How Top Brands Dominate on TikTok – Our Top Tips For Success

TikTok has become the fastest growing social media platform over the last few years and visitor attractions should now have a presence on this video sharing app. 

Whether you are just now securing your TikTok handle and starting out, have been posting every school holiday for a minimal presence, or posting more frequently, you’ll find this blog useful. It covers what you should take into consideration and 7 top tips to best engage with your target audience.

We still believe Facebook and Instagram are generally more important day to day, but you can’t ignore TikTok. It is the rising star of social media and has taken the world by storm ever since the pandemic in 2020, with videos getting millions of views in just a few hours.

TikTok Unveiled – The core statistics

Many brands both within the visitor attraction industry and outside of it are already active on TikTok, using their account to build awareness and reach new audiences. With the following stats, you can see why;

Over 1 billion people actively use TikTok every month, with a single person spending an average of 53 minutes each day either browsing on their ‘For You’ feed or ‘Following’ pages.

In the UK, it is estimated there are 17 million TikTok active users.

Attractions performing well on TikTok

Want to keep an eye on the competition?  We’d recommend you follow Drayton Manor (@drayton_manor), Cotswold Farm Park (@cotswoldfarmpark), Warner Bros. Studio Tour London (@wbtourlondon) and Chessington World of Adventures (@cwoar) on TikTok who continue to obtain excellent consistent results.

Seven tips make your TikTok content stand out

TikTok allows you to get hugely creative with music, sounds and effects to make your content stand out.

The below tips come from analysing the activity across top TikTok brand accounts:

1. The shorter the better – ViralTikTok videos tend to be shorted in length, although you can now post videos up to a maximum of 3 minutes.  Despite being able to post longer video clips, it’s important that you get your point across in a short and snappy way. At Agility, we recommend a post between 10-40 seconds, as people are more likely to watch something of a shorter length a few times over. More views means your content is seen as popular and pushed out to more users.
2. Use longer captions and relevant keywords – Keywords are an essential part of helping your video content get seen on TikTok. The search capabilities on this platform are just as powerful as Google. You will need to ensure that your caption is crafted in a way to incorporate the relevant keywords to raise the profile of your visitor attraction.
3. Use suitable hashtags – Hashtags, whilst less important than keywords, help your content appear to users searching for specific videos by subject. Although it may be tempting to use popular and generic hashtags, your video will more likely get lost in a sea of content and reach users who are not relevant to your business. It’s more effective to choose less popular hashtags and stand out. We recommend using 1-5 relevant hashtags per post that are relevant to your type of visitor attraction and niche to your target audience, this might also include adding a location as one. Similar to other platforms, TikTok have also recently introduced location tagging, where it shows a green map pin icon above the account name and video caption which will help your visitor attraction become more discoverable to others.
4. Subtitles are important – There may be times where your followers won’t be able to listen to videos with the sound on, therefore it’s very important to add auto subtitles, so your posts are accessible and inclusive to all. TikTok has a feature where it’ll automatically add the captions for you and you can review and correct them as you see fit.
5. Incorporate viral trending music and sounds where possible – Ways to make your video go viral on TikTok is by using sounds that are trending. You can find trending sounds by going to the search function in the app and typing in ‘trending sounds’, ‘viral sounds’ or similar. Once the results have loaded, you’ll be able to pick the most suitable sound and also view how many times they’ve been used in a TikTok video. Remember that trends are fast-moving. Keep an eye out for any current TikTok trends and be prepared to adapt your content to keep up with the craze.
6. Post regularly – The TikTok algorithm works similarly to other social platforms, rewarding users that post unique content frequently. The frequency you choose will depend on your resources, but to truly ‘win’ at TikTok, you should initially aim to post once a day to grow your account.   Once you are established, you can reduce your posting levels.  Content could be anything from behind the scenes of an upcoming event, posts about your staff or your company culture.
7. Create content that is entertaining – but stay authentic – Although recreating trends can help grow awareness. It’s also important to stay true to your brand when posting on TikTok. Let your content tell the story of who you are as a visitor attraction. People will be more likely to follow you if they believe you’re being authentic.

These are just a few key points when considering posting videos on TikTok for your business that we’ve learnt as a marketing agency, specialising in visitor attractions.

And finally…Let Influencers help spread your word

We know every marketing department has resource issues. If you don’t have the time to post on TikTok as regularly as you’d wish, make sure you collaborate with influencers to help grow the awareness of your brand. 

It is also interesting to note more people are looking at TikTok to discover recommendations for days out.  When doing a search on places to visit near your local town/county, you will always find influencer posts at the top. Are they listing your competitors?

When finding suitable influencers, however, be mindful whom you connect with to promote your business.  You obviously want to ensure they are reaching the right demographic, but have values in line with your brand (which can easily be identified by looking at their TikTok feed).  

By following the above tips for launching your business on TikTok, you’ll be well on your way to growing awareness and making a success on the platform!

This blog was written by Beth Kirby, Marketing Coordinator of Agility Marketing, a boutique marketing agency specialising in Digital Marketing for Visitor Attractions.