TikTok SEO: How to reach your audience and grow your business

Struggling to stand out on TikTok while your competitors are turning the platform into a lead generation machine? Well, you can do this too, but the truth is, most location-based businesses underestimate the power of TikTok SEO. Doing so puts you at the mercy of the platform’s whims, potentially missing out on the discovery, visibility, and revenue that come with ranking in TikTok search. 

Whether you run a healthcare clinic in Houston or a home services brand with locations across California, higher visibility on TikTok can directly translate to more foot traffic, inquiries, and revenue.

In this guide, we’ll explain exactly how TikTok SEO works, why it matters for your business, and the steps you can take to appear in more TikTok search results, reach your target audience, and grow your brand.

What is TikTok SEO?

TikTok SEO refers to optimizing your TikTok content to appear prominently in TikTok search results and sometimes even in Google Search. Like traditional search engine optimization, TikTok SEO involves using relevant keywords, niche hashtags, optimized video information, and other strategies to increase visibility within the app’s powerful search engine.

Whether you’re a multi-location healthcare clinic or a local restaurant chain, understanding TikTok SEO helps discover your content by more TikTok users actively searching for services like yours.

The process of content discovery on TikTok

FYP: TikTok's FYP algorithm curates engaging content based on a user's behavior. Appearing here depends heavily on your ranking content, user interactions, and trending elements.

Search bar: Many TikTok users leverage the TikTok search bar to find products, services, and businesses nearby. A good TikTok SEO strategy ensures your content ranks for these search queries.

Why is investing in TikTok SEO important? 

TikTok’s popularity has been one for the books in the past few years. After beginning as a video sharing platform, it is now one of the most critical channels for most businesses. Investing in TikTok SEO means you set your business up for success on this platform and ensure you generate qualified leads, revenue, and stronger brand awareness. 

Here are a few more strong reasons why every business account needs to focus on TikTok SEO: 

TikTok is a search engine

The internet has moved beyond Google, and there is a search engine in town – TikTok. Even if your audience discovers your business on Google, if they can’t locate you on TikTok, you may lose them to a competitor that has optimized their TikTok handle and video content. 

Birdeye research on social media usage suggests that 40% of users use TikTok regularly, making it a critical platform for customer outreach and acquisition. 

Conducting a TikTok keyword research must be a part of every marketer’s to-do list for continued hold in the market. 

Google now indexes TikTok videos

Video content has been dominating Google search results for a while now, mostly YouTube videos. TikTok videos have also been appearing for specific queries. 

Google indexing TikTok content is good news, but only if your account has appropriate keywords and hashtags in the caption for TikTok videos. Focusing on SEO for the platform can help you gain attention from Google and TikTok, boosting brand awareness and conversion potential. 

Optimizing TikTok videos builds a strong community 

Business owners and social media managers know the horrors of posting a video and waking up to barely any likes or comments. And this is not always a reflection of the content you post – it is often a sign of a weak TikTok community. With investment in SEO, TikTok videos reach your core audience via the search bar or the FYP page. 

Using the right keywords, hashtags, and video styling can signal the context to the TikTok algorithm, boosting engagement rates and the business account’s follower base. 

Being on the FYP translates to revenue 

Social search engine optimization strategies can help show up on search results and take you to the FYP (For You Page). This is where most TikTok users spend the most time, so an appearance here can ensure you reach your target audience and convince them to choose your business over competitors. 

Featuring on FYP means more video views, eventually leading to website traffic, appointments, walk-ins, and improved revenue for the business. 

Boost brand awareness 

A strong TikTok SEO strategy puts your business in front of the right audience—on their terms. Being featured in TikTok search results builds long-term brand trust and recognition while also strengthening your brand compared to your competitors. 

Birdeye research shows that only 20% of businesses are active on TikTok, making it the best time to build an early adopter advantage. And most location-based businesses are already leading the way with hospitality (50%), real estate (43%), and healthcare (35%) , boasting some of the highest usage rates. 

