TikTok Prepares to Introduce Sponsored Search Ads, Becoming a Competitor to Google and Microsoft

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TikTok is quickly becoming more than just a social media app for teens to showcase their dance moves and lip-syncing skills. It is becoming a lucrative platform for businesses to reach an increasingly diverse group of audiences, especially now that the company appears to be preparing to introduce sponsored search ads. 

This move aims to generate more revenue for TikTok and position the platform to be a direct competitor to Google and Microsoft.

The search ad market has long been dominated by tech giants like Google and Microsoft. The rise of social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram has driven a shift towards social media search ads in recent years, though. 

Now, TikTok’s entry into the market marks another step in this direction as the platform offers a chance for businesses to connect with a younger demographic who might not be as easily reachable through traditional advertising methods.

The new beta test of the advertising format on TikTok allows businesses to bid on specific keywords to appear at the top of search results. As usual, the search ads will be marked as “sponsored”, making it clear which results are paid and which are organic.

One thing that may help the ad option stand out is TikTok’s targeting capabilities. The app’s algorithm uses machine learning to personalize users’ feeds based on their behavior, search queries, and demographic information. 

This means that businesses can reach a highly specific audience with their ads, ensuring that their marketing strategies are more effective and efficient. This is particularly attractive to brands in a landscape where platforms like Facebook have gradually limited ad targeting options following criticism of its use of user data.

As with any new ad format, this move has the potential to be divisive. More ads in search results may potentially frustrate users. However, if search ads are relevant and engaging, they could enhance the user experience by providing relevant information.

Unfortunately, it is unclear when we can expect this ad option currently in a limited beta test to become available to all advertisers. In a statement to Search Engine Land, the company said:

“We are in the very early stages of testing search ads in select regions. For clarification – at this stage, advertisers do not have the ability to bid on specific keywords for advertising purposes. This part of our testing is managed by TikTok based on keywords that would be most relevant and impactful to the advertiser and their specific ad.”

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TikTok Adds 500,000 Licensed Songs Brands Can Use In Ads and Content

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TikTok is making it easier for brands of any size to use licensed music on the platform with its new Sounds for Businesses service. 

With this, small businesses will be much more able to afford popular songs in their ads, videos, and other organic content through the TikTok Audio Library. 

Why Licensed Music Is Important For Marketing

For brands trying to rise above the noise on social media, using licensed songs is a crucial part of getting users’ attention.

Even more, TikTok says its research shows 68% of users find remembering a brand’s message easier when it is paired with a popular song they like. Of those, 62% said they would take time to learn more about a brand if they enjoy the song. This is because users feel like a brand may have similar tastes to theirs if they choose music they like as well. 

Unfortunately, licensing music is not easy – especially for smaller brands. It is not always clear who to contact to license a piece of music and costs can quickly stack up. 

Trying to slip a popular song into your marketing materials without paying isn’t likely to work either. TikTok (and all other social networks) use automated tools to identify music that may be infringing on a copyright claim. When this happens, the app removes your audio entirely – potentially ruining your message in the process. 

With this new library of licensed music, brands can now avoid this entire complicated and expensive process by choosing from over 500,000 licensed tunes and sounds. 

How To Use TikTok Sounds for Businesses 

TikTok’s Sounds for Businesses library is available to brands creating content and ads on both desktop and mobile.

On desktop, the Audio Library is within the Creative Center. Here, you can filter audio by theme, genre, mood, and length to find the perfect match. 

For mobile users, licensed songs can be added when creating a new post by tapping “Add Sounds” and filtering the results to licensed music. 

Sounds for Businesses is rolling out now. For more, read TikTok’s announcement here.

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TikTok Adds New Targeting and Boosting Options For Promoted Content

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TikTok is expanding the ways brands can turn their TikTok content into ads with new targeting and boosting features for promoting posts.

Promoting content is a way for those unable to use TikTok’s more complex advertising options to improve their reach, boost awareness of their profiles, and drive new leads – similar to the limited “Promote” features on YouTube and Facebook.

Below, we’ll get into the details of the new targeting and boosting options available on TikTok and how they may help your business:

New Options For Promoted TikTok Posts

More Profile Views

As the name suggests, this option helps drive traffic directly to TikTok profiles through a unique call to action on your brand’s story or highlighted product post.

