How to harness FinTok to grow your financial services brand

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

Welcome to #FinTok – a TikTok community of millions democratising finance in a joyful and inspiring way. Year on year, we've seen a 275% increase of #FinTok video views as users seek to improve their financial literacy, develop and deepen their knowledge, discover new finance brands and explore products and services that meet their individual circumstances and needs [1]. This growing audience means that TikTok is a powerful – but untapped – marketing tool for FinServ businesses. In fact, 4 in 5 users agree that TikTok allows banking brands to build a stronger connection with their users and 72% of users say they like to see TikTok content from the brand they bank with [2].

And with 20% of French users having chosen their current bank after seeing it on TikTok [3] and 16% of UK users having opened or switched banking products after seeing content on TikTok [2], the opportunity for success on the platform is huge.

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

Know your audience

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

A friendly financial advisor for the digital age, more than one in three UK users currently go to TikTok to learn about personal finance, ranking higher than dedicated blogs, advisors and other social platforms [2]. With 81% of TikTok users saying they wish they knew more about personal finance, 71% saying that personal finance is complicated and 64% saying they struggle to save money, the FinTok community want to be educated and inspired by brands on TikTok [2]. In fact, almost one in three users actively search for banking and finance content using TikTok's search bar, while two in five users come across banking content on their For You Feed [2].

What this means for financial services brands

With 4 in 5 UK users agreeing that TikTok allows banking brands to build a stronger connection with their users [2] and 75% of French users wanting to see content from their bank on the platform [3], embracing the platform's authentic style, leveraging creators and utilising popular content formats are crucial strategies for financial services brands to achieve success on TikTok.

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 capitalise 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. New year, new bank?

The majority of users on TikTok actively seek financial stability at the start of the year as the "new year new me" mindset kicks in, with searches for "budgeting" and "money saving" spiking in Jan [4] and many focusing on various savings goals: saving for a holiday (55%), putting money away for a rainy-day fund (50%) and focusing on security (33%) [5].

And with nearly one in five users turning to TikTok to help narrow down their banking options, brands that service users with relatable, inspiring content will be able 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 in the personal finance community.

2. Tap into entertainment

Entertaining ads on TikTok help to guide users down the funnel; in a recent study, high entertainment ads* received +25% higher brand love, +15% higher purchase intent and +17% higher likelihood to recommend [6].

After watching finance-related content, 29% of UK users claim to have clicked save on the post and 16% say they added or created a 'saved folder' on the platform [2]. 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. Break into the top three

TikTok users consider at least three banking products before making a decision [2]. So leveraging our branding solutions to drive awareness and affinity with your brand is key to winning the hearts, minds and wallets of audiences on the platform.

Explore some of our branding solutions here.

4. Work with creators

TikTok users want to see FinServ brands produce authentic, native content and tap into creators for credibility: two in three users say videos from TikTok creators are relatable [7].

Working with creators is a shortcut to connecting with ready-made audiences with creative styles that have been tried and tested. You can leverage the TikTok Creator Marketplace (TTCM) to find the right creators for your brand and generate creative that really resonates. Try following popular personal finance creators such as @thisgirltalksmoney, @enzotaistoi and @powerpoussin to get a feel for the content that works for your audience.

5. Set up your campaigns for 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.

We recommend that our advertisers use TikTok's Pixel and Events API to maximise performance by deduplicating events and enabling Advanced Matching. This allows brands to further optimise towards the KPIs that matter most for their business and better utilise TikTok ad products to reach performance objectives, like Video Shopping Ads.

Our recently launched Self-Attributing Network (SAN) is a new Mobile Marketing Partner network integration that enables advertisers to see the true value and impact of their TikTok campaigns. See how transitioning to SAN helped AI financial assistant app Cleo AI uncover a 34% increase in conversion rate and a 46% reduction in cost per action.

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 how Plum used TikTok to boost conversions by 55% and how Santander generated 3.2B views for their awareness campaign!

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