TikTok SEO ranking factors – A look at the TikTok algorithm 

Before we dive into TikTok SEO, it is vital to understand the TikTok ranking factors that decide how and what content reaches the users. The 

User interactions 

When it comes to showcasing certain TikTok Videos on a user’s FYP, the platform considers two facets of user interactions – existing engagement/interaction your videos have received and how that particular user has interacted with TikTok videos in the past. 

Let’s break it down. 

For example, if an automotive business wants to reach an audience of social media-savvy business women looking for the latest car models, a TikTok video can help. But, how does the TikTok algorithm understand that your target audience may find the video engaging or helpful? Here is how: 

1. The platform analyzes the users who have already interacted with your video and then deems it engaging to similar audiences. 
2. The platform knows what each user has interacted with in the past, and if your video follows the same patterns – type of video, industry content they enjoy, content they save or share – then your video joins the queue of the content TikTok wants to put on their FYP. 

As you can see, this is a complex process, but keeping the faith and understanding what makes a video go viral can help you achieve better results with your TikTok campaigns. 

Note: While a profile's prominence can help, the actual TikTok follower count does not have a direct impact on content rankings. If people like your content, even a smaller account can take off and reach FYP. 

Video information

What does TikTok see within the video to identify its relevance, authority, and prominence to your audience? That would be the video information you add via keywords, hashtags, titles, visual elements, trending audio, and more. 

Each element of your video will play a crucial role in helping TikTok understand the context of your content. This is why we recommend analyzing trending videos to check what your audience likes and follow the same principles while adding your brand personality. 

TikTok SEO Tip: While it is tempting to replicate trending videos frame-by-frame, this strategy may not always work for all businesses. For example, an overload of transitions or filters may work for the hospitality sector, but healthcare businesses must proceed cautiously to not overwhelm the audience. Understanding the intersection of trends your audience likes and what works for your industry is the secret to success. 

Content and device settings 

TikTok prides itself on providing its users with the most relevant and engaging content. Users use the device and content preferences in their account settings to optimize the overall experience on the platform. 

Users can choose to view content from their region (country) in their language of preference. Often, TikTok also takes the device users have and their initial selection of content categories into account. 

TikTok SEO vs. Traditional SEO

While the basic principles of SEO can be the same across platforms, here are a few key differences to note between traditional SEO and TikTok SEO: 

Both require SEO strategies, but the mechanics and ranking factors differ significantly.

Getting started with TikTok SEO 

Now that we know how TikTok SEO works, let us understand how you can put this knowledge into practice. Here is how location-based businesses can optimize their TikTok accounts for greater visibility. 

Analyze the target audience and the current followers’ information 

Before you create, you must understand who you are creating for. Only then will the content resonate and gain traction on the platform. And to know this, businesses must start by defining:

• Ideal customer profile 
• The target audience group that is active on TikTok 
• Audience demographic that interacts with competitor content 

Multi-location businesses must do this exercise for the overall brand and individual locations, too, especially if you have location-specific accounts. 

Each audience group will have unique interests, content preferences, and online behavior. Understanding this brings you one step closer to creating and optimizing content that can instantly reach their FYP. 

Find relevant keywords and hashtags 

The next step is to conduct an extensive keyword and hashtag research. Businesses can identify the keywords they can target for their TikTok content by:

• Using the search bar to explore trending search queries
• Identifying keywords with trending video results on search engines 
• Auditing competitor content to see what TikTok hashtags and keywords are frequently used on their high-performing content 

Pro Tip: In your content, mix long-tail keywords, industry-specific keywords, and low-volume keywords. Pair them with popular hashtags and niche hashtags for balance.

Optimize content for higher rankings

TikTok has gained popularity as a search engine because of the platform’s organic and non-promotional nature of recommendations and content. Replicating such results for branded content can be challenging, since social media managers must balance optimal keyword usage and non-overtly promotional language. 

