How food & drink brands can cook up a storm on TikTok

From the #NegroniSbagliato being the drink of choice for a whole summer to everyone wanting to know what's up with the #StanleyCup, TikTok has changed the way that people in Europe discover food and drink and is having a massive real-world impact on shopping lists and mealtimes worldwide. In fact, 72% of TikTok snackers say they try new products or brands more often since joining TikTok and over half say that they tried a snack for the first time after viewing creator or recommendation videos on TikTok [1].

TikTok's full-screen, sound-on environment makes for mouthwatering entertainment and is what inspires our 'foodie' community to action, with 60% inspired to find out more about a food or drink product they've seen on TikTok [2]. And, although food and drink content has always been one of the top content categories on TikTok with millions of posts and counting, our community still wants more: more than one in three Italian users say that they want to see food content on their feeds every single day [3].

If you want to learn how your CPG brand can to tap into this opportunity to connect with a content-hungry audience on TikTok, keep reading.

Know your audience

TikTok has fundamentally changed how consumers make decisions about food & drink products, turning the marketing funnel into an infinite flywheel that provides unlimited opportunities for brands to connect with TikTok users and drive results:

What this means for food & drink brands

With 73% of TikTok users saying they feel a deeper connection to the brands they interact with on TikTok versus the other sites and apps they use, embracing the platform's authentic style, leveraging creators and utilising popular content formats are crucial strategies for CPG brands to achieve success on TikTok [4].

To stay top of mind, CPG brands should adopt an always-on strategy, posting organic beats and paid peaks to capture both last-minute and long-term planners. Here are four tips to help you craft the best campaigns to engage this audience.

1. Boost engagement with reviews and recommendations

Reviews are key for TikTok users when deciding on purchases: 21% of Italian users enjoy watching new product reviews on TikTok and 20% enjoy watching snack reviews [3]. CPG brands should consider servicing users with regular relatable content to reach these potential customers.

Encourage your users to interact with your brand by responding to comments, asking questions and commenting on other videos. To get started, explore our creative centre – you can utilise our keyword insight tool and review top ads or videos to gain inspiration and understand what resonates with TikTok foodies. Popular hashtags like #girldinner, #choppedsandwiches and #watertok could spark some campaign lightbulb moments.

2. Lean into authentic and entertaining messaging

Entertaining ads on TikTok help to guide users down the funnel; high entertainment ads* are rated 25% higher for brand love, 15% higher for purchase intent and 17% higher for likelihood to recommend [5]. Take inspiration from Lidl's award-winning "Ode to Bakery" campaign, which proves the power of entertaining TikTok-first creative.

To create entertaining content, check out our creative codebook or work with creative production experts using the TikTok Creative Exchange (TTCX), our one-stop solution that enables fast, scalable high-performing video production for TikTok.

3. Work with creators

Working with creators is a shortcut to connecting with ready-made audiences with creative styles that have been tried and tested: 50% of Italian TikTokers have made a recipe after seeing creator's content on TikTok [3].

Food & drink brands can engage with diverse #FoodTok creators to celebrate their cultural backgrounds and partner with them to create new dishes or drinks featuring their products. How-tos and recipe videos will also help introduce the community to new flavours and dishes that they may not have previously been exposed to. Leverage the TikTok Creator Marketplace (TTCM) to find the right creators for your brand and generate creative that really resonates.

For more on how TikTok works for food & drink brands, discover how Barilla's award-winning TikTok campaign drove more than 100M video views!

4. Maximise brand impact and drive offline sales

For food & drink businesses planning campaigns with both branding and sales goals, TikTok is a game-changer. We've found that businesses that implement upper-funnel media plans, combining multiple objectives into single campaigns, see improved campaign performance compared to isolated single-objective campaigns [6]. We recommend bundling our innovative upper-funnel solutions such as TopView and TikTok Pulse with Auction, Focused View and Reach & Frequency ads.

Advertisers can quantify the impact of upper-funnel campaigns using Brand Lift Study, which provides insights on metrics like ad recall, awareness, attitude, favourability and intent. Advertisers can also measure the incremental sales lift of in-person and online sales with Sales Lift Study (now available in UK, France, Germany and Spain). See how Coca-Cola uncovered a 7.88% lift in sales after their TikTok campaign.

Take your products from just out to sold out

Our community's desire to discover new food & drink products continues to grow day by day. Tap into our platform by leveraging the above insights and guidance to develop an always-on full-funnel strategy that features both organic content and paid media to drive growth and boost conversions. For more on how TikTok works for food & drink brands, sign up to our dedicated CPG newsletter!

*“High-entertainment” ads are ones that are relatable; make users feel uplifted/inspired; make them smile/laugh; or show them something they personally like