- Oh, I just got a million views in an hour.
- We've just gone viral.
- Just kidding, that's never happened.
Today, I'm gonna share four simple and actual ways
for you as a business owner to get more views
on your TikTok videos because views mean followers
and followers mean leads and leads mean sales.
- It all makes sense now.
- But don't worry, these aren't complicated things.
They're things that you can implement today.
And be sure to stay until the end
where I'm gonna share the common mistake
that business owners make
when it comes to getting more views
that you are not gonna make.
(upbeat music)
- I'm Elise Darma and I'm an elder millennial
that's helping you bridge the gap
between the pre-internet world, the corporate world
and today's digital marketing world.
So the first part of getting more views on TikTok
is understanding the TikTok algorithm.
Don't skip this part.
You've probably heard this before
but it's important to reiterate.
I cover the TikTok algorithm in depth
in my product called Videos Vault,
but I'm gonna give you a little teaser right now.
When you first publish a TikTok,
it goes on the For You page.
Yes, your video goes in front of people
who aren't following you.
This is the first small test.
The algorithm is checking to see
how people initially react to your video.
If your TikTok video gets enough points in this early phase,
it'll then move in front of a bigger group of people,
a medium size group of people
and it can stay there for two even three days.
This is where the algorithm might also perform some checks
on your video to make sure that no terms were broken in it.
If your video continues to perform well,
it's then gonna move in front of a larger group of people.
And this is when someone
from the TikTok team manually verifies
that your video is a-okay to show
in front of even more people.
After this stage, this is when your video can go viral.
From what we understand, when a video goes viral,
it's actually selected by the TikTok team
to get that level of exposure.
- This video is going viral.
- Now I mentioned points earlier.
How does your TikTok video collect points?
Let me explain.
There are ways that your TikTok video can collect points.
The very first way is by the likes it gets.
After that, and this holds a bit more weight,
is the comments that your videos generate.
After that, your video can collect even more points
by the amount of times it's shared.
Then the algorithm will look at the completion rate,
so are people watching your video all the way through?
And last but not least, the most important way
to generate more points is by getting repeat views.
Are people watching your TikTok
over and over and over again?
If you think about this, this makes sense, right?
You've seen TikTok dances and you've probably seen videos
that teach those TikTok dances.
These are tutorial videos.
What's someone doing when they want to learn a TikTok dance?
They're watching that tutorial over and over and over again.
That repeat of use is what gives that video major momentum
and can get it on the For You page
in front of millions of people.
I'm proud to say that my most viral video on TikTok
was when my boyfriend, now fiance,
and I went to Fyre Festival in April of 2017.
I took some of those clips from that festival
and I put them together with a trendy audio
and it got a hundred thousand views,
then 500,000 views and then 600,000 views.
And I knew people were gonna love it
because there weren't a lot of people on TikTok
who were showing footage of what it was like
to actually be at Fyre Festival.
Yes, we stayed the night,
yes, it was horrendous,
but that's another video for another day.
- Enough is enough.
- So in my opinion, that video did well
because I shared quick clips
of what we experienced at Fyre festival
and I think it encouraged people to watch it
over and over again to really take in all that goodness.
Now that we're all clear on the algorithm,
your next step is to do content research.
And yes, I am asking you to scroll TikTok for research.
This might seem basic but you have to do market research
in your niche.
So go ahead, go to the For You page and type in your niche
and take a look at what videos show up.
What is already doing well in your industry or niche?
If you're a jewelry maker,
you might find a lot of unboxing videos.
If you're a chef, you might find
a lot of time lapse type of videos
where you can watch a dish get created
from start to finish in 15 seconds.
I don't know about you,
but I haven't made anything in 15 seconds,
but it sure is fun to watch someone else do it.
- Does that look fresh to you?
- So right now you have permission
to open up TikTok in the name of research.
Don't get sucked into a scroll hole.
I know it's easy, the algorithm is incredibly smart,
but go ahead and look at what people in your industry
are already creating.
And when you're looking,
be sure to take note of the length of the videos.
So the content's important, but you also wanna see
are people making 8 second videos, 15 second videos, 30?
And now we can even make 10 minute long videos on TikTok.
Whether that's a good thing or not, I don't know.
But in the name of your research,
go ahead and take note of long the videos are
that you are seeing.
The next thing I want you to look at in your research
is what is the opening line or hook that people are using
in the very first few seconds of their videos?
These hooks are critical to capturing people's attention
because they're scrolling fast through that For You page.
You know what it's like.
- [Speaker] Scrolling, scrolling.
- So write down somewhere,
but take note of what those popular videos
are doing in the first one to three seconds.
Are they asking a question?
Are they showing something wild and crazy?
What are they doing to capture attention?
And keep this in mind, in your research,
you're probably gonna see a lot of trending video
which means dancing, pointing, lip syncing,
you don't have to do all that.
There are creators out there who have grown
to a million plus followers without ever following a trend.
Take Justice Shepherd for example.
He doesn't do trends, he simply shares tips related to math,
that's it, and he's got 1.8 million followers.
Algorithm, check.
Content research, check.
You know what's coming next, right?
Content creation.
How can you actually make TikToks
so that they have the best chance at going viral?
So now that you've researched
what's already working in your niche,
you should have a list of at least 5 to 10,
even 20 video ideas in front of you.
Yes, you should have a list that big
because when you go to create, you are gonna batch create.
You are not gonna make one TikTok video at a time,
you are gonna film 5, 10, even 20 in one film session.
This is the way that you as a busy business owner
can be the most productive.
Even if you have to do your hair and makeup
for one day of the week, it's worth it.
