TikTok is the place to be if you’re looking for organic growth. There are more watchers than creators on the platform right now, which means your content can be seen by more people.
Today we learn TikTok tactics from Collin Castrina. He has almost 350,000 followers on TikTok and over 3.5 million likes for his content. Even with these numbers, he’s not someone who’s been doing this forever. He got serious in January 2020 and found something that worked.
After his second post overall, he had about half a million views. Then his fifth or sixth posts had 4 million views. How did that happen? He tried different things on the platform and doubled down on what caught people’s attention. If you want to hear how he did that, keep reading because there are nuances to this. It isn’t just getting lucky. You actually have to figure out what the strategy is going to be that you can apply to your business.
WHY YOU SHOULD CONSIDER TIKTOK
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:04:02] TikTok is one of the hottest topics in social media right now. Let’s set the stage because there are a lot of people who have heard of it, they’ve looked at it, but they might be still confused. In your own words for us old people out there, what is TikTok?
Collin Castrina: [00:05:10] That’s a great question. Think about it almost as Instagram, but with videos. It’s starting to shift more towards business, but it’s a very short form video formatted app where you can be very entertained, just scrolling through videos.
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:05:25] Is this something that people should be paying attention to as one of the other major players for media out there right now?
Collin Castrina: [00:05:38] Yeah, for sure. TikTok actually became the number one app in the US for downloads. It was over Instagram. Instagram dipped below a 10 percentile and TikTok actually exceeded what Instagram did.
It has done better than Instagram in the previous quarter and their growth is exploding. It’s created personal brands that no one would have known two years ago or one year ago, or even a few months ago, even myself. It’s a free platform, a free way to grow your personal brand or your business with good content strategies.
Unlike some other platforms where you really have to pay (such as Facebook and Instagram, where it’s paid to play), on TikTok if you’re having fun, you have a good content strategy.
You’re able to download the app and give free exposure to yourself and your business if you just have fun and have good content.
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:06:24] I think it’s still in that beginning stage where people are trying to understand how to find their space in this. Tell me what’s the thing that you see the most on TikTok? What’s starting to show up more that’s new?
Collin Castrina: [00:07:15] Instagram originally started as being a photography app. Then we started to take over. Myself not a photographer and nearly everyone else that’s not a photographer has had so much fun on Instagram. On TikTok, the same thing is happening in my eyes.
A year to date was basically, I thought all it was were videos of people doing really stupid things. That made no sense for a business person to be on. You’ve previously heard about TikTok being all about dancing.
Actually it’s really shifting towards nearly any person in any niche can be successful. I’ve seen people who talk about Nerf guns have hundreds of thousands of followers. People who do power washing, their videos have gotten millions and millions of views. If you do anything and make it good and appealing, it can be successful.
TikTok is really just for anyone at this point. Every single day, it gets better where people are more confident to post about anything that they enjoy in life.
WHAT SHOULD YOU CREATE?
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:08:47] I’d like to hear a little bit about how you started to approach this. What are you creating now? Things that you just enjoy creating?
Collin Castrina: [00:09:14] What I’m creating used to be super micro-business content on literally how to cold-call successfully. Now it’s more towards me just having fun blowing people’s minds.
What are the most expensive celebrity cars? Things that I would look up on Google that I want to know that I can show other people on the platform. Doing promotions, a lot of different things that have been really fun to create.
I’m bringing back what Vine used to be to me, which is now a creative platform and doing that on TikTok. Having more fun with it, and also providing a lot of value in different videos that I choose to post, but mainly I’m sticking still with something related to money and business.
DIVIDE UP CONTENT
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:10:13] You have to get these little ideas conveyed in such a quick way. What’s your approach to doing that?
Collin Castrina: [00:10:34] When it comes to creating a video that has a lot of depth to it, trying to slam it in fifteen seconds (like a little commercial), I’ve tried to take the biggest pieces and put them in the video.
