Business marketing suffered significant shifts in trends since the pandemic. This was when traditional strategies became nothing but inefficient in increasing the target audience. At least that’s how it works for older generations. The Gen Z and Millennial agenda requires more effort from companies to be worthy of their interest. One of the easiest ways for businesses to reach a similar ground with these generations includes using TikTok marketing to make videos. The platform has 1,051 million users worldwide. It is slowly catching up with Meta platforms that have led the market for so long.
There are many reasons why TikTok became famous, but many don’t understand its purpose. Although it may not have been planned to be this way, TikTok marketing is now one of the best platforms for business advertisement. It’s the platform where companies can directly engage with clients and prospects in the most unserious way. Promoting their products and services in a witty, self-deprecating way that speaks to most youngsters.
But how does this method work?
Ryanair’s TikTok account is one of our favourites
Ryanair is a known low-cost airline that doesn’t necessarily stand out for its products and services. It’s a great travelling option for students or people who budget. However, some customers complained about uncomfortable seats and annoying extras for baggage with questionable rules.
Still, the company brushed off its reputation on the TikTok page. Although most clients know these issues, they still use the airline’s services and engage with the content. The reason is simple, it’s because it’s funny. Whoever administers their page has a vast knowledge of pop culture and internet trends. Therefore, can create similar content but shifted towards entertainment. Finally, with a little mix of sarcasm and sad truth, Ryanair is among the most loved accounts on the platform.
If you watch their posts, you might think their approach is childish, but their TikTok videos receive many views, comments and shares. In one recent video, you can see a Ryanair plane with lashes and nails mocking a book by Colleen Hoover, a controversial American book writer, and the video was incredibly well-received. Overall, this type of content makes people go, “I care about that too!”. Hence getting the idea that the company sees everyone.
Let’s not forget about Duolingo
Another successful company that thrives on sarcasm and weirdness is Duolingo. It is an educational app where you can learn almost any language. The app is recognized for the green and cute owl that takes you through lessons. This is the exact mascot used in all of the company’s TikTok videos.
The funny thing about Duolingo started some time before the platform’s appearance when the app sent passive-aggressive notifications to users who didn’t complete their lessons on time for several days. You might be familiar with “These reminders aren’t working. We’ll stop sending them for now.” Such a drama queen.
From this point on, everything escalated, and users started imagining that the Duo owl would come to their house or threaten them as a warning for not doing their Spanish lessons, which became rapidly a meme. This phenomenon helped the Duolingo TikTok account emerge and build a satirical and silly content brand that quickly got to the public.
The success of Duolingo is now based on an owl. But the public also contributed to this trend because they continued the company’s work by making funny comments or sharing the videos with their friends. Therefore, things are pretty simple for a company to get recognized now.
What can we learn from these examples?
Business marketing is changing continuously, and now the current burning strategy is seeing what people like so you can create similar content. So, your company might need a Gen Z candidate who’s spending a lot of time on the internet and is familiar with memes, trending audios and the language required for responding to comments.
Of course, some video editing skills are nice, but these can be acquired in time, too. What’s most important is that the person hits the right spot to advertise the company and understand where it stands. This is possible with TikTok marketing.
Still, one of the most critical business tips is simply taking it easy. Ads are different than in the past, and they’re more relaxed, funny and less planned. As for now, it seems like things won’t change much since future generations, like Gen Alpha, seem to have the same qualities as their parents.
Translating this in corporate: optimization is key
Duolingo’s videos weren’t a hit from the start, and we can say that their first few videos flopped successfully. However, they remained consistent in their strategies and did videos until the audiences caught up to their shenanigans. At the same time, they took the pulse of their audience and optimized content based on people’s usual responses.
As discussed, this type of market analysis is considerably time-consuming, but it’s not yet developed in new generations. That’s why hiring people who spent time on the internet and already have a knowledge base is more accessible than translating all this nonsense into corporate language and putting it into a PowerPoint for a Slack meeting.
It would be odd for team members to start calling each other “bestie” and throw a “slay” on the group chat when someone excelled in their task. That’s because the new era of “silliness” and carelessness seems futile for most marketers, but the truth is that only younger generations understand how these things work. And they’re more successful when considering the future of technology.
What do you think about this new TikTok era?
TikTok was supposed to be an entertainment platform like any other, nothing more than what Musical.ly accomplished. However, as the pandemic took over the world and created some interesting twists of events, it seems like TikTok marketing is now available on the TikTok app for creators and businesses.
With a combination of audio ideas, effects and hashtags, the platform is every company’s dream of advertising their products and services because it requires low effort to gain visibility. You only need one knowledgeable Gen Z employee, a pinkity drinkity and some time to see the results.