Kate Spade video strategy gets TikTok happy, dancing on the streets of New York

In the first 24 hours after launch, Kate Spade’s new ad was viewed more than 950 million times on TikTok — despite the brand having only 3,000 followers on the platform.

The combination of dancing, music and playfulness – along with a hashtag calling for others to give it a try – has proved the perfect recipe for getting people with larger, engaged followings to share the campaign organically.

Big TikTok success more typically happens by accident, and is not usually that easy for brands to achieve by design. The randomly posted Ocean Spray/Fleetwood Mac video that became such a hit last year is a good example of this.

But Kate Spade seems to have got it right first time, persuading influencers to share its own high quality content rather than creating partnerships that do their best not to look like an ad.

Parent company Tapestry Inc (which also owns Coach and Stuart Weitzman) has strengthened its millennial appeal over the last couple of years and registered $92 million profit in its most recent quarterly earnings.