TikTok Ads Targeting Options for Marketing Campaigns

  In Digital Marketing campaigns, success depends on accurately identifying and reaching the right target audience. The same applies to TikTok Ads — to maximize campaign performance, your targeting settings must align with your marketing plan. TikTok Ads is a powerful advertising platform offering targeting options comparable to Facebook Ads and Google Ads, allowing you to define precise audience criteria that match your business objectives. Since its debut in 2018, TikTok has experienced exponential growth, now boasting over one billion monthly active users. This makes it a highly effective channel for Digital Marketing, especially for e-commerce businesses and online stores. But what exactly are TikTok Ads targeting options? And how can you leverage them to maximize your revenue potential from TikTok advertising?

Asia Search Solution offers TikTok advertising services to help you run highly targeted TikTok Ads, create engaging TikTok content, and produce compelling product videos — all in one place.

What is TikTok Ads Targeting?

TikTok Ads targeting refers to a set of advertising options that define your ideal customers. It allows you to refine your campaign reach, ensuring your ads are seen by users genuinely interested in your products or services. This minimizes wasted impressions on disinterested audiences and significantly reduces your marketing costs.

To access targeting settings when creating a TikTok Ads campaign, you’ll need to sign up for a TikTok Ad Manager account. After setting up your campaign, you can configure your ad group targeting. Learn more about how to easily set up TikTok Ads for better sales results.

Within TikTok Ad Manager, you can choose between two main targeting modes: manual targeting and automatic targeting. Each offers different levels of control and flexibility:

• Manual Targeting: Ideal for advertisers who know exactly who they want to reach, allowing precise control over targeting criteria.
• Automatic Targeting: Based on your campaign objectives, creatives, and performance, TikTok automatically decides the best targeting parameters.

While automatic targeting is simpler and requires minimal adjustments, manual targeting gives you granular control for maximum relevance. This article focuses on using manual targeting for the best results.

The 5 TikTok Ads Targeting Options

• Demographics
• Audience
• Interests & Behaviors
• Device
• Smart Targeting

1. Demographic Targeting

As of 2023, TikTok Ads offers six key demographic targeting filters: gender, language, age, location, household income, and spending power. These allow brands to refine audiences with high precision.

• Gender: Male/Female
• Language: Based on the user’s app language
• Age: 13–17, 18–24, 25–34, 35–44, 45–54, 55+
• Location: Target by city, country, region, province, state, DMA region, or metropolitan area
• Spending Power: Show ads to users based on purchase behaviors tracked via TikTok Ads

Before setting these demographic details, assess your product and target market to ensure relevance. If your business caters to niche or premium markets, the spending power filter can be especially valuable.

2. Audience Targeting

Audience targeting plays a crucial role in TikTok Ads performance. You can target broadly or narrowly:

• Broad Targeting: TikTok’s algorithm identifies relevant users beyond your preset parameters to expand reach.
• Narrow Targeting: Specify exactly who to include or exclude using the “Include” and “Exclude” sections in Ads Manager.

3. Interest & Behavior Targeting

Since August 2022, TikTok has streamlined interest and behavior targeting into three main categories: interests, purchase intent, and interactions (video, creator, and hashtag engagement).

Purchase Intent Targeting

Shows ads to users actively researching or intending to buy specific products or services. Ideal for lower-funnel conversions and improving ROI.

Behavior/Interaction Targeting

Targets users based on recent engagement with TikTok content, including watching, liking, commenting, or sharing videos, interacting with creators, or engaging with hashtags.

4. Device Targeting

Refine targeting based on device-specific attributes such as OS version, device model, connection type, carrier, ISP, and device price range.

5. Smart Targeting Options

TikTok offers three AI-powered targeting enhancements: targeting recommendations, expanded targeting, and other optimization features designed to improve results while saving time.

Conclusion

Finding the right audience for your TikTok Ads is easier than ever with these detailed targeting options. When used strategically, they can help convert more viewers into paying customers. TikTok Ads can be just as powerful as other major platforms, and if you need expert help, Asia Search Solution offers full-service TikTok Ads management as well as SEO services to get your business ranking on the first page.