Then if there are smaller micro pieces, I like to put text over the video and add that in if I forgot it in the video, or put it in the caption as well. Or I’ll have to go through probably a thousand comments and let people know what they were requesting.
I just try to take the main pillars of the piece of content that will get people the most value and get their attention in the best possible way and I put that within the fifteen seconds.
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:11:09] It looks like you also do multi-part series. Is that planned or is that just what has become popular?
Collin Castrina: [00:11:15] Usually, if it becomes a series and I didn’t put a part in, that was unplanned and gladly it went successfully. But I’ve found that series extend content ideas and make sure I have content for the next day.
Parts do very, very well on the platform. If I have a part that is not successful, I can just kill it. If it does well, I can continue it, and because I put “part” or “series”, it allows people to follow me because they want to see part two. They want to see part three. It gives them an incentive to follow me and follow you as well.
I’ve recently done a few series. It’s given me huge growth on my page and also a lot of views. Having shares is a really good way to get people to follow you and continue a content strategy where you don’t have to think of new videos all the time.
HOW TO DO WELL ON TIKTOK
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:12:07] What are some of the principles of being on TikTok? What are some of the tips and ideas you might have to teach someone how to do this well?
Collin Castrina: [00:12:35] I used to test different content until I found what I enjoyed to make, and what was successful on the platform. Number one, I would definitely find out what you would enjoy posting about every single day. What do you want to be known for? If one of your videos went viral, would you be able to do it again?
For example, if you see a lot of people doing stupid stuff and it goes viral, but they never get a lot of followers and they’re not able to grow their following, it’s because they had a one-off video.
You as a business person, think about what you want to be known for. Something that if you could create it again, it would be a lot of fun to do and easy to do. Pick one thing that you really enjoy to post about and post about it as often as you can, every single day, if possible.
RELATED: Build your personal brand with the Content Marketing Starter Guide.
PRESENT CONTENT CREATIVELY
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:13:17] A lot of the creators out there on different platforms have ideas that they like to share. Coming up with a format to explain that in an interesting way, getting creative in this space is the challenge. Do you have any advice on how to be creative with a given type of message?
Collin Castrina: [00:13:46] If you look at my content, I use a PowerPoint because it’s quick-cut. It changes very often. In the first three seconds, you know exactly what I’m talking about. You know immediately within the first second if you want to scroll or if you want to stay on. It does very well.
One of my friends, Boxed Up Entrepreneur, uses a green screen effect. There are different effects that you can use on the app, such as the green screen.
For example, let’s say I’m recording myself like you just talked about. You can have a really cool filter behind you, you could have money behind, you can have cars behind you.
You can have your own business logo behind you and can make it visually appealing where it’s not just you talking in your room. You can do it and have a different background. Or let’s say you wanted to do a vacation page. You want to show off different scenery so you can spice it up and make your own template.
In my template, I follow a PowerPoint. I have my intro then I get into the content. A lot of people have their catchy headline and then they get into their content. Dancers, they’re able to just dance.
You just have to find what your niche is, and then look up the hashtag for that niche and see what other people are doing successfully. Then you can model their template.
USE THE HASHTAG BUTTON
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:14:56] How are you finding hashtags that can help you on TikTok and how are you tracking their performance?
Collin Castrina: [00:15:31] It’s actually super easy, which is one of the reasons why I love TikTok. Let’s say you just created a video and you’re on the “about to post” page (that’s what I’ll call it now).
Once you type in your caption, you can click the hashtag button. It’s a nice little button with the hashtag and says “hashtag”. It’s going to have a few different hashtags with a flame next to it. Click all of them, because there are only going to be three to five of those.
After you’ve clicked the trending hashtags, (the hashtags with the flames) then you can get into more micro hashtags related to your videos so you’re getting a more targeted audience.
The broader trending hashtags are going to allow you to get a more broad audience and really blow up your video. Then the micro hashtags are going to allow you to get more of a targeted audience.
