Different Types of TikTok Ads Explained

Thinking of starting TikTok Ads campaigns for your brand or business?

TikTok has more than 1.39 billion monthly active users in Q1 2022 and is estimated to reach 1.8 billion users by the end of 2022. If you haven’t started advertising on the fastest growing social media platform of recent years, now is the time to start.

Whether you’re looking to increase sales or drive traffic to your website, a creative and well-targeted TikTok campaign can yield great results.

In this guide, you can discover everything you need to know about different and creative TikTok advertising options.

 TikTok Ads offers a powerful and easy-to-use platform to help businesses and brands advertise to millions of users around the world, with targeting, ad creation, insight reports, and ad management tools.

While TikTok Ads are not yet as popular as Facebook or Instagram ads, they are an incredible opportunity for brands looking to increase their reach. Don’t think it’s too late to start using TikTok ads because many brands and businesses don’t yet realize the potential.

Whether you are a small business with a limited budget or you are running a 10-day campaign, TikTok Ads offers many tools to help brands and businesses succeed.

Similar to Facebook Ad Manager, TikTok’s ad platform tools automate the process of creating, serving, and optimizing your ads.

TikTok Ads currently has two budgeting options: daily or lifetime. With both options, your budget is not fixed; you can change it at any time during your campaign. You can also target your audience by gender, location, age, interests and other variables.

Similar to Facebook and Instagram’s Ad Manager, you can also create “Custom Audiences” and “Lookalike/Similar Audiences” to reach new audiences similar to your existing audience.

TikTok offers a variety of different creative ad types for brands and businesses to explore. You’ve probably seen most of these types while watching TikTok. 

What are TikTok Ad Types?

• In-Feed Ads
• Brand Takeover
• TopView
• Branded Hashtag Challenge
• Branded Effects

Depending on the outcome you want to achieve for your brand, you may need to use different types of ads.  Let’s look at the different types of TikTok ads and how they can work for your business.

In-Feed Ads:

In-Feed Ads are video ads that appear between user videos as they scroll through your For You page.

With In-Feed Ads, you can add call-to-action messages and keep your video between 9 and 15 seconds. With call-to-action, you can encourage users to make an immediate purchase, download your app or visit your website directly.

The most important thing to remember about in-feed ads is that, like any other video on your page for you, In-Feed Ads can be scrolled through or skipped fairly quickly. You only have 2-3 seconds to grab users’ attention before you have to keep scrolling.

In-feed ads should be full screen and attractive enough to keep users from immediately scrolling past your content.

TikTok Ads: Brand Takeover

Have you ever opened TikTok and immediately seen an ad? If so, these are Brand Acquisition Ads.

Brand Takeover Ads appear when the app is opened and deliver a full-screen video to your audience.

Since you can place your message directly in front of your target audience, it is one of the best options among TikTok Ad types to drive audience awareness and increase direct sales.

These ads not only appear as soon as users open TikTok, but can also appear as still images, GIFs or videos on the For You page.

Brand Takeover Ads are specific to their category, which means that TikTok ensures that users do not see more than one Brand Takeover per day. With Brand Takeover Ads, you can expect a lot of eyes on your content with little competition.

If you are just starting out with TikTok Ads, Brand Takeover ads may not be your first choice. Because, while very effective, Brand Takeovers are costly.

If you are a bigger brand with a big marketing budget, it is a great option for fast growth and reaching a large group of TikTok users.

TikTok Ads: TopView

TopView Ads is a new advertising option based on Branded Takeovers.

What makes TopView Ads different is that, unlike Branded Takeover Ads, TikTok users are not bombarded with ads as soon as they open the app – TopView Ads are the first in-stream post after 3 seconds. They appear at the top of TikTok’s most premium section, the For You page, with up to 60 seconds of full-screen video with autoplay and audio.

TikTok Ads: Branded Hashtag Contest

Branded Hashtag Challenges are a one-of-a-kind advertising opportunity exclusively for TikTok. You’ve probably seen branded hashtag challenges displayed on TikTok’s Explore page.

Similar to the regular hashtag trends on TikTok, Branded Hashtags Challenges offer both organic and sponsored opportunities for brands.

When creating a Branded Hashtag Challenge, it’s important to have concrete goals. Do you want to raise awareness for a new product? Generate new leads? Or increase overall brand awareness?

When a user clicks on a sponsored hashtag, they are taken to a landing page on TikTok with the brand logo, a link to the website, a short description of the challenge, and popular videos using the hashtag. 

It’s a great way to promote user-generated content and build brand awareness. It is a great opportunity for brands to collaborate and integrate themselves into the TikTok culture and community in an easy way.

TikTok Ads: Branded Effects

TikTok now offers branded shareable stickers, AR filters, and lenses in its admixes.

Similar to Snapchat’s branded lenses, TikTok’s branded effects allow brands to design their own custom filters in the app.

Branded Effects are a great way to encourage users to engage directly with your brand in a fun way.

How Much Do TikTok Ads Cost?

TikTok Ads are new on the scene – brands and businesses are still experimenting with the platform – so it’s hard to understand the average spend or return on investment (ROI).

So, if you are a small business and want to try TikTok ads, don’t let the unknown scare you off right away – spending big bucks on TikTok is not the only way to advertise on this popular app.

You can create a free TikTok Ads account and create In-Feed ads with your own set budget and schedule. Currently TikTok has a minimum campaign budget of $500 and a minimum ad group budget of $50. Source: TikTok

As more brands start using TikTok Ads, it will become clearer whether TikTok will follow a similar model to Instagram and Facebook ads, or whether it will continue to retain certain ad types such as branded ads.

If you want to grow with TikTok and reach both your followers and potential customers, we recommend that you meet our Digipeak team. You can get in touch now.