How To Edit TikTok Videos [Tips for Making Perfect TikToks]

Sep 15, 2023
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Picture-Perfect: How To Edit TikTok Videos

When social media marketing took off, it was enough to write a witty caption under a photo—now, as more and more socials focus on videos, video editing and production skills are a must.When you’re new to TikTok, the platform can be confusing. You can find 3-minute videos of perfectly edited dance moves, clothing changes, and optical illusions. Other TikTokers, like Addison Rae Easterling and Charli D’Amelio, often seem to grab their phone, take a video, and post whatever comes out—and they are the ones that make the most money.We’ll share some tips on how to edit TikTok videos without any prior knowledge. You can use these ideas regardless of whether you’re a marketing professional who uses TikTok for business purposes or someone who wants to boost their personal account.

Before the Editing Starts

Even though TikTok is not the first social media platform that focuses on videos, no app has managed to gain such popularity and make editing and posting videos so easy and fun.While others have tried to emulate it (looking at you, Instagram Reels), TikTok became popular by allowing users to express their creativity through easy-to-use effects—be it a sticker or a sound sample they can lip-sync to.Editing TikTok videos and applying various effects is what will make your post a good or bad one. That doesn’t mean, though, that you can create a masterpiece with a single effect added—the original video still has to be of a high-enough quality.To make a quality video, you need to consider two crucial elements:

  1. Camera
  2. Lighting

While you don’t need to have a professional camera that costs $10,000, you need to ensure the final product doesn’t come out pixelated and hard to look at. Thankfully, most current smartphones come with quality lenses.The magic of a quality video happens behind the camera. Lighting is crucial for a top-notch TikTok, and that’s why the popularity of ring lights has gone through the roof recently. They’re cheap, and they’ll give you even lighting, amping up the production value of your video and its engagement rates.

How To Edit TikTok Videos—In-App Editing

When you take care of the setting and adequate equipment, it’s time to make your TikTok video. It may seem too simple, but the in-app editing features can take care of 99% of your TikTok-editing needs. When you open the app and tap the Record button, you’ll find several options to play with your recording. These include:

  • Add sound—You can choose a track to add to your video. If you use a Business Account, TikTok will only show “Commercial sounds” that are royalty-free for sponsored posts
  • Flip—Use it to switch between the back and the selfie camera
  • Speed—This option allows you to slow down or speed up the recording
  • Filters—You can choose between different categories, including Portrait, Landscape, Food, and Vibe
  • Enhance—It’s a beautifying feature. It lets you smoothen and contour your face, whiten your teeth, and add makeup effects
  • Timer—This feature allows you to start with a countdown and lets you choose the duration of the video, allowing you to record hands-free
  • Reply—Adds a question from the Q&A section to your video

When you add all these elements together, you’ll get a TikTok video that’s miles away from the original footage.

Templates and Effects

Other available features in the in-app editing program are Effects and Templates.There are thousands of effects you can use in your videos—from green-screen backgrounds to heads-up polls. The Trending section of the Effects tab is worth exploring, especially for businesses, because you can:

  1. Find out what is popular and post a video about it, hoping to end up on the For You page
  2. Create your own effect and place it here via TikTok advertising, which can be a great way to promote your brand

Templates are there if you want to create a post quickly and don’t have a lot of creative ideas at the moment. It tells you what to upload (for instance, add 5–7 photos), and it creates a video on its own, using the same preset animations.

Editing After Filming

Once you create your video, you can add additional sounds, effects, text, filters, and stickers. The effects available after the filming is done are different from the initial options—at this stage, you can add transitions between different scenes or add filters and overlays to different segments, but you can’t change what your video looks like as drastically as with the effects available on the Record screen.When you have all the raw footage for your TikTok and tap the pink checkmark button to proceed, you will also have a chance to use three new features:

  1. Adjust clips—Lets you cut and trim your video, as well as combine multiple pre-recorded clips
  2. Voice effects—Alters the audio in your video with over 20 effects to choose from, including Baritone, Robot, Spooky, and Echo
  3. Voiceover—Allows you to record your audio after you’re done with filming, with or without keeping the original sound. This option is great for narrating (for example, in tutorials), and it is recommended to use a microphone to enhance the overall quality of your video

Depending on the app version you have, you may also see another Enhance option, which automatically adjusts several video settings to make your post look better.

