I first wrote this list in March 2023, when every brand wanted a hashtag challenge. Three years on, the campaigns that actually worked look very different.
The most successful TikTok campaigns of the last few years include Jet2’s accidental “Nothing beats a Jet2 holiday” meme, Duolingo killing off its own mascot, Stanley’s reply to a car-fire video, Made By Mitchell’s $1 million day on TikTok Shop and Gap’s hoodie designed by a creator. None of them looked like a traditional advert. Each one either started with a creator, or let the audience take the joke somewhere a brand would never dare to go on its own.
This is an update of a post I wrote in March 2023. That was the same month I finally got off my backside and ran our first free TikTok strategy webinar, and pushed my team into starting a Prohibition TikTok channel. The original list was all UK fashion: Gymshark, ASOS, Boohoo, PrettyLittleThing and River Island, nearly every one built around a branded hashtag challenge.
Those campaigns were good for their time, but the hashtag challenge has largely had its day. What has replaced it is TikTok Shop, creators who co-design products, and memes that brands have the sense to leave alone. So I have rebuilt the list from scratch, with the numbers sourced and a lesson under each one that you can actually use.
If you would rather see this walked through live, we still run free webinars on social media strategy most months.
What makes a TikTok campaign successful now?
A successful TikTok campaign earns attention people choose to spend, then turns it into something measurable, whether that is sales, sign-ups or brand awareness. In practice the winners share a few habits. They look native to the feed rather than polished, they put creators or customers in front of the brand, and they move quickly when the audience does something unexpected.
The other habit is patience. Most of the campaigns below sit on top of years of consistent posting, which is the part nobody puts in the case study.
Seven successful TikTok campaigns worth learning from
1. Jet2: the meme they had the sense to leave alone
In summer 2025, people across TikTok started pairing chaotic holiday clips with the Jet2holidays advert voiceover and Jess Glynne’s “Hold My Hand”. The line “Nothing beats a Jet2 holiday” became the punchline to every disaster you can imagine, from collapsing sunbeds to delayed flights.
Jet2 did something most brands find impossible, which was nothing at all. Marketing Week reported that its advisers warned a big corporate brand muscling in would make the meme “uncool”. The trend reached more than 80 billion views across 11.8 million posts, and TikTok named “Hold My Hand” its song of the summer.
The business result was real. YouGov BrandIndex data quoted by Marketing Week showed Jet2’s ad awareness among 18 to 49-year-olds rising from 19.9% at the start of the year to 55.7% in August 2025. Jet2 carried 14.09 million passengers in the six months to September, around 750,000 more than a year earlier. Euronews asked whether the meme was behind those record numbers, although Jet2 itself stopped short of saying so. The catch is that perceived quality and reputation scores fell over the same period, so the joke was not free.
What to steal: when the internet adopts your brand, resist the urge to join in with a branded video. Measure sentiment as well as reach, because awareness and reputation can move in opposite directions.
2. Duolingo: killing off its own mascot
On 11 February 2025, Duolingo announced that Duo, its green owl, had died. On 17 February it asked users to “bring Duo back” by earning 50 billion XP through lessons, and on 24 February Duo returned in a resurrection video. NPR reported that learners collectively earned around 50.92 billion XP, just over the target, with dozens of other brands joining in with tributes.
The stunt worked because Duolingo had spent years building Duo into an unhinged character on TikTok. The audience already knew the joke, so the death landed as a story rather than a stunt. It also tied the attention straight back to the product, because the only way to save the owl was to do a lesson.
What to steal: link the stunt to the action you actually want people to take. Be honest about whether you have earned the right to do it, because a brand with no character on TikTok cannot borrow this one.
3. Stanley: answering a car fire with a new car
In November 2023, a TikTok user called Danielle posted a video of her burnt-out car. The only thing that survived was her Stanley tumbler, which still had ice inside it. The video passed 60 million views, according to ABC7.
Terence Reilly, Stanley’s global president, replied on the brand’s own TikTok account. He offered to send her new cups and to replace her car, something he said the company had never done before. That reply turned a customer’s video into the best product demonstration Stanley could have asked for, and it was covered by news outlets across the US.
This one takes me back to the early days of social listening, when I helped build some of the first Radian6 monitoring dashboards. The tools have changed completely since then, but the principle has not. You can only respond like Stanley did if someone spots the video within hours, and has the authority to say yes.
