Selecting the right ad types for your TikTok campaigns is essential. Feeling overwhelmed by the variety of TikTok ad formats and unsure which one is best for your business? Explore this blog to get acquainted with all the TikTok ad types, along with practical advice on how to choose the right one for your needs.
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All Types of TikTok Ads You Need to Know
TikTok offers different ad types to help businesses achieve their specific goals when advertising on this platform. Here are all the ad types you need to know:
Collection Ads
TikTok Collection Ads are an ad type that allows people to find, discover, and browse products in a full-screen mobile experience. When users click on Collection Ads, they will immediately be taken to an Instant Gallery Page where they can browse a curated collection of your products. In a survey conducted by TikTok, people were 1.8x more likely to engage with TikTok Collections Ads (e.g., click on the call to action or on any social interaction) compared to ads on other platforms.
Why use Collection Ads? Because it can:
- Drive product discovery on mobile
- Publish ads featuring relevant products
- Create an immersive experience
This ad type personalizes the products displayed to each audience and gives users a seamless shopping experience from product discovery to checkout.
TikTok Shopping Ads
TikTok Shopping Ads – the latest of TikTok ad types – is the name of a trio of new advertising solutions that help sellers on TikTok Shop to promote products in the store through different product displays. It’s a three-in-one solution with new formats to adopt and combine:
- Video Shopping Ads: Allows you to make your TikTok in-feed video ads shoppable.
- Catalog Listing Ads: Displays 1 or more products of the same category as a list – a feature of Collection advertising.
- LIVE Shopping Ads: Drives more TikTok users to discover and watch your LIVE videos and browse and buy your products.
TikTok Lead Generation Ads
TikTok Lead Generation Ads serve as an advertising objective that enables you to nurture potential customers, interact with leads, and gather lead information on the TikTok platform, as well as collect valuable lead data for your website.
When users engage with these lead ads on TikTok and tap the CTA button, they are presented with two options:
- Instant Form within TikTok: Users can access an Instant Form within TikTok, where they can gather more information about your business, provide their contact details, and express their interest in your product or service.
- Redirect to Your Own Website: Alternatively, users can be redirected to your own website, where they can submit their contact information directly to you.
In-Feed Ads
TikTok In-Feed Ads – one of the very first TikTok ad types – enable brands to achieve full-funnel marketing goals naturally. In-Feed Ads appear within the For You feed and are intended to capture customers’ undivided attention in a full-screen and sound-on background. The impact of TikTok in-feed ads has been demonstrated, with them being regarded as 23% more memorable than TV commercials.
This ad type can also be promoted with brands’ organic content called Spark Ads. With Spark Ads, brands can boost performance even further by amplifying their own organic videos or the content of popular creators.
In-Feed provides some spark benefits, such as:
- Have the lowest ad cost
- Look like organic content
- Easily set up and manage within TikTok Ads Manager
- Obtain multiple advertising objective types (reach, video views, followers, etc.)
- Increase brand exposure to users
TopView Ads
As the first video users see when they open the app, TopView is TikTok’s billboard. By capturing users’ attention and allowing space for creative storytelling, TopView boosts brand awareness and triggers interactions throughout the community.
TikTok TopView ads utilize TikTok’s ad placement to put your brand in the spotlight and provide a unique viewing experience with no competing content. With 71% of users agreeing that TopView is one of the most practical ways to grab attention, it is also more effective than other ads, with 67% higher sales effectiveness for the CPG industry.
Branded Hashtag Challenge Ads
Branded Hashtag Challenge transforms how brands interact with their audiences. It enables brands to create trends by encouraging users to join challenges.
Branded Hashtag Challenge occurs when a brand sponsors a hashtag and creates a challenge to push users’ actions, such as following the hashtag, making a video, inspiring people to complete the challenges, etc. It enables brands to
- Ignite massive engagement
- Spark organic visibility
- Generate full-funnel impact
Branded Hashtag Challenge uses user-generated content (UGC) to promote products so they are close and authentic. Therefore, users will not feel like they are watching an advertising campaign, which will make it easier to increase reach. However, this ad format is only suitable for growing brand awareness and can not drive conversion. Also, it belongs to Reservation Ads, contrary to Auction Ads, in which advertisers need to book ad placement on TikTok.
Branded Effect Ads
TikTok Branded Effect uses brands’ stickers, filters, and effects to highlight products, campaigns, and brand names. Users can create their own content with brand effects in the filter list of TikTok videos. Videos made with Branded Effect display naturally on the For You Page, providing any brands with the opportunity to be discovered. With Branded Effect Ads, you can:
- Empower users to co-create with your brand
- Allow users to engage with your product
- Increase word-of-mouth
Because this ad creates an enjoyable and creative environment with AR effects, the brand can incentivize high-quality organic content creation and make an impact beyond your existing fanbase. Along with Branded Hashtag Challenge, Branded Effect is also included in Reservation ads.
Top Feed Ads
Top Feed TikTok appears as the first TikTok In-Feed ad at every app open. It can be understood as an advanced option of Reach and Frequency, which distribute in a premium placement on TikTok.
With Reach & Frequency buying, Top Feed delivers greater targeting, and its memorable ad placement increases the impact. Additionally, you can use Interactive Add-Ons or other multi-creative delivery methods to improve your Top Feed campaign.
Top Feed TikTok has several benefits over other feed placements that might help you:
- Make a memorable and long-lasting impact.
- Acquire additional levels of campaign control.
With the purpose of increasing brand awareness, Top Feed ads help you capture users’ attention by placing your ad content at the top of your feed.
However, the primary ad accounts don’t have the Reach and Frequency option. This campaign-buying type allows you to control the audiences you reach and the number of times they are exposed to your ad messaging before delivery. To access this feature, you will need to contact TikTok Partners for an Agency ad account.
Which Ad Type is The Best for Your Campaign?
The “best” TikTok ad type can vary based on your specific goals, target audience, and content strategy. Here are some popular TikTok ad types and when they might be ideal:
- In-Feed Ads: Ideal for promoting products or services directly in users’ feeds, ensuring high visibility and encouraging engagement.
- Branded Hashtag Challenges: Highly engaging, fostering user-generated content and generating buzz around your brand or products.
- TopView Ads: Perfect for making a strong initial impact by being the first thing users see upon opening the app. Effective for product launches and events.
- Dynamic Showcase Ads: Present your products in a visually appealing and interactive manner, allowing users to browse a collection within the ad.
- Carousel Ads: Showcase a series of images or videos in a single ad, each with its link, providing a captivating storytelling format for your products or services.
- Branded Effects: Enhances brand engagement by allowing users to interact with your branded effects, creating an immersive experience.
Hopefully, through this article, you get a full look at TikTok Ad Types and choose your best fit. Besides dividing by objectives, these 11 ad types above can also be split into three segments based on the method of buying ads:
- Reservation: TopView, Branded Hashtag Challenge, Branded Effect
- Bidding: In-Feed, TikTok Shopping, Deeplink, Collection, Dynamic showcase, TikTok Lead Generation
- Reach & Frequency: Top Feed
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