—Marketers are not yet investing in meaningful creative data that unlocks the “why” behind an ad's failure or success.—
By Troy Hayes
With 150 million monthly active users and average usage of 1.5 hours a day, TikTok has remarkable power to drive incredible results for brands.
But if simply running ads on TikTok was enough to maximize conversions, why do some ads convert better than others? Why are some tanking while others succeed? There has to be more to the story than effective media placement and audience targeting.
AI creative performance data tells us there is.
Running ads on TikTok without a creative performance data strategy is like traveling to Amsterdam without an itinerary. You may see a few exciting things, but you’re likely not getting that coveted dinner reservation, and there’s no way you’ll get a ticket to the Van Gogh Museum. Trust me, it’s impossible.
You may have a good trip, but you left experiences on the table due to a lack of planning.
Many marketers are being held back by a traditional approach. The industry is looking at the quantity of creative to develop creative testing strategies. This model may lead to some high-performing campaigns, but ultimately, money is left on the table due to a lack of planning.
What if, when developing creative, data and insights supported your decision-making so that you could maximize ROI, while wasting less money on low performing ads? This is the power of creative performance data, powered by AI.
Many marketers are not yet investing in meaningful creative data that unlocks the “why” behind an ad's failure or success. Brands should use this to their competitive advantage.
Start with a single channel, like TikTok, to hone this new approach before expanding. Getting to know what doesn’t work ensures you get the most out of every media dollar spent.
TikTok creative worst practices
Using AI-powered analytics, VidMob analyzed 1.8 million ads frame-by-frame to determine which creative elements hurt ad conversion rate across 995 billion impressions on TikTok.
- Misaligning creative with brand objectives. When building creative for conversion, it’s important to hone in on the specific promoted product or service. VidMob’s analysis saw a median 66.5% decrease in conversion rate when using scenic images, which could indicate that focusing on aspirational imagery hurts low-funnel performance, versus having a strong focal point for viewers.
To improve conversion, ditch the establishing shot and get straight to the point: making sure messaging and visuals are concise and direct, and using sound and graphics to emphasize the action they want the audience to take.
- Not using talent to reinforce the CTA. When capturing talent, it’s key to shoot for every channel and CTA placement. There is a median 61% decrease in conversion rate when talent is looking away from the CTA, which suggests that users are more likely to convert when talent is reinforcing the action.
To most effectively drive conversion, talent should show the audience exactly what action to take. They can use their voice to direct where to click, point, use their line of sight, or other visual or messaging elements. The bottom line is clear: the more the talent directs the viewer to act, the more likely they will convert.
- Relying on text to tell the story. People want to be visually immersed on TikTok. There is a 12% decrease in conversion rate when on-screen text is present, which may mean users don’t want to be told, but rather be shown. Showing the value of a product or service elicits an emotional response that will increase their likelihood to convert.
But anyone can list out product benefits; therefore, it’s important to think about visual storytelling from the beginning of the creative process. Thoughtful creative direction can make all of the difference to create a compelling visual story. Consider elements like talent, colour, pacing and layout to bring a product or service story to life.
Marketing pitfalls to avoid
Knowing what doesn’t work on TikTok is a great way to work your creative data muscles. Look out for a few common pitfalls to ensure you are setting yourself up for success across the entire marketing strategy.
- Don't inform creative decisions with media performance data. Creative drives 60% of sales contribution when compared to media (26%) and brand (14%). Refocus attention on the creative decisions that drive media outcomes. Make sure you have access to actionable creative data to maximize ROI. AI now allows you to access this data with the click of a button.
- Optimize for native platform best practices. Score creative against channel best practices to set a baseline of adherence. Then integrate best practices into the creative production process to look native on every channel.
- Don’t rely on manual, sample-based creative testing to identify performance drivers. Often, testing creative can be manual, time consuming, and not connected to performance outcomes. Invest in automated and scaled creative data so you can spend your media dollars more wisely to see better returns and stretch your media budget much further.
Because creative planning has been based primarily on media performance metrics, brands are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars developing and supporting the wrong ads.
Start using creative data to strategize and expand impact across channels and brands within their company to stay at pace with competitors and, most importantly, maximize ROI.
—Top image: Getty
Troy Hayes is creative director at VidMob. This column originally appeared at Campaign US.