There really is no hashtag research. You could if you want to go super in-depth. Honestly, I’ve found what’s been successful for me and other people just using the hashtag button and then clicking the hashtag with the flame on it.
WHICH HASHTAGS TO USE
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:16:33] Have you ever looked at other people’s hashtags in similar spaces as you and seen what they’re using that might be helpful?
Collin Castrina: [00:16:40] Yes, you can notice really by the day. If I’ve posted that day, (which more than likely I have) if I’m scrolling on my friends and on the people that I follow, I’ll notice that they’ve more than likely used the same hashtags. Those are the trending hashtags for the day.
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:16:54] There are a few that aren’t trending, they’re just there every time. For example, the “For You” page, or the “For You” hashtag, or the #FYP. Should I be using those? Are there certain hashtags I use on every post or just certain ones?
Collin Castrina: [00:17:18] Certain hashtags that I personally use would be (because it’s related to my niche) entrepreneur, business, or money. I interchangeably use those three if I have enough space. More than likely, especially if it’s a business post, I will be using those hashtags.
You should not be using #foryou, #FYI, #FIP. There’s another one, it’s #XYZBA. Don’t use those hashtags. The reason for it (so you don’t think I’m just making it up) is because there are so many videos that it’s been used.
It has billions and billions and billions of views. You’re not going to be relevant with that hashtag. However, if you look up #entrepreneur and #business, there are a lot of views, but it’s still an open playing field where you can be successful.
People look up that hashtag because they’re fellow entrepreneurs or business people. They will watch those videos. Don’t use #FIP, #FYI, et cetera.
THE 3 SECOND RULE
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:18:50] Are there other things beyond the hashtags that are going to help you be found? Or is that the whole strategy?
Collin Castrina: [00:19:05] I’ve helped over a thousand people in my direct messages that have asked me, how do I become famous? How do I do this?
You must capture attention in the first three seconds. If you think about a sitcom, if you watch Friends, The Office, Seinfeld, Big Bang, really any popular show, you’ll see that they start with something that really grabs your attention that’s funny. Then they go into the intro, and then they go into the video.
With TikTok, what you see with a lot of people who don’t dance, (because more than likely you’re not going to be dancing) you need to catch attention. If you don’t catch attention, people are scrolling so fast, and they want the dopamine hit so much that if you don’t get their attention fast enough, they’re just going to scroll.
Make sure to punch them in the face and get their attention. That’s what is going to get them to click the “like” button because they’re going to stick on and they’re going to watch your video, which boosts your watch time.
Catch their attention within the first three seconds, then provide your value, and that’s when you’re gonna rack up your likes and rack up your follows.
OTHER STRATEGY TIPS
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:20:14] Let’s talk about a few of these other kinds of things. First is the length of the video. The second is direct calls to action that get people to interact with the content. Third, the frequency of posting.
Collin Castrina: [00:20:38] For me and what I’ve seen for most people is fifteen-second videos. This is an option when you’re editing on the platform and about to create a video. You can click the fifteen-second video option.
That’s the most successful length to do a video, not long videos because people want to scroll. They want to move on as fast as they can and they don’t want to be on it. It’s not like YouTube.
FIFTEEN SECOND VIDEOS
Fifteen seconds is the optimum length for a video, even a little shorter. They’re moving more towards where they really like watch time. But as you’re just getting started and you don’t have a huge following, people aren’t going to be loyal enough to stick on for twenty-five, forty-five, or sixty seconds.
Stick to a fifteen-second video format because you’re going to rack up good watch time. You’re still going to get a lot of watch time. People are still going to get the dopamine hit. It’s going to be quick because right now if you don’t have a lot of followers, you just need attention.
Once you have your loyal followers, then you can expand the length of your video
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:21:36] I imagine if they can watch to the end and then it starts to play again, you’re getting some kind of a signal that is saying, “This is not terrible.”