Source: Plann

Editing After Posting

If you post a video you’re not completely happy with, you can’t edit it any further on the spot. What you can do is:

  1. Download the uploaded video
  2. Tap Record
  3. Access the downloaded video from the library
  4. Add new edits

The downloaded video will keep all the previous edits you applied during the initial editing process. When you add all the other elements, you can post the new TikTok and delete the old one.

Video Editing Apps for TikTok

If you’re not fully satisfied with the editing range the app offers, you can always use external TikTok video editors. Although they have a small learning curve to them, they’re intuitive and easy to use, and you won’t need any training to master them.Here are several video editing apps and programs that you can try if you find TikTok lacking in features:NameAdvantagesPricingGoPro Quik

  • Unlimited cloud backup
  • Auto-sync edits to the music
  • Automatic highlight videos

Free with in-app purchasesInShot

  • Great for combining multiple videos
  • Convenient for trimming, cutting, and splitting videos

FreeMagisto

  • Licensed music library
  • Free templates
  • Stock videos and photos

Subscription options start from $4.99 per monthLomotif

  • Music catalog
  • Hyperlapse effect
  • Collages/montages
  • Instant edits

Free with watermark ($4.99 to remove the watermark)Zoomerang

  • Large effects library
  • Free tutorials

Free

TikTok Video Editor

It’s also worth mentioning that TikTok has its own video editor, separate from the in-app options. TikTok Video Editor was created for businesses who want to make an authentic video when creating an ad, and it can be found in the Create a Video menu on the TikTok Ads Manager dashboard (or in the Ad Creation menu available when setting up your paid campaign). To use this editor, you need to:

  1. Select your video clips
  2. Add a soundtrack
  3. Add text
  4. Use post-production tools like:
  5. Object Eraser
  6. Effects
  7. Multi-layer Edit
  8. Transitions
  9. Crop to size
  10. Split Audio Track

You can also turn on the Masking feature to see what your ad will look like in the TikTok app.

How To Edit TikTok Videos—Using Transitions

Transition videos are popular on TikTok and are more likely to end up on the For You page. If you want to become famous on this app, you need to perfect the art of making transition videos (spoiler alert: it’s not that hard).You can make separate video clips within the same post with a specific transition in mind and add a transition effect after you film all the clips. Some of the most popular ideas for transition videos include:

  • Jump cuts—This is the easiest one. Just record one clip after another without any effects in between
  • Finger snaps—The transition from one clip to another happens with a finger snap. It’s important to place your fingers correctly to make the edit look seamless. Videos using this theme usually incorporate some popular background music
  • Before and after—Cover your camera with a hand or a blanket to make a transition between different settings. This is often used in fashion and makeup videos, where creators showcase outfits or the final look

https://www.tiktok.com/@mnrazon/video/7024480752444247323?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc&web_id7056720794054985222Source: MN RazonSince transition videos are so popular, you can always look at the trending challenges to inspire you and give you more ideas for your future content. For instance, check out #InfinityChallenge or #HandsUpChallenge.

TikTok Video Editing for Businesses

If you’re using TikTok as a part of your social media marketing strategy, your video editing process doesn’t need to have any special steps that differ from what general users do when posting on this app. While you want to create high-quality videos, make sure you don’t do too much in one post.TikTok has an off-the-cuff feel to it, and unless you’re Zach King, over-the-top production value can actually work against you. That doesn’t mean you should put out something filmed with a toaster, but you don’t need to (and shouldn’t) upload a 4K cinematic masterpiece either.TikTokers appreciate spontaneity and are likely to get annoyed with a company that posts a perfectly shot ad instead of a quirky dance challenge with a blooper in it.A great tip for businesses is to make a TikTok that’s a looping video. TikTok keeps playing the video from the start automatically until the user scrolls away from it. Looping videos—the ones where the ending perfectly matches the beginning—are oddly satisfying.https://www.tiktok.com/@explore_create_capture/video/7050121710397443334?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc&web_id7056720794054985222Source: BRIAN O’DONNELLWith a short looping video, you have the chance to get people to watch your video over and over again, giving you more views instantly and improving your engagement rates. Your completion rate will be higher, and TikTok’s algorithm will recommend your content on the For You page, which is the first step to going viral and reaching new followers.