A few ways to seamlessly optimize TikTok content include: 

• Using keywords and hashtags in captions, on-screen text, and speech
• Choosing trending sounds relevant to your brand
• Formulating video titles with relevant keywords

Monitor, analyze, and iterate 

The research and optimization parts of the plan are vital, but you can’t stop there. Social media algorithms are constantly changing as users find new profiles, content formats, and creators to engage with. That is why it is important for business accounts to use TikTok analytics and monitor their progress constantly, analyze what’s working, and iterate on successful video styles. 

Some metrics to monitor for TikTok success are video views, impressions, link clicks, and comments. 

How to track search traffic on TikTok

After working on SEO, TikTok managers obviously also want to know how much traffic it drives to their business. So, how do you measure TikTok SEO driven traffic on the platform? The platform’s analytics dashboard tells quite a bit about this: 

1. Business accounts can track traffic sources from the analytics dashboard and understand what drives people to their accounts. The options include FYP, Following, Personal profile, sounds/audio, direct messages, and others. 

2. The search terms that led TikTok users to your account. 

Gaining traction on TikTok can do wonders for your online presence, but it requires a systematic approach to outshine the competitors and creators working in your niche. And that is why, understanding the audience, the landscape, and business goals before setting out to publish videos is the best way to ace TikTok SEO for location-based enterprises. 

8 best TikTok SEO tips that every business should know 

Wondering how to come out on top (literally!) on the platform? Here are the top TikTok SEO tips that every business account must follow:

1. Understand TikTok search intent 
2. Choose broad and industry-specific hashtags 
3. Get creative for high-ranking content inspiration
4. Optimize on-video content 
5. Keep it cool on keyword and hashtag density 
6. Maintain a consistent posting schedule 
7. Turn on the auto-generated captions 
8. Leverage trending sounds 

Let us explore each of these TikTok SEO tips in detail. 

Understand TikTok search intent 

The first rule of SEO is always to follow the search intent—whether informational, commercial, or transactional. TikTok SEO is no exception to this rule. 

Understanding search intent helps you understand the target audience and deliver relevant content for each keyword. This is especially relevant for boosting visibility in active search discovery mode or when someone types in a business name or a related keyword like sushi restaurant manhattan or ford service Austin.

For example, someone searching for ‘Invisalign vs. dental braces’ wants educational content,, while the keyword ‘top Invisalign clinics’ is a more commercial search. Understanding this helps you tailor your content accordingly and provide a superior user experience. 

Pro Tip: Expand your search beyond TikTok’s search engine to understand the intent. Run a Google search and analyze the results to unlock opportunities that your competitors are missing. You can use tools like Birdeye Insights AI to see your local content's ranks on Google search. 

Choose broad and industry-specific hashtags 

As a search engine, TikTok relies on keywords and hashtags to understand your video’s content. To optimize it to the fullest extent, businesses must choose a combination of broad and niche hashtags. 

Let us consider a plumbing service in Austin looking to reach its target base via TikTok. For a project video, it must choose the hashtags #plumbinginAustin and #homeservicebusiness. 

This way, anyone looking for a home service provider in the locality can also find them, in addition to those specifically looking for plumbers in Austin. 

Get creative for high-ranking content inspiration 

Keyword research can help you build a solid content calendar, but you should not limit yourself to it. Look for inspiration beyond TikTok search: 

• Explore other social media platforms to anticipate needs before they reach TikTok. If competing dental clinics go viral on Instagram or YouTube shorts for a particular topic, be the first to break it on TikTok. 
• Monitor competitor feeds to see what is working for them and explore how you can put your spin on it to steal the traffic to your account. 
• Talk to your customers and understand what they would like to see more of on social media platforms. Deliver on expectations to see a quick rise in follower count. 

Looking for a comprehensive view of your competitors’ feeds to see what is trending for the day? Birdeye Competitors AI helps you keep tabs on your competitors and replicate results with a few clicks. 