Collin Castrina: [00:21:43] Yes. TikTok will see that people are rewatching, and it also adds to your watch time, which is awesome.
CALLS TO ACTION
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:21:48] Have you used calls to action? Do you think that they’re helpful for some types of posts, or are they things to avoid?
Collin Castrina: [00:22:01] Call to actions are really helpful if you’re doing a series. At the very end of your video, you could say, “Like for part two, like to see the next video or like so I can make another video.”
Or you can say, “Follow me and shoot me a DM so we can talk more, or go to my Instagram.” You can push people to different platforms if you use a call to action correctly.
Let’s say you’re making a video about hyping up the tee-shirt launch. What you want to do is really hype up the video. Keep making the video super exciting, grab attention, and don’t satisfy them. Say, “Like for part two, or follow me on TikTok and DM me on Instagram.”
You can really capture that audience, but if you’re going to push people onto another platform or push people to part two, do not provide enough value in the video where they don’t want to do so.
Just like you would want to do on Facebook or another platform, you want to provide enough value and really capture their attention. That way they want to click, they want to learn more, they want to sign up. Really build up excitement, but don’t satisfy them. Then you can push your call to action.
REMEMBER WHAT YOU WANT TO BE KNOWN FOR
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:23:23] There are a lot of these (what I’d call) short-term, shortsighted approaches to calls to action. “Hey, help me get to a million likes so that my dad will buy me some McNuggets” or whatever the thing is.
Collin Castrina: [00:23:43] Definitely those don’t do well. Or they get one that does well, but their followers don’t go and increase. Again, it’s a one-off video.
What we want to make is content that we can replicate, which is why we want to push them to a series and not push them to help you buy a Tesla one time, because they’re not going to push you to buy a Tesla.
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:24:00] Even if the idea is true-hearted, for example, I’ve seen one that said, “Like here. If I get a hundred thousand likes, my dad will quit smoking.”
That’s fine, I want to help you quit smoking, but that doesn’t make me actually want to see your content all the time. I think you have to avoid the things that are short term solutions to growth.
Collin Castrina: [00:24:22] Exactly. What do you want to be known for? Why do you want to go viral? Keep it around your brand. Everything that you push out there, if it went viral, you would be happy about it. It would be something that people would follow you for so they can see it again.
POST FREQUENCY
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:24:34] Let’s talk about post frequency. I imagine it’s more beneficial like it is for a lot of platforms when you start to find some consistency in your schedule. On top of that, I imagine more is better?
Collin Castrina: [00:24:47] More can be better, but there’s a certain point where you’re just pushing out dog poop. I mean, I love you Gary V. But sixty-four times a day? If I saw my friend post sixty-four times a day, I’d punch him in the face.
You want to make sure you know what you are posting. If you’re new, I would post three to five times a day. One a day is fine because if we set huge goals and we don’t meet them, we usually just give up. Make sure that you’re actually meeting what you want to do.
Try to post, especially if you’re new, one time a day. This will allow you to spread out content where you don’t have to think of three videos a day, five videos a day, even more. I just post five times a day. That’s extremely hard to do if you have kids, if you have a job. If you have a real job, you have to go to work.
That’s going to be really hard and TikTok is going to become stressful. I don’t post as much because I’m more watching the platform right now. I haven’t been putting out a ton of content. Posting one time a day has been the best. Just try to stick to at most three, but if you’re burning yourself out, definitely go lower.
COLLIN’S PERSONAL JOURNEY
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:26:02] You didn’t start right when TikTok got going. You started in August and it looked like you got really serious in January. Your second post has almost half a million views.
Collin Castrina: [00:26:55] That was actually my third post. I deleted the other ones. The first post I ever posted is the one with the Lamborghini.
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:27:04] Then your fifth, which we’ll call your sixth, had 4 million views. I’m sure it didn’t happen on day one, but tell me about what was going on. Tell me that journey. What was going through your mind?