Follow TikTok Celebrities

The best way to find great ideas for your TikToks is to follow the most popular creators and see what they’re posting. More often than not, they’re the ones that initiate trending challenges and dances.You can also use Stitch—an editing feature that allows you to take a part of their video and react to it in your own post. Another popular editing tool is the split-screen mode called Duet, perfect for recreating challenges as it shows the original video and your reaction to it at the same time.Promoting your brand on TikTok via influencer marketing is another great option, especially if you don’t have enough time to deal with editing videos on your own.TikTok influencers are successful content creators with a large following who earn money on TikTok through the platform’s Creator Fund program or by striking deals with brands and creating sponsored posts.As a business, you can benefit from an influencer’s popularity—you’ll reach a large audience, and many fans will support companies that support their favorite creators.You can use the Creator Marketplace to find an influencer that best fits your brand’s needs.When agreeing on a sponsored post, you can choose what type of content you want your influencer to create or give them total creative freedom if their content already matches your brand’s intent.

Let Professionals Edit Your TikTok Videos

It’s tough to transition to a new social media app, especially one that targets the new generation. You have to create a unique approach and post content TikTok users will relate to—copy-pasting the same material you use on other social media won’t do the trick.TikTokers are used to editing videos a certain way and will quickly sniff out a brand that tries to pretend they know what they’re doing. The worst part is, if you go full-throttle and create an amazing video with exceptional quality, you’ll overdo it and miss the point of TikTok, which is to be spontaneous and post videos quickly.If you have an in-house social media manager, they probably have to take care of content calendars and ad campaigns, interact with followers, and create content for multiple platforms—not just TikTok. Still, for building brand awareness on this platform, you need someone who can quickly react to new viral trends and dish out a high-performing post without delays.That’s why many brands easily fall behind when it comes to their TikTok presence.

We Know How To Create Engaging TikTok Videos

Kubbco is a TikTok partner and a social media agency that has experience with successful TikTok campaigns and knows how to produce videos that perfectly fit the theme and match the vibe of the platform.When you start working with Kubbco, you’ll have a team of content creators, video producers, designers, animators, and voiceover and sound engineers at your disposal—all ready and waiting to react to the latest trending opportunities on TikTok and respond to the latest challenge that’s taking the platform by storm.When we create content for our clients, we use both paid and organic channels of promotion to help with brand awareness, sales increases, or lead generation—it all depends on what you want.Kubbco offers the complete package:

  1. A thoroughly thought-out organic marketing strategy
  2. A complete takeover of social media management, from creating content calendars and interacting with the audience to scheduling posts and compiling data reports
  3. An ad campaign that will optimize your investment
  4. A dedicated team of content producers ready to create TikTok videos, photos for Instagram photos, podcasts, YouTube videos, infographics, or any other type of content you need

You can subscribe to our newsletter for free to get all the latest tips and tricks regarding business strategies for TikTok and all other social media platforms.

Matas, OLAPLEX, and NATURLI’ Foods Can Tell You About Our Work

With Kubbco by your side, you only need to know what you want to achieve with your TikTok account. We’ll plan everything else and execute the campaign according to your brand messaging and carefully analyzed data. We’ve created multiple viral videos for our clients because we know what it takes for TikTok content to succeed!In just five weeks, together with OLAPLEX, we uploaded 28 videos, received 5.1 million views, and gained 22,000 new followers!Check out these numbers that illustrate the success of our clients:PartnerTime Spent TogetherPosted VideosViral VideosTotal ViewsFollowers GainedNATURLI’ Foods23 weeks112206.2 million5,200essence cosmetics2 years 2 months5561273 million386,000OLAPLEX5 weeks2825.1 million22,000Matas8 weeks2585.6 million13,500

When you jump on board, we will help you find the perfect niche for your brand and spread your message by posting high-quality content consistently. We’ll ensure that the videos we post have something uniquely yours and present your company in the best light.Contact us and discover what our strategizing process looks like in detail and how we can help you build your TikTok account.

Featured image: Ron Lach

Caroline Dan
TikTok Specialist & Content Creator

I create viral TikToks for brands.

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