How to find and leverage the latest TikTok trends

TikTok is mostly built on trends, and leveraging those trends allows you to connect with your audience in a fun way. You get to show a little of your personality and get more exposure in the process. 

But how do you jump on the latest TikTok trends as a business? And where do you even find them? We’ll tell you.

This guide will cover:

• Finding the latest TikTok trends
• Leveraging the latest TikTok trends
• Succeeding with TikTok as a business

TikTok doesn’t curate the trends itself. Instead, it shows users a mix of popular and less popular videos based on content they’ve engaged with before. 

TikTok trends are the fastest way for your business to get exposure on the platform, but you have to jump on early before the trend dies out.

To do that, you need to find them first. Here’s how:

There are different types of trends you and take part in. One type of trend is hot topics, based on popular current events.

A current trend in the UK relates to storms Dudley and Eunice. We see videos of people fighting the wind set to Celine Dion’s It’s All Coming Back To Me. Users also film themselves preparing for the storm, often with some humour. 

The best way to find these trends is to search for the event on TikTok ( the magnifying glass in the top right corner). Just make sure the hot topic you choose ties in with your brand, mission, or values. More on that later.

Tiktok’s Discover page is full of curated trends that the platform updates daily. These trends include hashtags, effects, sounds, dances, and branded trends that companies pay to have featured (learn more on TikTok Ads Manager).

Simply click on the Discover icon at the bottom of the screen to access the page. You can view the trends, including how many videos have been made using it. 

Keep in mind that trends on the Discovery page are already so popular and saturated that they likely won’t last longer than 3-4 days. 

That said, Discover trends are still an excellent way to show followers your personality and have fun while taking part in the app’s culture. 

Who knows? Maybe you’ll go viral!

TikTok trends are challenging because they usually don’t last long (about 3-5 days) before people get bored of them. 

So try to jump on these trends before they hit the Discovery page and become too saturated. To do this, you need to see a wide variety of content that reaches outside your niche. 

The solution? Create a second empty TikTok account and only use it to scroll on the For You page. This way, you’ll see dances, music, content creators, and other trends that you wouldn’t come across on your main account.

Scroll through the feed and look for repeating patterns with actions, music, video text, or hashtags.

Once you find a trend that could work for your business, create your own TikTok video for it.

No one likes a copycat, and TikTok videos that just copy something rarely hit the Discover page. So to get the best results from your video, make sure it fits into your niche and brand. 

You want to create something people haven’t seen before and put your own stamp on it. Make people remember your brand after watching the video. 

For example, a recent trend called “everything you ever want” used a song from The Greatest Showman. Users lip-synced the lyrics and used the text to tell a story about a struggle they overcame. 

This kind of trend is perfect for personalisation since you can share an experience relating to your brand. 

How long you’ll need to create a TikTok video depends on the trend. Some can take five minutes, while others require more time. 

Let’s say you want to create a video based on a “day in the life” trend. In that case, you’ll need footage from an entire day and trim it into a few seconds.

Now, if you already have tons of videos on hand, you only need the time it takes to piece the video together. If you need to film all the footage, naturally, it’ll take longer. So make sure you have the time. 

There’s no rule that says you can only take part in a TikTok trend once. If your first video doesn’t perform that well, just try again with another version. 

Think about how you can put a different spin on the video to make it more engaging and memorable. Some people can create ten trend videos where only one goes viral. 

TikTok trend videos typically flop because you were too late, unoriginal or the quality wasn’t good enough. Some trends need clean transitions or special effects, which can take time to master. 

So if one video fails, just try again. 

The most important thing to remember when leveraging the latest TikTok trends is to only jump on ones that make sense for your business.

For example, if you run a dog walking business, you’ll do better by jumping on trends that involve dogs. 

In addition, while trends are fun, they should only make up about 10% of your content. The rest of your TikTok content should offer value and build trust and authority. 

It takes time and dedication to perfect your skills and find your best style. One way to free up time to dedicate to your TikTok marketing is to make other business processes as fast and easy as possible. 

For example, a tool like Countingup can shave hours off your accounting admin that you can dedicate to TikTok instead.

Countingup is the business current account and accounting software in one app. It automates time-consuming bookkeeping tasks for thousands of self-employed people across the UK. 

Save yourself hours of accounting admin so you can focus on growing your TikTok page instead. 

Get started for free today. 

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