Collin Castrina: [00:27:23] I think this is a really interesting story, even though it’s my own personal story. I used to think TikTok was stupid. There was no point in it.
I used to be on Vine, which was my favorite app, and I said to all my friends, “I’m ride or die with Vine, and will never download TikTok because I had a thousand followers on Vine in seventh grade.”
I thought I was the coolest person ever. Then it was cross country season. We run every day together. We talk about TikTok and everything related to it. They said, “Oh, one of our friends has got a video with 2 million views.” And I said, “How? His video is stupid!” He’s getting all these followers. He has 70,000 followers right now.
He doesn’t post anymore, but I saw that and I kept telling my friend, “If I can’t make it business related, there’s no point to me trying to be on this platform.” So I posted a video with me in a Lamborghini, and that got around 130,000 views. At the time I had three followers. That just shows the potential that TikTok has.
TIKTOK GROWTH CAN BE EXPONENTIAL
Collin Castrina: [00:28:17] My next video I posted, it was just me talking about how expensive Starbucks was. When my next video was posted, a well-edited video of the thunderstorm and me on an airplane, it got about half a million views. At that point I’m sitting about 970 followers. (Right about now I’m at 345,000.)
Going into January 1st, I had 970 followers. I told my friend, “Could you imagine what it would be like to have ten thousand followers on the platform? That would be the craziest thing. You’d be so famous.”
We were talking about all the famous people on the platform and how their lives have changed. When I got home, it was January first. On that day, I posted my first business-related PowerPoint video. I was very blessed. It went very, very viral over millions and millions of views.
I saw that video did well, so I continued that strategy. I found what worked and continued to push that strategy, and started going hard every single day because I saw there was potential. That video got me six thousand within a few days. And I thought, “Wow, this is awesome. There’s potential here to do business.” It was what I wanted, just like I told my friend earlier.
It boomed. I literally had 970 followers and then zero to a hundred real quick. Everything really just started to blow up. That just shows the growth that can happen for your page. This gives you a reason to get started right now.
Your life can change. You can get ten thousand followers in a week if you really push and find something that works. It may not happen that fast. It may take you a few months, but it only takes one video.
It’s not like any other platform where you really have to build something up. It takes one video for you to be very successful in the platform and blow up.
TEST WHAT GAINS TRACTION FOR YOU
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:30:19] Is there anything else that you noticed other than using the right hashtag and having an interesting PowerPoint video that you think is the reason this one seems to blow up? Or is it just kind of random?
Collin Castrina: [00:30:55] To show it’s not a fluke, I’ve worked with other people on helping them create viral content so it’s not just, “Well, I was really lucky!”
For example, on my dad’s page, we tried multiple, multiple different content strategies. Him in his office and with different backgrounds, different intros, different value, different topics, modeling other people, using the PowerPoint. The PowerPoint didn’t work for him, sadly.
Then we actually found that his IGTV videos work the best. We’ve had back to back forty-four thousand viewed videos. That’s shown to do very well for him, reposting his IGTV videos. Those get a few thousand views.
You have to test until you find what is gaining traction for you. Don’t give up because one content strategy didn’t work, five didn’t work. On my dad’s, we were on six or seven different content strategies.
On Zack Benson, we knew what he wanted to be known for. We started posting really nice travel videos and noticed a lot of the things that didn’t work. We used different sounds, different hashtags, more hashtags, and tried using text on the videos.
TRY DIFFERENT VARIABLES
Making sure you’re trying different variables, trying different things where one video, if you added a different sound, could have gotten you multi-million views. That’s worked on my page. I’ve tested it. You have to use and test different things on your page.
Zach’s video, we tried no text and text. It’s shown that text has worked on his page, different sounds have worked better on his page. You have to test what works for you because your page is different than mine, which is different than Zach’s, which is different than other people’s.
