How To Make Money On TikTok
TikTok originally became famous for people lip-syncing a popular culture song and then making some funny gestures or joining a hashtag challenge. The variety of content on it has grown quite a bit since then. It's now the best opportunity for growing a large audience from scratch, whether you grow your account organically or use growth services or automation tools to help jump-start the growth. You will be hard-pressed to find a better opportunity for viral growth. Some people who have quickly grown large audiences from scratch are now left wondering what to do next.
Like other social media platforms that enable you to engage with a wide range of users and sometimes find ways to monetize your audience, your TikTok account can also be monetized, especially if you have attracted a large number of fans or followers.
This post will cover multiple ways you can make money on TikTok. Whether you want a quick and easy way to make money or a long term business, there are solutions for everyone. Most of the following strategies can be used on other social platforms as well in addition to TikTok.
Influencer Marketing (Promoting a brand's product or service)
The above image shows a few TikTok creators who are utilizing influencer marketing to help make some money from their accounts. Over time you too can build an audience that will trust your feedback or suggestions about a particular topic. Influencer Marketing on TikTok works the same way it does on other platforms.
An influencer promotes a particular product by actually using it in a video or images and then providing a review or useful information to their followers. For example, if you have chosen to create content around photography, you can create short reviews of the tools you use to create content. You could create tutorials that show how to create great videos, show how to edit videos using various software, review specific camera models, etc. Genuinely help your audience out and they'll want to return the favor. If brands ask you to review products, remember to above all be honest, the trust you have built up can erode quickly if you get greedy and forget to put helping your audience out first.
By consistently producing engaging content in a niche, you’ll realize that in no time, you’ll get noticed by notable brands and you could begin to charge for sponsored posts. You can charge anywhere from $20 to hundreds of dollars per post. (The number of followers you have and how much they engage with your content will affect this price).
If you can’t attract brands to your profile despite having a highly engaged audience, you can also join some influencer marketing platforms like Intellifluence. They already have connections with brands who want exposure and can quickly introduce you to brands in your niche who need you and your followers. They’ll serve as the broker between you and the brand. These influencer marketing platforms also provide software for influencer relationship management, content management, campaign management, analytics, and relationship management. The brand pays to use the software and then may also pay a small fee per campaign, but one large benefit is that they don't charge the influencer at all.
Influencer Marketing Benefits
All you have to do is sign up and fill out all of the required info. After that, brands will reach out to groups of influencers who are in their industry, and offer you either cash, free products, or sometimes both in exchange for doing a product review, social media post, or blog post. You set the price point you are willing to accept and then brands will start contacting you with offers. Overall this is the easiest and fastest way make money on Tik Tok.
Affiliate Marketing Or Ecommerce
Depending on your audience's interests there may be some products you could sell to them or promote another brand's products and receive a commission of any sales you send their way.
Currently, TikTok is a great platform to trend upcoming musicians considering its lip-syncing feature. So, it’s a great platform to promote and sell upcoming artists. You can contact an upcoming artist and get permission to use their song as a background track to an interesting video promoting the song. You can then charge the artist for any download done through your profile.
This principle of affiliate marketing is not exclusive to the music industry alone. From cooking to bodybuilding, you can take advantage of the limited content on the platform. Regardless of your interest, you can also carve out a niche and build an audience that trusts your decision when it comes to making their choice on a particular product.
You can do this by signing up as an affiliate with your favorite brand. Then get your customized affiliate link for the product. Now, you need to consistently create and share engaging content about the brand’s product to your audience.
Don’t forget to take advantage of relevant hashtags. Also, remember to put the link to the products on your profile. That way, you'll get commissions for each sale made through your link.
Affiliate Marketing Or E-Commerce Benefits
Donations
Tik Tok has a great feature that allows internal monetization, but may not be all that well known. During live performances, your viewers can compensate you with coins for an amazing video. The coins can be bought from a user’s profile. A hundred coins cost $1.39. After gathering enough coins, the creator can exchange them for diamonds which can be converted into cash via Paypal.
Creators can also send shout outs to their audience and encourage them to make donations if they love to hear their names mentioned in the videos.
The Benefits Of TikTok Donations
Grow And Then Sell Accounts With Audiences
Another way to make money on Tik Tok includes growing accounts within a specific niche. Some brands like to buy these accounts if they have a large or highly engaged audience or fans. You can list accounts on a marketplace like FameSwap, to help speed up the process of finding an interested buyer. This post covers buying TikTok accounts from places like FameSwap a little more in depth.
One thing that could prove valuable to a brand is offering help transitioning the account to them. This way you could slowly start posting more of their content rather than disappearing and then having the brand start posting right away. This could be valuable if you find a successful way to structure it.
The Benefits Of Selling Accounts
Sell Services To Other TikTok Creators
Another great way to make money from TikTok could be selling services to other TikTok creators. Selling services is another good option that can bring in cash flow right away. The disadvantage is that its time based and may not fit the passive income dream that some people are looking for.
Think about what you are already good at and see if its something that another creator may need help with or be willing to pay for. Some skills could include editing videos or audio, networking with brands for influencer deals, etc.
The Benefits Of Selling Services To Other TikTok Creators
TikTok TeeSpring Integration Coming Soon
This was only recently announced, but there is a TeeSpring integration coming soon that will make it easier to sell T-shirts directly on TikTok. It sounds like they have started a beta test with some creators and will be bringing on additional creators later. You can learn more about it here - https://www.socialmediatoday.com/news/tiktok-and-teespring-partner-on-new-integration-to-enable-creators-to-sell/584522/.
In conclusion, there are many ways to make money from TikTok. Your industry/niche plus how involved you want to get will help you decide what strategy will work best for you, If you are looking to make some cash asap with the least amount of work you should try influencer marketing and sign up for one of the networks mentioned above. If you are willing to invest some extra time you could find relevant products and build an e-commerce store that will give you a solid foundation that you could build a real long term business from. No matter which route you go, you should always try to build up an email list so you always have a way to directly contact your audience.