Optimize on-video content 

As video information is a significant TikTok ranking factor, optimizing the content in and on the video is critical to reaching search results. Even the most well-shot content may not rank well if it isn’t optimized for SEO within the video. 

For best results:

• Overlay keywords in your video with text. 
• Ensure the keyword comes on in the beginning and stays on for at least 3-5 seconds in the video. 
• Enhance the captions and video descriptions with long-tail keywords so that you set the context for the platform and users. 

Pro Tip: TikTok constantly monitors what you say, show, and write in your video to rank it accordingly. Make sure you mention the top keywords in the video, showcase them via text, and use them in the background as much as possible. 

Keep it cool on keyword and hashtag density 

Brevity is your best bet to win on a platform with an average video time of 20-30 seconds. This applies to keywords and hashtag density as well. 

The optimal keyword and hashtag density is to use 2-3 meaningful long-tail keywords, two broad hashtags, and two niche hashtags at most. Stuffing the most keywords and hashtags may confuse the algorithm and harm your growth. 

Focus on creating high-quality videos that speak to your audience by stuffing keywords and hoping for the best. 

Maintain a consistent posting schedule 

The early engagement your TikTok video receives plays a considerable role in the platform championing it and moving it to your audience’s FYP. So, anything you can do to get likes, comments, shares, and saves when you post a video goes a long way towards SEO efforts. 

Maintaining a consistent posting schedule is one of the best ways to ensure your video immediately receives attention. 

Like any social media audience, TikTok users have specific usage times. Once you identify the best time to post on TikTok for your niche, you should make the most of it. Posting consistently at the time can give you the start you need to boost TikTok SEO efforts. 

Wondering how to identify the best time to post for various locations and social accounts? Work with an AI social media management tool like Birdeye Social AI to get instant recommendations on when to post on what account. And, in a few clicks. 

Turn on the auto-generated captions for accessibility and improved user experience 

Most people passively scroll through TikTok feeds with the sound off. Having captions boosts accessibility, keeps them engaged, and ensures that your overall interactions remain high on the platform. 

The spoken keywords get an additional boost when they also appear in the captions. 

Use the auto-generated captions feature to increase keyword density, optimize for user experience, and expand the reach of your content. 

Leverage trending sounds 

When a trending video catches the audience’s attention, they tend to go on a watching spree of all videos associated with that sound. Identifying trending audio and using it in your content ensures you reach a broader base than you would have otherwise. 

However, it is important not to mindlessly follow trends but to choose relevant audio that your audience will appreciate and engage with. 

Conclusion 

TikTok is one of the most popular search platforms for Gen Z and Millennial customers. Following TikTok SEO best practices ensures users can discover your business via active search and FYP. 

Whether you’re managing multiple clinic branches or restaurant locations, optimizing your TikTok content ensures your brand surfaces in search, reaches the right audience, and converts views into visits. 

TikTok SEO strategies help your videos land in both TikTok and Google search results, from keyword-rich captions, relevant hashtags, to on-screen text. The earlier you start, the stronger your presence. Don’t let your competitors win the attention game—start optimizing today and make your TikTok account an actual growth engine for your business.

FAQs on TikTok SEO

Supercharge your growth on TikTok with Birdeye Social AI

Consistency, optimization, and analytics—focusing on these three pillars can significantly appease the TikTok algorithm. However, these pose significant challenges for multi-location businesses with multiple accounts, a high user base, and a competitive market. 

And that is why Birdeye Social AI is the perfect fit for enterprise businesses looking to streamline their TikTok marketing efforts. With Birdeye Social AI, your social media managers can: 

• Make the most of TikTok search engine phenomena with built-in AI features to create, optimize, and schedule content across multiple accounts 
• Schedule and publish all content at pre-determined best times to guarantee maximum engagement 
• Monitor competitor feeds and identify trending topics
• Track and analyze engagement rates to tweak TikTok SEO strategy as needed 

Put your TikTok account on autopilot and let Birdeye Social AI help you scale your marketing efforts. Watch a free demo to learn more.