In the years following the pandemic, TikTok evolved well past what it used to be. Back then, it was seen as just another entertainment platform filled with silly audios, dance trends, and a small handful of influencers dominating the space. Now, the app holds all of that plus breaking news, educational deep dives, tips and tricks, and virtually every niche community you can imagine. TikTok has become the dominant force in social media, and with that dominance has come a real opportunity for brands to stand out and show off their creativity.
The platform has moved through several distinct eras, some of which came and went fast. Brands like Duolingo, Ryanair, Scrub Daddy, and Liquid Death were once at the forefront of this shift, leaning into being silly and unhinged in a way no one expected from a brand account, which is exactly what made it work. But audiences seem to have grown tired of that brand-meme style of content, and it would be remiss not to mention that this approach no longer lands the way it once did. The platform now seems to reward content with a distinct, individual point of view; the kind that takes more effort, and often more production value, to actually earn attention.
Top Brands on TikTok: Quick Picks
| Brand | Handle | What They’re Known For |
|---|---|---|
| Beis | @beis | Founder-led (Shay Mitchell) travel brand using competitive benchmarking and creator diversification to stay ahead of the algorithm |
| Poppi | @drinkpoppi | Pioneered “founder-led TikTok” with unscripted origin-story content and a mix of micro- and mega-creators |
| Rhode | @rhode | Hailey Bieber’s raw “Get Ready With Me” content and comment-driven product iteration |
| Grillo’s Pickles | @grillospickles | Runs its account like a fan page dedicated to pickles — ASMR, street interviews, recurring mascot bit |
| Gap | @gap | Denim collaborations (Katseye’s “Better in Denim”) turned into crowd-sourced dance challenges |
| Anthropic / Claude | @claude | Positions AI as a creative collaborator, not a replacement, to win over a skeptical creative community |
| Graza | @getgraza | Turned olive oil packaging into a bit — DM outreach to creators, skits, real-time meme response |
| Monte | @themonteclub | Instructional, tactile hair-styling tutorials driven by affiliate-style creator codes |
| Nude Project | @nudeproject | Community-before-product streetwear brand built on raw visuals and limited drops |
| Lohause | @lohause | Small eyewear brand scaling views through a recurring character (“Mr. Lohause”) rather than post volume |
What brands are crushing it on TikTok?
1. Beis | @beis
Shay Mitchell’s travel brand has become one of TikTok’s most consistent case studies in staying ahead of the algorithm. Beis keeps its feed loaded with trending sounds, product drops, and demo-style content, and it leans on competitive benchmarking, tracking rivals like Away and Monos to make sure its content and cadence stay a step ahead. On the influencer side, Beis has deliberately diversified beyond its core female travel audience, bringing on menswear creators and even NFL players to open up new demographics without losing its original voice.
Putting the founder front and center, not just as a face, but as a presence in the content, gave Beis a voice beyond the product. That shift is a big part of what makes her feel less like a founder doing PR and more like an entrepreneur in the trenches with everyone else — and it’s what makes the rest of the content land the way it does.
2. Poppi | @drinkpoppi
Poppi is the reason “founder-led TikTok” became a startup playbook. Co-founder Allison Ellsworth posted an unscripted video about the brand’s origin story that generated $100,000 in sales within 24 hours and TikTok wasn’t even part of the marketing budget at the time. A year later, roughly 20% of Poppi’s ad spend had shifted to TikTok, and the brand’s ‘drink poppi’ hashtag has since crossed a billion views.
What makes Poppi’s approach distinct is the range: it works with lesser known creators such as Brett Chody and Mickey Gordon alongside mega-names like Alix Earle and Post Malone, and it deliberately keeps content low-production — founder selfie videos and behind-the-scenes clips that read as friend recommendations, not ads. That authenticity-first approach helped the brand scale to a PepsiCo acquisition.
3. Rhode | @rhode
Even before Rhode officially launched, Hailey Bieber spent years sharing her honest, everyday skincare routines online. This built a huge level of trust with her followers. By the time her products actually came out, there was already a waitlist of 700,000 people who felt like they knew exactly what they were getting.
That feeling of being in the loop is the heart of their TikTok strategy. Instead of flashy ads, you see raw “Get Ready With Me” videos, often with Hailey herself chatting with fans in the comments. Rhode has also nailed a certain look that feels almost like food — think “glazed donut” skin or “strawberry glaze” vibes. It makes people crave the lifestyle, not just the product. And since only about 15% of posts even mention Hailey by name anymore, it’s clear the brand is strong enough to stand on its own.
What really keeps people coming back, though, is that Rhode actually listens. They treat comments like a guide for what to do next. When fans mentioned they didn’t like the texture of a lip treatment, the brand fixed it right away. From updating their jars to cutting out colors that weren’t working, they show they aren’t afraid to do the hard work of making things better based on what their community says. In a world of social media fluff, that kind of honesty gives them real staying power.