Promote For Others

The idea of buying ads to promote someone else may seem weird but can be very useful for those who share content collaborations, those who partner with influencers, or partner brands. Additionally, this option allows the promotion of a specific creator’s videos or LIVE content.

Location Targeting

If you’re a local business that only services a particular area, location targeting can allow you to restrict your ad reach to exclusively target those in that service area. 

More Messages

The new “more messages” advertising option is a powerful tool for those who typically rely on their sales team to drive sales from leads. With this option, you’ll drive users directly to messaging your TikTok account where your experienced sales team can take over and close the deal.

Brands are likely feeling conflicted about TikTok ever since it was revealed that the company regularly uses internal tools to bypass its ranking algorithm and promote content or profiles across the platform. With these new options for promoting posts, you can take the power back into your hands to ensure your posts are being seen by the users who matter most to you.

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Since Elon Musk’s Takeover, Twitter Has Lost 40% of Its Daily Revenue

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Since the much-publicized takeover by Elon Musk, Twitter has seen its daily revenue plummet by up to 40%. While Musk has been widely criticized for his behavior as CEO and management of the company in recent months, this info, reported by The Information, indicates things are also falling apart behind the scenes. 

Much of the lost revenue is attributed to recent news that more than 500 of Twitter’s top advertisers cut or entirely stopped advertising on the platform since Elon Musk’s takeover. 

Why Are Advertisers Pulling Away From Twitter?

The main issue raised by most major advertisers is Musk’s approach to content moderation. Musk has claimed to be a proponent of free speech online, indicating that content moderation should be handled with a light hand – if at all. 

As such, Musk has reinstated many previously banned accounts – including those of avowed white supremacists – and dismissed most of the staff responsible for content moderation on the platform. 

Understandably, this has made many large advertisers wary of how safe the platform is for their advertising. 

At the same time, Musk has also terminated much of Twitter’s sales teams, including those in charge of accounts with the company’s biggest advertisers. Similarly, engineers and data scientists who were working to improve the advertising service on Twitter have been dismissed. 

What This Means For Twitter’s Future

Unless Musk finds a way to reverse course and satisfy previous advertisers’ concerns, this could bode poorly for the company’s future. Users have already expressed frustration with having new features locked behind a paywall as part of Twitter Blue, indicating the premium service will not be able to make up for lost ad revenue. Meanwhile, Musk’s slashing of staff will make it difficult for the company to engineer new tools or services that generate revenue. 

With all this in mind, advertisers have every right to approach the platform with caution.

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LinkedIn Previews 2023’s Upcoming Features and Updates

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To kick off 2023, Linkedin is giving a preview of the upcoming features it is working on. Along with updates to the platform’s job search systems, the company revealed it is prioritizing making content more accessible, new ways to find B2B products and services, better analytics, and more. 

Let’s explore all 7 of the new features LinkedIn revealed:

1. Improving Accessibility for Video Content

To help content creators make their videos more accessible, LinkedIn will start automatically generating captions for all videos on the platform. Currently only available for English users, creators can edit these captions or upload manually generated captions when uploading videos. 

Additionally, LinkedIn is adding a high contract mode on the LinkedIn app to make videos and other content easier to see for those with difficulty seeing. 

2. Standardized Accessibility Job Titles

LinkedIn is making it easier for those working in accessibility to find job opportunities and connections by providing a set of standardized job titles for use across the platform. 

3. Alt Text In Campaign Manager

Another feature intended to make visual content more accessible, LinkedIn’s Campaign Manager has added the ability for advertisers to add alt-text descriptions to images in ads. 

4. Personalized Job Collections 

According to LinkedIn’s research, more people are casually looking for job opportunities than ever – particularly with the goal of finding a position that better aligns with their values and interests. 

With this in mind, LinkedIn is creating personalized job collections to help users find opportunities without conducting specific searches. 

5. Improvements to B2B Product Search

To make it easier to search and filter through the nearly 90,000 B2B available across LinkedIn, the platform is adding new category filters and ways to share information with prospects 

Along with updates to the B2B product search engine, the company is improving Product Pages to better showcase the benefits and unique features of B2B products.

6. Post Scheduling

After years of pleas from users, LinkedIn is finally letting creators schedule posts ahead of time. 

