TikTok is one of the world’s most dominant social media platforms, with over a billion active monthly users.
This meteoric rise has gone hand in hand with continual development of new business features for brands on TikTok, helping them to grow their businesses and realize new marketing and analytics opportunities like never before.
With the release of its new Search Ads last year, plus a transformative 2024 update, TikTok has linked two of its most powerful standalone features – TikTok search, and TikTok ads – to impressive effect.
We’ll be diving in to help you understand just what these changes are, as well as what they mean for your brand on TikTok.
Growth of the TikTok search engine
The past couple of years have seen strong growth in TikTok as an alternative search engine option, and one that’s found a unique niche in the competitive search landscape.
TikTok excels at serving experience-based search queries, helping a rapidly growing audience discover places to eat, visit, brand experiences and events, to name a few. The reason for this is TikTok’s offer of an incredibly visual-led experience, not to mention – an influencer-led one.
In fact, Google data shows that almost 40% of Gen Z are now using TikTok and Instagram for their search needs, highlighting the significant role these platforms are taking for younger audiences.
Across TikTok users, the platform reports that 57% of its users utilize the search function, while 23% of people do so within just thirty seconds of opening the app.
The rise of TikTok as a search engine is a natural evolution, powered by the influencer ecosystem that the platform has nurtured in a way that few others can. Led by video, home to thousands of influencers from niche personalities to global celebrities, and always at the cutting edge of viral trends, TikTok is a natural choice for users looking to discover new products and lifestyles.
What are TikTok search ads?
Search Ads are the latest way for brands to present relevant, product-led ad content to TikTok users in response to search intent.
The Search Ads Toggle appeared as an option in TikTok Ads Manager in 2023, but only allowed simple placements in search results as part of an existing campaign, rather than being a standalone ads option. With the 2024 update, advertisers can not only have their content show up in ‘related searches’, but can now target specific search terms and phrases in their campaigns.
The 2024 update equips brands with sophisticated keyword-led ads, purpose-built for the TikTok search results page. The appearance of ads pre- and post-update is identical, with paid videos blending seamlessly with the organic content that audiences love, but advertisers benefit from a new toolbox filled with fresh features and targeting capabilities.
Search Ads can leverage your existing in-feed video ad creations, displaying them in search results as a related search or in response key words or phrases that you’ve specifically targeted. They appear alongside organic results with a ‘sponsored’ tag, and allow users to engage directly with you, moving into the video or to your TikTok channel directly from their search query.
TikTok search ads impact on brands
TikTok Search Ads is already proving to be a game changer for brands across all verticals, from new entrants to well-established companies who have been succeeding with TikTok for some time.
The key change ushered in by Search Ads is that it capitalizes on intent-based targeting. While TikTok’s famous feed is discovery-based, led by analysis of a user’s taste, Search Ads result directly from keyword searches. What this means in practice is that brands using Search Ads are communicating to a far more engaged audience, showing content that they know to be highly relevant and actively desired. Advertisers can therefore expect high engagement and conversion rates as a result.
In fact, early testing by TikTok found that running Search Ads alongside In-Feed Ads yielded an uplift of conversions of around 20%, on average.
This interaction with high-intent users also opens up opportunities for new ways to build audience loyalty and drive product discovery. With Search Ads, you’re not as tightly governed by the fast-moving world of in-feed content – instead, you can direct search traffic to pieces of high-impact or specific product focused posts across longer timeframes.
TikTok Search Ads are a natural complement to other ad types on TikTok – a testament to the platform’s growth as one of the most exciting and effective social media platforms for 2024 and beyond. By weaving together intelligent Search Ads with features like TikTok Shop, which enables in-app ecommerce purchases, it becomes possible to develop a fully-fledged, intent-led sales funnel entirely within the TikTok ecosystem. It’s not only what any social media marketer would dream of – it’s exactly what your Gen Z and Millennial userbase want.
Tips for brands looking to use TikTok search ads
The first two seconds are key
Unlike the TikTok feed, when users see your Search Ad it’ll be on screen with a number of other different pieces of competing content. Each will be vying for the user’s attention, and the first to be clicked has the best odds of achieving success.
The first moments are key in any TikTok content – but even more so here. Think carefully about how you can hook your audience instantly. Often, the approach will come naturally from the keywords you’re targeting. Whether it’s through your choice of influencer, on-screen text, or the story you’re telling, you need to make that first couple of seconds as compelling as possible.
Authenticity is still supreme, even on search ads
Just because your target audience is actively searching for something, much like a traditional SERP, doesn’t mean they aren’t still looking for the classic TikTok experience. That means they want entertaining, fresh, exciting, and most importantly – authentic.
We’re talking about ads that don’t look like ads. You want to target keywords for your product category, but don’t fall into the trap of creating a traditional social media ad. Instead, consider how an unboxing video from a popular influencer in your sector could be far more effective in catching your user’s eye and getting them to click than a ‘produced’ ad.
Much of the time, your audience might not be searching for a specific product at all. Just as in your usual influencer content, look for natural entry points for your product into the topic or trend.
Keywords and hashtags are everything
As a TikTok marketer, you might not be used to grappling with keyword analysis and selection.
Careful keyword choice is essential to ensuring that you’re matching your content to people with the relevant intent. User intent can vary from education to entertainment, inspiration, product research, and searches for specific influencers, challenges, hashtags or trends.
With TikTok Search Ads, if you don’t use the new features and target keywords, the platform will default to using your hashtags to match ads to audiences. Your hashtags will often be different to optimized keywords, so consider these differences carefully.
Concluding thoughts / Key takeaways
Search Ads have revolutionized targeted marketing on TikTok, opening up a whole new landscape of intent-led ads for savvy digital marketing teams. The full range of possibilities are still being realized, but what’s certain is that brands who are quick off the mark are sure to reap the largest benefits.
With a 2024 update that adds specific keyword targeting to TikTok Search Ads campaigns, brands can now dial in on ultra-specific, high-intent audiences to deliver new heights of conversion.
However, there are key differences that need to be considered when working with Search Ads. Businesses will be competing, working to better identifying and leveraging certain search terms as they emerge (and fade, just as quickly).
Even more importantly, advertisers won’t just be trying to stop users from scrolling past the ad, as with the classic TikTok feed. They’ll be competing against a range of organic content and other promoted content on the screen, before they ever get the user to click on them in the first place.
With a multi-stage process for capturing attention, holding it, and driving conversion, the creative for TikTok Search Ads needs to be razor sharp.
Given that Search Ads content will also show up in-feed, some things aren’t changing – influencers will always be critical to crafting creative that competes.
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The Goat Agency is the global social media agency for TikTok influencers and the brands who use them. We’re on the bleeding edge of brand-new TikTok features and updates, like Search Ads in 2024, understanding and integrating these systemic changes into the influencer partnerships and campaigns we create.
If you need help understanding just how to make TikTok Search Ads a part of your successful strategy, get in touch!
