I made a brand go viral on TikTok (yours could be next)

Not Pot wanted to go viral on TikTok. They asked if I could get them 100,000 followers in six months. We spent a month scoping an experimental content plan, spent $13 on the first video, and published it at 6 p.m. on a Friday. In two hours, it had 100 likes. In two days, Not Pot had 178,000 followers.”

Brands go viral all the time on TikTok, but it's usually a flash in the pan. A video gets a ton of views and then putters out. Our main goal was to build an audience, so we needed to retain each viewer. With only a $5000 budget, we wanted to make sure each video we published had the opportunity to get not just views but followers. How'd we do it?

I'm not going to lie. Building an audience of 100,000 people with $5000 was a daunting task. That budget prohibited us from using influencers and TikTok ads. We had to get our hands dirty and develop a strategy to stretch the budget while providing maximum impact per video. I knew we could make videos worthy of views, but how could we build an account worthy of followers: A premise worth coming back to.

Not Pot's successful TikTok strategy proves that with a well-planned and executed content plan, even a small budget can result in significant audience growth. By creating quality content that kept their audience engaged, they surpassed their goal of 100,000 followers in just two days. If there's anything to learn from this case study, entertaining content is paramount to success on platforms with algorithmic discovery. Treat your product like a character in a film and place it in situations that make for good storytelling.