4. Grillo’s Pickles | @grillospickles
Rather than maintaining a standard corporate presence, Grillo’s has effectively crafted a fan page dedicated to pickles. Their feed seamlessly blends ASMR jar-opening clips, street interviews of people trying a pickle for the first time, and a recurring joke where the brand treats itself as a cherished mascot. While you always recognize the brand, the specific post remains unpredictable by design.
By maintaining an absurd, low-stakes tone and deliberately avoiding giveaways, Grillo’s ensures users follow for the content rather than an incentive. This restraint preserves the authentic fan account feel, earning follower loyalty organically. While many brands attempt “unhinged” humor and come across as forced, Grillo’s executes it effortlessly through a collaborative approach focused on creating an inviting space for pickle enthusiasts.
5. Gap | @gap
Gap has been around for decades, but it’s in the middle of a genuine renaissance right now, largely thanks to a run of denim collaborations that keep hitting. The “Better in Denim” campaign with the K-pop-adjacent group Katseye, dancing to Kelis’s “Milkshake,” became the most-liked and shared TikTok in company history within its launch week and helped push Gap up to the No. 6 spot among adult denim brands in the U.S.
Notably, the ad skipped dialogue and any direct sales pitch entirely, focusing purely on movement set to music, which made it inherently shareable and easy to remix, prompting fans to post their own choreography and turning the campaign into a crowd-sourced dance challenge that spread almost entirely on its own.
That’s become something of a formula for Gap now: Katseye, Hailey Bieber, Malcolm Todd, and the list keeps growing. A repeatable structure of pairing denim with culturally relevant names and letting a song and a moment do the selling. It’s also folded into a broader brand reset that includes nostalgia plays like reissuing vintage pieces. Some would argue Gap is edging toward a point where audiences get fatigued seeing the same playbook repeated, but until that happens, the formula is working, and Gap is killing it.
6. Anthropic / Claude | @claude
What sets Anthropic apart on TikTok is how deliberately human it’s trying to make an AI brand feel. The company knows it’s fighting an uphill battle with the creative community. A lot of people’s default reaction to an AI tool is suspicion, if not outright hostility, so the content strategy leans hard into positioning Claude as something that helps creatives rather than replaces them. That meant highlighting genuine creators, real use cases, and work that actually required a human point of view, rather than leading with the technology itself. Because Anthropic knows it’s up against real skepticism, there’s a noticeable effort to make sure whatever does go out is good and meaningful, not just a product push.
That care shows up around the edges of the brand’s footprint too. Anthropic’s TikTok presence isn’t built on traditional brand content so much as it’s become something marketers point to and dissect on their own breakdowns of its ad campaigns, its notably lean team structure, and its growth stack. Anthropic seems to understand that winning over the creative community requires more restraint and intention than a typical product launch.
7. Graza | @getgraza
Graza turned olive oil into a TikTok obsession by treating the bottle itself as the brand strategy. Before launch, Graza skipped paid contracts entirely and just DM’d food creators with playful one-liners, sending free samples of the bright green squeeze bottle split into two clear-use SKUs: Sizzle for cooking, Drizzle for finishing. That clarity plus a genuinely photogenic, squeezable package made Graza a natural fit for cooking content, and creators ran with it on their own.
The brand’s own content leans into that same playful energy, often tipping into full-on unhinged territory with skits and goofy bits that show off its personality rather than just its product. One standout was a skit riffing on “The Devil Wears Prada,” which pulled in over 4.5 million views, well beyond what most of their posts typically get. That kind of reach is a payoff for genuinely committing to the bit instead of phoning in a generic reference, and it’s a big part of why their originality keeps standing out in a crowded food-brand space.
That same instinct carries into how Graza handles moments it doesn’t control. When Sam Altman was filmed using the finishing-only Drizzle to cook, Graza leaned straight into the culinary “controversy” with a real-time “Drizzle vs. Sizzle” campaign instead of getting defensive, and it’s turned other random internet moments (like a viral olive-oil-slip story) into on-brand label riffs within days. It’s become the go-to case study for treating comedy and real-time cultural reaction as core content strategy.
Niche brands leading on creativity (before they go fully mainstream)
1. Monte | @themonteclub
Monte, a men’s hair styling brand, has built its TikTok presence almost entirely around instructional, tactile content, step-by-step texturizing tutorials, “how to style your hair like [iconic figure]” formats, and barber-style demos that treat the product itself as the star.
The messaging leans hard into specific, sensory selling points, repeated across nearly every piece of content, which keeps the value proposition consistent even as creators and formats change. Much of its growth has come through affiliate-style creator codes rather than big-budget campaigns, letting individual barbers and stylists become de facto brand reps.