Now, when it comes to content production,
usually people like me say things
like quality over quantity.
But with time, my opinion on this has kind of changed
when it comes to TikTok because TikTok wants volume.
It doesn't want perfection.
So I don't want you to get hung up
on making the perfect three TikToks
over the course of eight hours.
No, I want you to make 10 TikToks in one hour.
10 TikToks in 10 minutes if you can.
I want you to challenge yourself to just film.
You don't have to be perfect.
C's get degrees, as they say,
and it definitely applies when it comes to TikTok.
Now, I give this advice, but I know full well
it is very hard in reality.
I am like an A+ student, perfectionist, over analyzer
all of those lovely qualities
and those qualities have served me well.
I know I can create high quality content.
But in the case of TikTok,
it's really less about perfect polished content
and it's more about data.
That's why you wanna publish as many videos as you can
because you and I,
we don't know which ones are gonna take off.
So the more you can publish, the more data you're gonna get
and the faster you're gonna learn
what works with the algorithm.
Now, the official word from TikTok
on how many videos to post, well at minimum,
they want to see at least three videos posted per week.
That's doable, right?
But if you can swing it,
TikTok would to see two to five videos published a day.
Again, this is why we're going
for a volume and not perfection.
I also want you to keep in mind that your TikTok content
is generally going to a cold audience first.
So you can create a lot of videos
in and around the same topic.
It's not gonna be annoying for your audience.
And in fact, when you start to see one topic
or one style of video take off with your audience,
keep making more just like that, in that same style
or whatever is working with your audience.
I've made this mistake before in the past,
where I've had a video take off
and I didn't keep that momentum going.
In fact, I've made a lot of mistakes
when it comes to TikTok, so stay tuned,
I'm gonna cover those at the end of this video.
Once you TikToks are created and edited,
I know you're gonna wonder,
well, what do I do about hashtags
and when do I post this video?
Well, I have good news for you.
Hashtags won't make or break your TikTok video,
whew, because hashtags stress people out
and they're not that important anymore.
In fact, TikTok creator, Jack Gordon,
ran a lengthy experiment and he concludes the same thing.
So don't stress about hashtags,
use a few that target your key industry,
your target market and call it a day.
Now when to post that video,
well, marketers like myself will tell you to post
when your audience is most active and most online.
According to Influencer Marketing Hub,
the best days to post are Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday.
And they recommend to post early in the morning
between 6:00 AM and 10:00 AM
or late at night between 7:00 PM and 11:00 PM.
And that's according to your timezone.
Now there's a caveat.
It's always is nice when some other source tells us
when to post, but truly the best time to post
is gonna come from the data from your account,
your own analytics.
So that's why you wanna start posting, get that data
and then look at your analytics
to see when TikTok is telling you the best times to post.
This brings me to my fourth point
around generating views on TikTok,
and these are the common mistakes that myself
and my fellow business owners make.
So, remember when I had that one viral Fyre Festival video
and I didn't make any more after that?
Yeah, that was a mistake.
I should have continued the momentum
of my one video around Fyre Festival
and even though it's not related to my niche,
it could have still generated more traffic
and eyeballs over on to my page.
One major mistake that I personally have also made
is being inconsistent.
We know that the TikTok algorithm like any algorithm
wants a consistent stream of content.
And there's been days where I've posted every day
and there's been times where I haven't posted for months.
The algorithm doesn't love this.
- Look who came crawling back.
- It wants to know that I'm gonna be
a consistent creator of content.
So, that's again why I recommend batch creating
your TikTok videos.
The other mistake I'm guilty of
is trying to put too much into one TikTok video.
Now, there is merit in longer videos.
When I say long, I'm talking about 30 to 60 seconds.
There is merit because you're able to spend extra time
with your followers who are there
and you're able to educate them
and engage with them in a longer piece of video content.
Now, the attention span of someone who isn't your follower,
someone who's just seen your video
on the For You page is a lot shorter.
I would say eight seconds
is probably the average duration here.
So if you have eight seconds, you gotta use them wisely.
May make sure that you're opening up
with a really good hook,
you're getting to the point really quickly
and if you have time, you're finishing your video
with a call to action,
some sort of action for your viewer to take,
whether it's to share the video, comment or like.
Remember that you don't have to pack everything
into one video, you can always create a series of videos
and this is a common practice on TikTok.
Here's part one of XYZ, follow for part two.
You'll probably see that on TikTok
and it's a strategy that works.
And I'm gonna take this opportunity
to ask you to subscribe to my channel and like this video,
because, hey, we're having a good time here, right?
And you don't wanna miss any future trainings
just like this one.
The next mistake is switching up your niche topic
all the time.
Now I know I said to experiment
with videos that work, that take off,
but once the algorithm has pinpointed your account
in a certain niche,
you generally wanna stick with that niche.
Now you can share the occasional personal video
or fun video every now and then,
but when your account is already doing well
within your niche, you want to really keep
that momentum going and continue making videos
around those topics.
Another mistake that I'm totally guilty of making
is not being very social on TikTok,
meaning I don't spend a whole lot of time engaging.
Now, engaging could be replying to comments
that I get on my TikToks which I do do,
but I don't spend a lot of time engaging
with other accounts in my niche.
Now, this is a strategy that could work
because it gets my name and my account out there.
It gives it exposure If I'm commenting
on other people's videos in my niche.
Now that we've covered how you can get more views on TikTok,
we can't forget about making money on TikTok.
So go ahead and watch this next video right here,
where I cover how you as a business owner
can make money on TikTok today.
And yes, people buy on TikTok.