The recent UK election was the first time TikTok became a weapon in the armoury of political campaigns in Blighty. The Labour Party used it to makeover their image, galvanise younger voters and use meme culture to ridicule the incumbent Conservatives. An architect behind Labour’s TikTok campaign tells B&T there are lessons for Aussie politicians on how to use the social media platform effectively and — just as importantly — what not to do.
It was only days after the former UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak called a sudden general election that two major political parties, Sunak’s Conservatives and Keir Starmer’s Labour Party, set up TikTok accounts for the very first time.
Although both parties had sophisticated social media strategies across the Meta platforms, X (formerly Twitter) and YouTube, TikTok — mired in allegations of Chinese ownership — had been avoided to date.
But with much on the line and a resurgent Labour desperate to court younger voters, the platform soon became a new battleground for the right and left — even though TikTok doesn’t accept paid political advertising.
As the days and weeks transpired, it became clear that both parties had radically different approaches to TikTok and social media, with Labour winning new fandom and viral success, while the Conservatives floundering in a litany of ‘what not dos’. Although the Conservatives were well behind in the polls after a disastrous 14 years in office, there are lessons that can be learnt from how both parties used social media in their political campaigns.
For starters, their spending patterns were noticeably different. Labour spent £2.6 million to the Conservatives £1.1 million on Google and Meta platforms alone.
Winning the battle on TikTok is a different game altogether, it relies on organic posts going viral by tapping into the cultural zeitgeist of the day.
@uklabour Would you hire the builder who wrecked your kitchen to fix it? #generalelection #toriesout #change #ukpolitics ♬ original sound – UKLabour
Labour’s TikTok strategy
To sharpen its TikTok game, the Labour Party enlisted the help of social-first creative agency Uncovered Group, who has previously worked with the likes of Nike, Cadbury, Coca-Cola, Heinz and a host of other brands to lift their social game.
Uncovered worked with the Labour Party’s head of digital Abby Tomlison, director of digital Tom Lillywhite and their team, running social ads for more than 100 MPs and generating over 1,500 pieces of creative.
@uklabour AAAAAAAAAAAAAAH #generalelection #ukelection #ukpolitics #toriesout ♬ Creepy and simple horror background music(1070744) – howlingindicator
The content achieved 75 million organic views, more than 234,000 followers and 6 million engagements in only six weeks.
“When you start to look at the data around what the parties did during the election, in terms of eyeballs we drove massive, massive reach but there’s two things that the content was doing,” Cookson said.
“The first is social proofing the Labour brand through humour, because if people find you funny, it’s a positive emotion and this received 100,000s of shares.
“Then it’s also building a huge audience for people that were retargeted with a lot more of the serious stuff that we were making on other channels, and that might be Labor’s policy offering or podcasts with (now Chancellor of the Exchequer) Rachel Reeves and Mary Portas about women in business.”
Cookson said the Labour Party social strategy was about targeting potential swing voters from the Conservatives, and it called upon high-profile figures like the Iceland supermarket CEO Richard Walker and former Bank of England governor Mark Carney to explain why they were switching to Labour. This ran alongside ordinary former Conservatives from Bradford and other regions.
“If we just ended up putting (swing voters) to camera pieces on TikTok, it would have absolutely flopped,” Cookson added. “So we made quite a distinct decision to push them towards meme culture and that really kicked off.
“We were using the memes to drive an audience to the more serious content on other platforms – they worked in harmony. TikTok is that halo effect but the really hard-working dollars are on Meta.”
A good example of Labour’s new meme game was in reaction to a Sunak policy to reintroduce national service for 18-year-olds – which at the time went down like a lead balloon.
“I was sitting in the cinema with my two-year-old watching Shrek, and there was a part where Lord Farquaad came on and said, ‘And some of you may die, but it’s a risk I’m willing to take’. I thought that would work perfectly at this moment, so we got up a meme and out that day.
“Suddenly we were driving huge, huge audiences.”
The Labour Party also called on celebrity endorsers’ content with the likes of Kit Harrington, Tony Robinson and John Richardson posting videos.
It helped MPs sharpen their TikTok chops, including Starmer and several frontbenchers, such as former opposition leader Ed Miliband, who now leads the environment portfolio.
Cookson said that Labour’s playful, meme-powered approach helped it reach far more eyeballs than the Conservatives’ rigid, piece-to-camera style.
@uklabour Labour’s plan for GB Energy will lower bills, create jobs and deliver energy security. Change will only happen if you vote for it. Join Kit and vote for change on Thursday 4 July. #ukpolitics #ukelection #generalelection #change
When asked about what not to do, “Look at Rishi Sunak, a lot of the posts that he did they’re just not authentic. If you are inauthentic, audiences on TikTok will sniff it out and you can start making headlines for the wrong reasons.
“Another absolute no-no is to stand in front of a whiteboard or blackboard that people can superimpose things, which Rishi did multiple times. This offered up loads of opportunities that Labour used several times. Also be wary of transitions, because people can transition you into all sorts of crazy places.”
@uklabour Thanks for the plug Rishi 👍 #rishisunak #ukelection #generalelection #ukpolitics ♬ original sound – UKLabour
Humour – if you have it – and being informative work well for politicians, so too does reacting extremely quickly to the news cycle and producing loads of volume; in the first few days of the campaign Labour had 40 more videos than the Conservative Party, and this volume grew as the campaign wore on.
Although TikTok is just one small part of an effective political campaign, its influence is only likely to grow at the imminent US election, and Australian election next year.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese could do worse than consult his British Labour peer. The same can be said for Peter Dutton learning from Sunak’s TikTok disaster.
@munyachawawa Rishi Sunak’s Sky TV struggle. 🥲📺 #comedy #satire #rishisunak ♬ original sound – Munya Chawawa
