found that the magic happens when you align with an influencer's unique style while subtly infusing your brand's message. On TikTok, this means embracing the platform's dynamics – vertical videos, catchy tunes, and trending hashtags. The key is to blend these elements with the influencer's authentic voice and your brand's essence, creating content that's both relatable and memorable.

Remember that creating content is THEIR responsibility, not yours. They understand what will resonate with their audience, how to contextualize the campaign, and how to design the content best. Your talking points and suggestions should be inputs, not desired outputs. If you can't trust the creator to do so in a brand-safe way, then either reconsider the creator, or reconsider the campaign.

To run a successful TikTok influencer campaign, focus on audience understanding, authenticity, and trend integration. Craft visually appealing, interactive content that tells a compelling story. Collaborate with authentic influencers, maintain consistent branding, and leverage TikTok's music library. Develop a unique hashtag for user engagement. Measure performance using analytics and iterate based on insights. Stay adaptable to current trends and user feedback within TikTok's dynamic environment.

Use the platform's analytics. Track key metrics like views, likes, shares, and comments to gauge content performance. Assess follower growth and audience demographics for insights. Monitor engagement rates, completion rates, and click-through rates for specific campaigns. Utilize TikTok's analytics tools to understand audience behavior and adapt your strategy accordingly but also to know when to post content and where. Regularly analyze data to refine content and maximize impact. Adjust campaigns based on performance insights to optimize future engagement.

Try to follow Tiktok most popular influencers in your niche. They are usually the ones that either start trends using audio, filters or challenges and try to follow those trends the earliest possible. Also, you should post content regularly. Quality matters, that's true but being early in trends and posting frequently (once to twice per day) is important. Don't hesitate to benchmark people in your niche but outside your niche as well. You can adapt content that succeeded on other niches to yours.