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:32:31] What do you mean by different sounds? Are you talking about the soundtracks and music behind it?
Collin Castrina: [00:32:35] Yes. People really love the sounds on TikTok. That’s something really simple that you can do when you’re editing or thinking about your video. You can go and click on the very top of the app when you’re recording and click the sound button.
There’s a trending button that you can click, or you can add it when you’re editing on the next page of TikTok. You can add whatever feels good to you, as long as you’re on the trending section, which is a very obvious button that you can click on that homepage. That allows you to add what is really appealing. It’s nice to listen and not just to watch.
SOUNDS WORK FOR BUSINESS
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:33:08] I feel like that is one of the strategies. You can either use your own sound, your own audio. Or you can choose a soundtrack, either music or some other funny skits or statements. That part of it seemed like it was just for people who are trying to lip sing or be funny. Does it work for business? What kind of sounds are you talking about?
Collin Castrina: [00:33:31] I posted a video where I didn’t have a popular sound. It was just my voice and it got maybe a hundred thousand views. Then I posted another video, extremely similar, using a popular sound. It got hundreds of thousands more views, I think even to a million.
Using a popular sound puts your video into the sound category. If you use that sound, it’s not going to be original sound. If it’s original sound, you’re going to be the only video. However, if you use a popular sound, you’re going to be pushed in the algorithm with songs that have also used that.
For example, my friend Gerardo, he used the “Toosie Slide”. He was about the third video to use it, and it boosted his video millions of views because he uses a certain sound.
Make sure to add sounds. You can turn down the volume very low to where your voice is eighty percent and you barely hear the music, but having a sound really adds gasoline onto your posts.
RESOURCES FROM COLLIN
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:34:27] If people want to follow you and understand how to do this themselves, I know that you help people with this exact thing. Can you tell me about how you’re helping people with it?
Collin Castrina: [00:34:50] I help people for free on Instagram. If they shoot me a direct message @collincastrina on every single platform. I’ve helped over a thousand people just with my direct message.
Then my friend and I, Gerardo, (he has over a hundred thousand followers on TikTok talk as well), have our private LinkedIn group, which is free. It’s TikTok Marketing. My friends and I, our network, try to provide as much free value as we can. Answering questions for anyone, even in my direct message, I’ll help you for free. We can get on a call, anything like that.
HOW TO REPURPOSE CONTENT FOR TIKTOK
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:36:37] Is repurposing a thing on TikTok? If you were creating something on YouTube, or a blog or podcast first, what are some things you’ve seen people try that might be a good repurposing strategy?
Collin Castrina: [00:37:20] That’s a great question. I co-own The Success Network, which is all reposted content. My friend, Jamie and I, (who has half a million followers) we wanted to show we can do it on other pages using reposted content without ever showing our face.
Let’s say you personally have a YouTube channel. What you would want to do is download your YouTube video. Once you download your video, you can have a VA or a video editor, or even yourself edit it to where it’s formatted for TikTok.
You may be slightly big, but it’s going to perform way better. You see Gary V do this and a lot of other successful people on the platform. What you want to do is just download that video and format it for TikTok.
If you create IGTV videos, you can repost that on TikTok as well. When you take up the whole screen, TikTok notices that you took up the whole screen and that you didn’t download it, but in reality, you did.
If you’re taking out the whole screen and it’s formatted natively for TikTok, it’s going to be pushed out by the algorithm and it’s going to perform a lot better because people see it’s taking up the whole screen and that it makes sense.
TEST NATIVE VS. REPURPOSED CONTENT
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:38:37] I figured if you actually want to get into it, you might have to try to create some other things that are native as well. There might be some combination of repurposed and native to really give this thing a shot. Would you say that that’s true?
Collin Castrina: [00:38:52] Yeah, definitely. If your reposted content is doing really well, you’re fine with sticking to that. If you’re noticing this really, really slow growth and you feel like you’ve posted a couple of videos that you personally think would do really well, then it might be time to try hopping in a video.
