Harnessing #FinTok to unlock business impact

Amidst economic uncertainty and the rising cost of living, consumers are becoming more intentional and proactive with their finances. They are seeking flexible banking options, financial security and support, as well as closer relationships with banking brands.

Fast forward to today, #FinTok has entered the chat - a TikTok community of millions democratising finance in a joyful and inspiring way. As audiences seek to improve their financial literacy, discover new finance brands, and explore products and services that meet their individual needs, we've seen a 373% rise in video posts for financial content on TikTok in the last year.(1) This growing and engaged audience means that TikTok is a powerful marketing tool for FinServ businesses. In fact, TikTok is the #1 source for financial information among Canadian users under the age of 45 in social and video platforms, surpassing financial institutions’ websites, financial advisors, and family & friends.²

Want to learn how to harness FinTok to grow your financial services brand? Keep reading.

Audiences are evolving

Over 1 billion people are spending a movie's length of time each day on the platform to be educated, inspired and entertained. Did you know that 70% of TikTok users agree that financial topics are important to them?² While their learning experience begins in-app, #FinTok has the power to inspire action off-platform as the impact transcends the screen.

Communities on TikTok span generations, each with distinct financial needs as users are going through life changing moments. From starting a new job, to buying a new car, financial literacy is key for these audiences. 52% of Canadian TikTok users agreed that when they started working or entered adulthood, they lacked enough knowledge to manage their own finances.² Now we see an increasing number of audiences turning to TikTok for guidance with their financial journey as the platform offers useful tips and tricks to get audiences prepared to confidently nail “adulting.” According to Quentin Humphrey, cultural strategist and trend forecaster, Gen-Z in one word would be ‘fluid’.

What this means for financial services brands

#FinTok is filling a much needed knowledge gap, with 62% of audiences agreeing that TikTok allows them to learn directly from experts.³ For FinServ brands, this is an opportunity to lend a trusted voice to the conversation. An estimated 2 in 3 Canadian TikTok users are interested in seeing financial content from brands³, and 77% want brands to create TikTok videos that teach them something new.⁴

The TikTok community craves content that entertains, educates, and inspires. To stay top of mind, financial services brands should adopt an always-on strategy, posting organic beats and paid peaks to capture both last-minute and long-term planners. Explore the platform to find out how to best capitalize on high-growth areas: scroll through your For You feed to identify trends, review follower comments for insights and search lookalike communities to find hooks and content ideas that align with potential customer motivation.

Here are four tips to help you craft the best campaigns to engage this audience:

1. Unlock new insights

With a spike in searches for budgeting and money saving, audiences are interested in content focused on various savings goals like investing (31%), saving for their first home (27%), or putting money away for a retirement fund (24%).²

Nearly 44% of Canadian TikTok audiences are in market for a new savings account or credit card², and they are turning to TikTok to help narrow down their options. Brands that service users with relatable, inspiring content will be able to reach these potential customers. Encourage your audience 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 utilize our keyword insight tool and review top ads or videos to gain inspiration and understand what resonates in the personal finance community.

2. Unlock entertainment

Entertaining ads on TikTok help to guide users down the funnel; in a recent study, high entertainment ads* received +52% higher brand love, +17% higher purchase intent and +26% higher likelihood to recommend.⁵

After watching finance-related content, 59% of Canadians on TikTok claim to have saved, liked or commented on video² and 55% agreed that TikTok is a place for legacy financial brands.⁶ To create content worth saving, 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. Unlock creativity

TikTok users want to see more FinServ brands produce relatable and authentic content, that leverages creators for credibility. In fact, 59% of Canadian TikTok audiences like it when financial brands partner with brands or creators in other categories such as sports, gaming, or dining,⁶ and after watching ads with creators, 51% buy the product online or in-person.⁷

Collaborating with creators can push the boundaries of what advertising looks like. When you tap into creators in a nuanced and effective way, it can help you connect with viewers who value the different niches on TikTok. TikTok creators help advertisers build favourability and trust—which drives results. You can leverage relevant creator voices in the financial education space via the TikTok Creator Marketplace (TTCM) and generate creative that really resonates. According to creator, podcast host and author of Talk Money To Me, @jason_tartick, we need to have "healthy conversations" to learn how to navigate finances.

4. Unlock full-funnel success

Putting in place safe and reliable data connections is the most important thing app and web advertisers can do for successful marketing campaigns on TikTok. As data connections power all of your measurement, targeting, optimisation and automation capabilities, the more you fuel Ads Manager with data connections, the better it becomes at generating conversions.

TikTok fuels business performance from discovery to conversion— and everything in between. We recommend that advertisers tap into our diverse ad solutions like App Profile Page and Enriched Lead Forms to drive incremental revenue. This allows brands to further optimize towards the KPIs that matter most for their business and better utilize TikTok ad products to reach performance objectives, especially with unique targeting solutions like Audience Integrations.

Bring home the bacon

Our community's desire for financial knowledge and expert advice 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. Learn more about our ad solutions here.

For more on how TikTok works for financial brands, discover more category specific success stories like the money management app Plum, which used TikTok to boost conversions by 55% and the brand KOHO which generated a 15.6% lift in Ad Recall for their awareness campaign!

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Sources:

1. TikTok Internal Data Global, Video Posts, Jan 2023 to Apr 2024

2. TikTok Marketing Science Custom Finances Survey via AYTM, CA, September 2023. Base: TikTok MAU 18+ [Q5] (n=450)

3. TikTok Marketing Science Custom Learning About Finances Survey via AYTM, US, August 2023. Base: TikTok MAU 18+ who saw financial content on the platform [Q13,16] (n = 172)

4. TikTok Marketing Science Global Community and Self-Expression Study 2021 conducted by Flamingo.

5. TikTok Marketing Science Global Entertaining Ads Study (Canada Results) 2022 conducted by Marketcast

6. TikTok Marketing Science NA Custom FinServ Creative Survey via AYTM CA, April 2024. Base: TikTok users 18+ [Question] (n = 400)

7. Source: TikTok Marketing Science Global Creators Drive Commerce Study (Canada results) 2022 conducted by Material

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