2. Nude Project | @nudeproject
Nude Project is a Spanish streetwear label that went from a €600 start to a brand reportedly valued in the tens of millions, and its TikTok/Instagram strategy is built entirely around community before product. Early growth came from a giveaway mechanic requiring follows and shares rather than purchases, which prioritized audience-building over immediate sales.
Since then, the brand has leaned into limited “drop” releases and a raw, unpolished visual style. Product shots tossed on beds or floors instead of clean studio grids, that reads as more collectible and authentic to its audience. Founders have described the approach as building a worldview first and a product line second.
3. Lohause | @lohause
Lohause is a small Portuguese eyewear brand that went from roughly 12,000 average views per video to 500,000+ in about a year, with some videos crossing 2 million. And they achieved this with a tiny volume of posts rather than high-volume output.
The engine behind their growth is a recurring character, “Mr. Lohause,” styled as a sharp, espresso-drinking Lisbon figure who appears across cinematic mini-skits that only subtly feature the glasses. The brand also runs an efficient content pipeline: short-form video is shot once, then stills are pulled from the same footage for use as static ads, so nothing is produced twice.
The Unhinged Era Is Over: What’s Replacing It on Brand TikTok
What is unhinged marketing on TikTok?
Unhinged marketing is best exemplified by accounts like Duolingo. This strategy avoids rigid formulas in favor of rapid trend-jacking, deep alignment with internet culture, and occasional plain random posts designed purely for shock value and attention. Duolingo demonstrated this strategy when they temporarily “killed off” their mascot, sparking widespread conversation online.
However, unhinged marketing inherently struggles with long-term sustainability. Once the initial novelty and surprise wear off, relying solely on shock value fails to build a durable social media foundation.
Where Brands on TikTok are Pivoting
Brands are constantly adapting their social media strategies, but analyzing these recent examples highlights a major shift taking place. The digital landscape is continuously evolving: after moving away from rigid, corporate, high-production content, brands embraced overly casual, meme-driven, and “unhinged” posts to align with modern internet culture. However, as this unscripted, highly informal approach has become saturated, its novelty is fading and audience engagement is dropping.
Based on emerging FYP trends, a noticeable pivot is underway. Audiences are now seeking a balance in content that retains the authentic, relatable feel of platform-native videos, but is elevated by the higher production value, effort, and polish traditionally reserved for commercial campaigns.
The Social Shift
Even with the standout examples of brands on TikTok above, there has been a noticeable decline in brands truly making a lasting impact on social media, largely driven by the broader shift in content dynamics. As audiences increasingly demand original, well-defined perspectives over temporary trend-jacking, the landscape has fragmented.
Instead of sustained influence, we see a revolving door of brands momentarily capturing the spotlight with a single campaign before attention quickly drifts elsewhere. Maintaining a long-term position as a thought leader in the social space has become far more challenging, and it will be fascinating to observe how this landscape adapts as a new style of content takes center stage.
Why should brands be on TikTok?
TikTok is undoubtedly a powerful channel for brands seeking to expand their visibility and reach broader audiences. The platform offers unmatched exposure, making an active presence increasingly vital for brands aiming to remain competitive. Younger generations frequently turn to TikTok for product discovery and purchasing decisions; without a strategy in place, brands risk missing out on significant engagement and potentially revenue opportunities.
How do brands succeed on TikTok?
There’s no single formula for guaranteed success on TikTok, but consistency comes closest. The algorithm rewards accounts that show up regularly, which means posting isn’t just about staying visible, it’s about staying in consideration. Every video is a chance to remind your audience you exist, show potential customers what you’re building, and reinforce that your brand has something worth paying attention to.
The inverse is just as true. Go quiet for a week or two, and the algorithm starts treating you like a stranger, not a familiar face. Reach drops, followers drift, and the rebuild takes longer than the pause did. On a platform built around momentum, silence doesn’t just pause growth, it actively works against it.
How often should brands post on TikTok?
Ultimately, post frequency depends on the brand, but consistency is non-negotiable. As a general rule, aim to post at least twice a week, and increase output whenever possible around product launches or major brand events, when visibility matters most.
On NoGood’s TikTok, we aim to produce around 5 videos a week. We want to be active participants in culture, not spectators commenting on it after the fact. Staying at the forefront of timely conversations means showing up consistently enough that the algorithm knows we have something to say.
Can small brands compete with big brands on TikTok?
Although it can feel intimidating, smaller brands can easily compete with larger ones on TikTok. Often, the content that stands out most comes from small brands with a strong, distinct vision.
Rather than feeling discouraged, smaller businesses can use this to their advantage — they have the flexibility to build a unique identity and test fresh ideas without the pressure of a massive audience watching their every move.