In-feed vs. spark TikTok ads: which is better for marketing your retail business.

Savvy entrepreneurs are quickly recognizing that social media is an effective marketing tool. Whether your customers are making purchases online or in your physical store, chances are good that they will have interacted at some point with the online short video behemoth that is  TikTok. If you want to leverage this behavior to the maximum, you need to learn about in-feed and spark ads to optimize your marketing strategy.

Why advertise on TikTok?

If you aren’t already familiar with TikTok, it’s time for a little lesson. The platform was founded in 2016 by the Chinese company ByteDance and is now available in over 150 markets. By 2022, it boasted 1 billion daily users. Thanks to its diverse audience, short video format, and complex algorithm, TikTok has become one of the digital marketing options of choice for businesses both small and large.

In-feed advertising.

When users are scrolling through their For You page, they are exposed to a steady flow of short videos that are selected according to their past interests and choices. In-feed ads appear as just another video on the customer’s page. You can make your ads as short as five seconds in length, although TikTok recommends 21-34. With this format, customers can like the ad or comment, and you can activate a call to action (CTA) button that connects to your landing page.

For brands interested in expanding their reach and exposure to customers, in-feed ads are ideal. Companies working with influencers can ask them to mention the brand in their content, with the ad coming up soon afterwards in their feed.

Spark advertising.

Spark ads build on the concept of the standard in-feed format. They allow a company to convert the TikTok videos they have created into compelling ads for their products and services. With permission, the videos of other creators can also be harnessed for this purpose. Just as with organic videos, users can comment on, like, and share them. Additionally, they can visit the brand profile with a left swipe or by clicking on the handle name or profile picture.

Spark ads allow brands to connect to users by means of authentic native content that is sent to the community using the power of in-feed advertising. Additionally, visitors can piggyback on the content you send out by creating their own video with the same soundtrack or co-create with you via a duet or stitch. This helps to foster the collaborative, relationship-oriented ethos that most customers are demanding these days.

In addition to simply providing a CTA that connects to your product page or website, spark ads give increased exposure to the landing page by featuring it on your profile as soon as the user clicks on it. This can increase your ad campaign’s click-through rate even more.

In fact, spark ads have a 134% higher completion rate and a 157% six-second view-through rate compared to standard in-feed ads. Generating spark ads based on your own content is ideal for your company if you want to quickly increase your number of followers and build your social presence. Other desirable scenarios include if you are running a strategy that includes both organic and paid advertising methods or if you have a mixed bag of marketing goals and want to cultivate followers now so that you can engage them in later promotions.

Alternatively, there are times when you may choose to piggyback on another creator’s organic posts via your own spark ads. This is especially effective if you want to boost your own success with the help of better-known influencers and creators. There may also be situations when you don’t have the time or capacity to create your own native content but need engaging videos to round out your campaign.

In-feed vs. spark ads: which to use.

Spark ads provide you with all of the advantages of their in-feed cousins — plus a lot more. Because they contain all of in-feed advertising’s upsides augmented by additional advantages of their own, spark ads are currently the clear choice.

If you are just launching a new ecommerce business, you already know that you need to scope out your customer base and curate products that will meet their current needs and even fulfill some desires they may not have even known they had. In addition, you must find the best payment processor for retail stores to ensure that ecommerce transactions are fast and secure. Once you have accomplished these necessary steps, you can harness the power of TikTok advertising.

This social media giant can give you multiple vehicles to introduce products, engage with customers and flex your creative muscles. Embracing it can lead to vastly enhanced brand exposure and a dynamic community of customers who are ready, willing, and able to comment on, like and share your posts to their numerous contacts. There is no time like the present to get started with your dynamic social media advertising campaign.