You may be asking yourself, What is the “For You Page” or FYP on TikTok and how does it help my business?
The For You page, is the first page that TikTok takes you to when you open the app. It is a feed of videos that has been selected for you to view because TikTok’s algorithm believes that you will like them. The algorithm uses the interests that you first choose when setting up your account, as well as any interactions that you have on videos that you have watched or looked up.
TikTok states:
“On TikTok, the For You feed reflects preferences unique to each user. The system recommends content by ranking videos based on a combination of factors – starting from interests you express as a new user and adjusting for things you indicate you’re not interested in, too – to form your personalized For You feed.”
To be successful on TikTok, from a marketing perspective, you want your videos to appear in your target audience’s “For You Page” or #fyp. If your video lands on a TikTok FYP then that could mean increased followers while reaching a broader audience to grow your brand awareness and sales. As well, once you grow a TikTok following you can direct them to other social media platforms or to your website to increase traffic. If you can consistently get 100 views per TikTok, a feature on FYP can push that to over 10000 views without spending any money on advertising.
So How Do You Use the Algorithm to Your Advantage?
Here are a few tips about how the “For You Page” works:
- Interactions: The more people react and interact with your videos the more likely the algorithm will pick it up. This means the more shares, likes, and comments your video gets, the better.
- Information: Using hashtags, sounds and captions can help you get onto the FYP. If you use a trending hashtag or song it is more likely to get picked up by the algorithm. So if your content follows a trend or a trending song, you are more likely to get noticed. You can also participate in hashtag challenges to increase your exposure.
- Keywords: Using keywords that relate to your business or product helps get your video noticed by the right audience.
- Completion: The more people watch your video to the end, the more likely TikTok will push it out for further distribution. This is why the majority of TikTok videos are short and to the point. The time limit is 60 seconds but the shorter your video is the greater the probability will be of people watching it to the end. Make sure your video has a hook within the first 10 seconds - this will attract the attention of your viewer and then you need to make sure that you hold their interest, make them want or desire what you are selling and then convert that desire into action.
- Captions: Again here, less is more. You only have 150 characters for your caption including any hashtags that you may want to use. So your caption needs to be short, include any related hashtags and be engaging. Many TikTok posters use the caption “Watch to the End”, ask a question or tease their audience in the caption. “Watch to the End” increases video completion and as stated before, this helps you to get on the coveted FYP. Asking questions encourages viewers to make comments about your video, which again increases your chances of getting picked up by the algorithm. Teasing your audience in your caption entices the viewer to watch your video to see what you are trying to tell them.
- Sounds: You can use trending songs or sounds to gain exposure to your videos. When you create a video, you can tap the “Sounds” button at the top of the screen. A new page will appear where you can tap “Discover”. You can also look through the “Trending” page to see what is trending for certain categories. You can save these songs or clips into your favourites folder for you to use in your video.
Now that we have explained what TikTok is all about, how to set up an account and why and how it is useful to your business, we hope that you will get started promoting your business using the TikTok app yourself!
If you have any questions, or need more guidance, feel free to reach out to melissa@webware.io
