More and more retail businesses are succumbing to the lure of TikTok advertising. It’s a platform known for its effective targeting options and cost-effective bidding strategies. But it’s not always easy to get started. In fact, it’s a fairly common experience to find yourself waiting and waiting for the clicks to roll in. So, what are the reasons behind poor TikTok ad spend, and how can you address them?
What’s Going Wrong with Your TikTok Strategy?
There are several potential issues that may be impacting the success of your TikTok advertising campaign. But the good news is that once you’ve identified them, most are fairly easy to fix.
You’re in the learning phase
TikTok has an ‘ad learning phase’. This is the period in which the platform’s algorithms learn about the performance of a new ad. So, after your ad has launched, the algorithms collect user data and interactions to assess who best to show your ad to. That done, TikTok can optimise where your ad is delivered, helping you to achieve the best results. But the temporary outcome of this process is that you will experience poor ad performance while the initial learning phase and optimisation is happening.
You’re having trouble with targeting
When you first start out, ad targeting can seem an almost esoteric process, involving a lot of luck and guesswork. The problem is that if you get it wrong, it doesn’t matter how great your products are, or how clever or engaging your ad is, no one relevant is going to see them.
The great thing about TikTok is that it gives you a range of targeting options. You’ve got demographics, behavioural targeting, and interest-based targeting, which allows you to really drill down into your potential market. But this can mean that you end up setting your parameters either too wide or too narrow, which is where paying attention to TikTok’s audience-gauging tool can really help. Aim for ‘balanced’ and you’re ready to go.
Your bidding strategy is off
If your ads are delivering low-level performance, it might be due to your bidding strategy. Bidding is the term used for the amount you’re willing to spend on your campaign and impacts where and when your ads are shown. The higher you bid, the more likely you are to beat competitors into the primary spots within your target market, but the faster you’ll get through your budget. On the other hand, if you opt for a lower bid, your ad will hang around for longer, but your viewing/interaction potential falls.
This is one of the most difficult areas to fix, and it can often be a case of trial and error. If your ads aren’t performing, you could try adjusting your bidding strategy. But as ad quality can also impact bidding cost (high quality ads are more likely to be shown in prime positions), you might also want to look at your creatives.
You’ve run out of cash
If your TikTok ads have been performing well, then suddenly fail, it usually means that you’ve used your budget. The only option here is to top up your budget and start all over again, waiting for the learning phase to be worked through. So, prevention is better than cure – watch your budget and you won’t be in this position again.
You’ve used the wrong currency
When you’re promoting products, you need to use the currency on the audience you’re marketing to. TikTok ads align with the nation you’re targeting, which means that if you’re selling products in the UK, you need to use GBP. And if you want to broaden your reach, you need to tweak your ads to change the currency to match your intended new market. Luckily, if you do accidentally post an ad with the wrong currency (it’s easily done), you simply need to go into your Ad Settings and change it. You should soon notice a difference in your ad performance.
Your ads are ‘out of schedule’
When you create an ad in TikTok you have to schedule a live period. You will only generate results within this period. So, if you’ve launched an ad and you’re not yet seeing any activity, check your launch date.
Your creatives aren’t hitting the mark
TikTok deploys a distribution algorithm that decides who your ad is shown to – this algorithm also decides whether your ad should be shown at all. If your ad creative doesn’t meet the standard required by TikTok, it’s not going to be shown, even if you use a really high bidding strategy. If you think this might be the case for you, you need to review the quality of the content and the format of your ads.
You’re receiving negative user engagement
Not all engagement is good engagement. If your ad receives enough negative feedback – whether negative comments or complaints to TikTok, the platform will shut down your ad. There’s no quick fix for this. Your best recourse is to pay attention to what viewers are saying, respond to it positively, and take action. This will not only prevent future ads from being shut down, but could help to win you customers.
Poor TikTok ad spend can feel like a major setback, especially if you’ve invested – financially, emotionally – in a big TikTok launch. But in most cases, these difficulties are easy to overcome. And once you’ve taken stock and taken the right corrective action, you’ll find that advertising through TikTok can be a great way of driving sales for your business.
Contributor: Edi Moraes, Media Buyer, Upbeat Agency
