Oct 12, 2022

Part 1: TikTok Sharing Road to 1K


I didn’t understand TikTok as a social media site in the beginning. This was in 2020. 

My first impression of TikTok was “what are all these kids doing? Wasting their life dancing in front of the camera and creating nuisance in the public”. 

And then I went up one level to “how the heck these youngsters can earn on TikTok by just dancing?” 

During the MCO era, there were so many people jumping into TikTok. What really motivated me to put my first foot onto TikTok ground was the need to access certain content. That time (during lockdown), Malaysians were so creative and my friends were sharing to me some TT content that can be only be accessed if you are a user. I downloaded the app and created an account. That was when I got down the rabbit hole. 

For a good amount of time, I was the "observer". I enjoy being the consumer of the content by continuously viewing, sharing and commenting on other people's video. 

In this post, I want to share how I got from zero followers to 1K (at the time of writing this post, I have 12K followers, but what matter the most is the first 1K followers). 

Always login to your analytics under the creator's tool tab to analyze which content garner followers for you

#1 - Connect with friends & family via the TT app

I think this is the very basic starter pack. Your friends & family are probably the best support for you to start. You're able to sync your contact & Facebook so that your contacts are able to find you on TT. 

I got my first 200 followers that are my family & friends. That is almost 20% of the goal to 1K.


#2 - Finding your niche 

This might take a few months, or a few uploads before you are getting comfortable posting content on TT. The good news is, taking video for TikTok doesn't require a lot and I assume everyone know how to take video on their phone - which is good enough for you to start. 

Some of the things you can take into consideration as you develop your contents are:

  • What topic or subject you want to focus on? It's not necessary for you to post entirely on the topic only, but it gives TikTok algorithm to pick up who are the target account to boost your post to. For example, if you keep posting content about cars, TT will push your content to people who already following car content creator or frequently engage with car related content. 
  • In terms of location, where is your focus? You can target your locality based on the language you want to use, the location you want to tag & also the relevant hashtag to use. 
  • The direction of your content - this means that how do you want to deliver your content? Do you want to use comedy approach or education or recommendations. Is it going to be videos with text only? Are you going to do a voice over? Do you prefer to post just photos but in a form of video? After a few months you’ll be able to find a “template” when making your video. Once you have that template the process is pretty easy. 
If you have a specific style when you're posting your content, TT will play a match-making role by sending your content to the relevant audience. This is an organic way to grow your audience. 


#3 - Use all TikTok's resources


When posting a video on TT, try to use all the resources. The resources are:

  • Text - type relevant info with the text function on your video. TT’s algorithm will pick up keywords from the text. 
  • Stickers - look out for campaign stickers such as “stay at home” (during lockdown) or “makanlokal” (during local food campaign). This will help TT pushing your video to the relevant community that using the same stickers. 
  • Songs - trending songs can help you generate more views 
  • Hashtag - Hashtags help you get views through 2 ways: (1) through search when users search for specific videos and (2) for TT algorithm to pick up the video category and push it to FYP. Let’s talk about FYP some other day. 
  • Tag location of the place - If your video is relevant to a location such as travel, always tag the location. If you are doing a general video such as unboxing video, then tag a generic location such as "Petaling Jaya". 

#4 - Post content of same subject constantly


In order for TT to categorize your content faster, post your content of the same subject consistently. A bad example would be: 1 post on cars, the next day you post something about childcare, the next content on travel, and then shopping. TT cannot understand who are the people you are targeting and they can't categorize you to a specific circle. Try to stick 3 posts within the same subject before you upload other type of content. 


I think that's a good start for your road to 1K. Do watch out for weekly update on this blog. I have prepared other tips on:

  • Hashtag tips on TikTok
  • How to get your video to FYP
  • How to earn from TikTok
...and many more to come. 

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