Let’s say you’ve tried 20 videos of reposted content, and none of them have really exceeded your expectations, getting over a hundred views or getting over a thousand. That’s the time to hop in the videos and you need to try something different.
HAVE FUN WITH THIS SOCIAL
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:39:26] There are people out there that are figuring out their path and are starting a personal brand game. They’re trying to become known for something. Maybe you can give us some of the steps you’re taking? If someone wants to follow the same sequence, what would you tell them?
Collin Castrina: [00:39:50] I’ve tried Instagram. I love Instagram, I love LinkedIn. LinkedIn is awesome. Facebook’s cool. But TikTok allows you to have fun. Unlike any other platform, you don’t have to be extremely professional.
You can be goofy, you can have your little kids in the videos and have fun. That allows you to take off the tie, unbutton your collar, and have fun with your content. You don’t need extreme setups to be successful in the platform.
For you to build a personal brand, it’s free exposure. Try and test different content for you. Use popular sounds, use trending hashtags, and have fun with the platform. Be loose with it. Don’t say, “I’m never going to pose. This is so stupid. My coworkers are gonna laugh at me.”
They’re not going to laugh at you if you have a hundred thousand followers because you decided to take action. The big difference between successful people and unsuccessful people is taking action.
When it comes to personal branding, you just have to try it. You just have to go for it. This is free exposure. It’s really anyone’s platform. You just have to go out and take it.
YOU CAN TURN FOLLOWERS INTO YOUR TRIBE
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:40:54] How do you turn a following into a customer or a tribe?
Collin Castrina: [00:41:25] That’s an awesome question. What you would do is, again, ask what you want to be known for. You’re going to create your authority in that niche. Let’s say you want to be an expert in pottery, but you’re posting about basketball.
You’re never going to get anyone buying your pottery because they don’t know you for that. You don’t have any credibility, you haven’t established your authority.
If you’re making pots, if you’re in pottery, what you need to do is make videos every single day showing off your skills related to pottery. You’re going to start to get more targeted art people following you, people who appreciate what you do.
That’s going to allow you to push your product and say, “Hey, you know, I’m releasing this special bowl, this special pot. Go to my Instagram, follow me, shoot me a DM if you would like this. Or, comment in the comment section if you’re interested in buying this.”
Then you can spark connections. You can really get the conversation going with monetization if you’re selling products. We’re not even going to have to get into the influencer brand deals. Clothing stores are super, super successful on the platform.
Anything visual can be successful in the platform as long as you’re building your authority within that niche. You have to post about that niche and establish you are really good at what you do.
USE TIKTOK TO ESTABLISH YOUR AUTHORITY
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:42:41] The common saying is, if you want to have a business, you need to find a problem and solve it. If you have a solution for people, you can monetize it. While you’re creating that content, you talk to the people in your community, and you can provide solutions.
Collin Castrina: [00:43:13] It could be literally free market research. You can notice when people are commenting, what people are interested in watching. If I create a video that people are interested in, such as cars, I can reach out to a car dealership and say, “Hey, I’d love to help you with TikTok,” which I’ve done.
I helped the Ferrari McLaren and a Lamborghini dealership because I love cars. I saw that people were loving my car videos. You can have fun, showcase what you love, and establish your authority on social media within anything that you do as long as you try.
Brandon Birkmeyer: [00:45:17] Any final parting words you want to leave?
Collin Castrina: [00:45:28] I challenge you to go create five videos within the next five days and see what happens. Make a different video for each day with a different content strategy. Use popular sounds, use trending hashtags and have fun. Use a fifteen-second video format and tag me in it. I’d love to like it, I’ll comment on it.
If you have any questions, you can send me a direct message on Instagram. I’d love to help you guys for free.
FIND COLLIN
TikTok: @collincastrina
Instagram: @collincastrina
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