Users will begin seeing a “schedule” button directly next to the “Post” button when preparing a post. If selected, the icon will let you select exactly when you want your content to go live. 

7. Improvements to Analytics

Lastly, LinkedIn is updating its analytics dashboard for creators to include more relevant data like audience insights and top-performing content. 

The company says highlighting these specific types of data will help brands understand their overall growth and performance at a glance.

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Microsoft Advertising Makes Predictions For Ad Trends in Early 2023

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Microsoft Advertising is helping you get ready for the new year with three new predictions for upcoming trends in digital advertising. 

As we enter the final month of the year, many are already planning their marketing and ad campaigns for the start of 2023. Unsurprisingly, many of these campaigns will be focused on health and self-betterment as consumers make their New Year’s resolutions.

According to a recent study by Opeepl, approximately 60% of people reported making a New Year’s resolution in 2022 with the most popular resolution being to get healthier.

Even more interestingly, almost half (49%) of those who didn’t make a resolution reported that they still made changes to their lives to improve their wellness around the beginning of the year.

To help you take advantage of this with ads that will connect with health-minded consumers in the start of 2023, Microsoft Advertising shared three predictions for upcoming trends in Health and marketing:

‘Organic Food’ Will Spike In Interest

Microsoft believes clicks for ads related to organic food may leap up to 20% during the week of January 14 compared to the same week in December.

With that in mind, Microsoft recommends planning ahead:

“Target users searching for healthy, nutritious food options in January with In-market Audiences. Our internal forecasting data suggests that clicks will peak during the winter on January 14, so although you should ramp up your budget after the holidays end, make sure you don’t run out midway through the month.”

Target Sports Apparel From Now To Late January

The predictions indicate that searches for sports apparel are likely to surge beginning early this month and lasting through January, creating an opportune time to target customers with related shopping campaigns:

“Use Shopping campaigns to showcase your sports and fitness apparel products late November and early December during holiday shopping sales. Microsoft internal data estimates that consumers will be most heavily searching for gear between the weeks of and November 26 and December 3, but activity will remain high until January.”

‘Fitness & Nutrition’ Searches Regularly Surge In Interest

While it is true that searches for fitness and nutrition-related topics are likely to increase in the new year, Microsoft Advertising also notes that this trend is likely to pop back up throughout the year. Because of this, it may be better to take an “always-on” approach to targeting these areas:

“Using 2021 data as a comparison for what to expect activity wise over the next year, we can assume clicks for nutrition and fitness will peak in January, May, July, and October. Consider an always-on approach since Audience Ads are shown to drive users down the funnel to search tactics.”

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Google Introduces Frequency Targeting For Youtube Ads

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Google is officially rolling out frequency targeting controls for video ads on YouTube according to a new blog post from the company.

With this move, advertisers can now take control and set limits for how often individuals see their ads.

In the past, the only way to do this was through connected TV campaigns in Google Display & Video 360 – more advanced advertising tools and features.

What Is Frequency Targeting For Ads?

Frequency targeting lets advertisers set a target number of times their ad will be shown to specific users.

This helps make the most of ad budgets by preventing ads from being repeatedly displayed to unreceptive audiences.

As the announcement for the feature explains:

“This will help advertisers optimize towards more precise reach and frequency, while ensuring that we continue to provide a suitable advertising experience for viewers. Target frequency allows advertisers to select a frequency goal of up to four per week and our systems will optimize towards a maximum unique reach at that desired frequency.”

Why Set a Frequency Target For Your Ads

Though there may be times when repeatedly seeing the same ad may be beneficial to motivate potential customers, there is a limit. Most studies indicate that repeatedly seeing ads is much more likely to contribute to diminishing returns and bad will with consumers.

For example, one Google-commissioned study found that TV advertisers see a decrease in ROI of 41% when the frequency of their ads was more than 6 views per week. Based on the data, more than 46% of ad impressions were above this threshold, making nearly half of ad impressions wasted.

The study says:

“Almost half of the linear TV impressions in our study were considered waste but the same study from Nielsen shows that brands can increase their average weekly frequency from one to three on YouTube with a consistent ROI.

“This is a huge opportunity for marketers to maximize their impact across the same set of people they are already reaching today.”

Final Details

Frequency targeting is now rolling out to all Google Ads users around the globe. 

Google claims that over 95% of all campaigns using frequency targeting hit their goal using the tool in testing.

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New Google Tool Turns YouTube Videos Into 6-Second Ads

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Google is officially releasing its bumper ad tool to the general public. The tool, now being called simply “trim video”, makes it easy to turn existing videos (up to 140-seconds long) into short but sweet clips that can then be used as bumper ads for video campaigns.

Though the tool has been in testing in various forms since 2019, this is the first time the general public has been given access to it for their campaigns. 

In the time the tool was in beta testing, Google says it has “helped hundreds of brands drive more reach, frequency, and efficiency by effortlessly generating 6-second bumper ads.”

The announcement of the tool describes trim video like this:

“Trim video is a video ad production tool that helps advertisers make new bumper ads from their longer video assets quickly. Trim video uses Google Machine Learning to simplify the process of bumper ad creation by identifying the most important frames in a long ad and turning them into 6-second videos. It also has simple editing features that allow advertisers to modify the final output.”

Using the tool is as simple as copying and pasting a link to one of your existing YouTube videos or your Google Ads library. From there, you’ll be given four different options you can edit further or save as a bumper ad. 

To access the trim video tool for yourself, sign into your Google Ads account and select the asset library page. Then, select the tools and settings icon and look under “Shared Library” to find “Asset Library”. Here you’ll find the trim video tool under the Video section.

For more about the trim video tool, read the full announcement or visit the Help Center article dedicated to the tool.

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Google Shopping Gets New Visual Overhaul on Desktop

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Google is updating its online shopping features on desktop with a new focus on visual elements including an increased focus on product images.

The company released a screenshot as an example so you can see how product search results start with a row of thumbnail images.

As users scroll down the page, they will also see details about pricing, user reviews, and ratings for specific products included in the result,

When clicked on, the product listings bring up a panel with more information and links to purchase the product from different retailers.

Most importantly, the panel does not interrupt your browsing process and users can immediately resume shopping from where they left off.

As before, users can also filter product results using a number of categories including brand, type, retailer, and discounted products.

The announcement says about the overhaul:

“Whether you’re looking for clothes, electronics, beauty products or home goods on desktop, you’ll see a more visual feed of shopping results that includes products, brands, articles and videos from across the web.”

Additionally, Google says these product results and search filters are all dynamic, so they will continuously be updated to include the newest products, popular retailers, and up-to-the-minute discounts.

The new Google shopping update is already rolling out to all users and should be available to everyone within the next few days.

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US Search Advertising Continues To Flourish According To New Report

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Brands across the US are increasing how much they spend on search advertising, with the overall US search ad spend predicted to reach almost $112 billion by next year. That is nearly double the amount spent in 2019, according to the new report from Insider Intelligence.

US Search Ad Spend 2019-2026 graph

This year, the data says $99 billion is being spent on search advertising. Much of this is driven by Google, which receives about 56% of the total ad spend. Google is in fact driving much of the growth in this area, outpacing all other traditional formats. 

While Microsoft remains the second-leading search ad platform, the data indicates that other platforms like Apple and Amazon may eventually overtake it. 

Data shows that Apple Search Ads will receive $5 billion dollars alone in 2022 revenue thanks to new ad and placement options which allow brands to find less competitive ad space.

Meanwhile, Amazon is gaining ground as the best platform for bottom-of-funnel customers. 

Interestingly, the report indicates that TikTok is also a growing force in search ad spending. The new data shows that up to 40% of 18- to 24-year-olds in the US already prefer to use TikTok and Instagram for their searches instead of Google. This may explain why recent studies showed that brands spent 60% more on overall advertising on the platform. 

Mobile Vs. Desktop

Unsurprisingly, mobile search advertising spend is far outpacing desktop by about two-thirds and shows no sign of slowing down. 

One indication of this is the fact that more than half of the U.S. population was reported to have used a smartphone to make an online search in 2016. By next year, that number should reach 70% by 2023. 

Privacy-Focused Platforms Lose Steam

After years of slow growth, privacy-first platforms like DuckDuckGo appear to be losing traction with US searchers. This is reflected in other recent reports, including data showing that DuckDuckGo had fallen to less than 100 million daily searches in June. 

For more findings about the current state of search advertising, download the full report from Insider Intelligence here.

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