What to steal: have listening in place and a senior person willing to reply in their own voice. If you want to rehearse the opposite scenario too, our crisis management training covers both sides.
4. Made By Mitchell: $1 million in a day on TikTok Shop
Made By Mitchell is a UK beauty brand founded in 2020 by make-up artist Mitchell Halliday. In June 2024 it ran a 12-hour TikTok LIVE marathon from Manchester during TikTok Shop’s summer sale, with creators including Amelia Olivia and Hollie Flynn joining the stream. ChannelX reported that the stream took $830,000 and the brand passed $1 million within 24 hours, the first UK brand to hit that figure on TikTok Shop in a single day.
Bizarrely, this is still the example most marketing directors I meet have never heard of. It shows TikTok working as a till rather than a billboard, which changes how you plan, staff and measure everything.
What to steal: if you sell physical products, treat TikTok Shop LIVE as an event with a run sheet, exclusive offers and creators on the stream. Then measure it in revenue, not views.
5. Gap and Julia Huynh: the hoodie that hoodies
In October 2023, TikTok creator Julia Huynh started a series hunting for a “hoodie that hoodies”, rating hundreds of them on fit, sleeve width and weight. Rather than send her a free hoodie like every other brand, Gap invited her to its New York headquarters to design one. Glossy reported that it was Gap’s first creator collaboration of its kind, launched at $98 in October 2024.
Sinead Morrissey from my team talked us through this campaign on the Embracing Marketing Mistakes podcast. She explained that someone in Gap’s merchandising team had simply noticed the content trending and brought it to marketing, so the partnership felt organic instead of forced. She then took great pleasure in telling Will and me that the first Prohibition hoodies I ordered fail every one of Julia’s tests, which is nothing short of rude.
Gap’s head of marketing, Erika Everett, told Glossy that success was measured on engagement and reach rather than sales, which is an honest admission for a single product.
What to steal: search TikTok for creators who are already obsessed with your category, then give them real input rather than a script. Our influencer marketing training covers how to find and brief them.
6. Little Moons: the one I still use in training
This one is older, but I still use it on almost every course. In early 2021, a handful of creators started filming themselves hunting for Little Moons mochi ice cream in “big Tesco”. Grocery Gazette reported that Tesco’s sales of the product rose by 700%, Waitrose’s by 350%, and the videos passed 31 million views, according to co-founder Howard Wong.
Little Moons did not create the trend. What it did well was keep stock flowing and back the moment with paid activity once it was clearly real. It is the clearest UK example I know of TikTok moving product off supermarket shelves.
What to steal: have a plan for what happens if something takes off, including supply, retail partners and a press response. Plenty of brands have gone viral and then sold out for a month.
7. The Washington Post: proof you do not have to dance
The Washington Post launched its TikTok in 2019, fronted by producer Dave Jorgenson and his self-confessed “dad-joke” persona. FIPP reported that it had 644,000 followers by September 2020, built on short, funny videos explaining the news. We used its spy balloon coverage as an example in one of our own webinars.
My favourite detail is a mistake Jorgenson admitted himself. He ran a haiku contest twice a day for a week and watched completion rates fall, so he said he would spread it out next time. That is a better lesson in TikTok measurement than most guides manage.
What to steal: one recognisable person, a consistent format and a posting rhythm your audience can keep up with.
How much does a TikTok campaign cost?
A TikTok campaign can start with a very small ad budget, but the real cost is the time of the person making the content. TikTok’s own Ads Manager rules require a daily budget above $50 at campaign level and above $20 at ad group level. Creator fees vary enormously, from free product to thousands of pounds per video.
Tom Basgil, a B2B marketer who came on the podcast, put the hidden cost bluntly. He told us that nine times out of ten he tells clients to wait on TikTok, because “in order to do it well, we need money and we need time. And we really need a dedicated person.” His advice was to budget for at least half a year before expecting results.
How do you measure a successful TikTok campaign?
Measure what the campaign was for, and decide that before you post anything. For awareness, look at watch time, completion rate, shares and saves, plus branded search and brand lift. For sales, use TikTok Shop revenue, discount codes and conversion data from Spark Ads.
Always read the comments as well as the dashboard. Jet2 is the reminder here, because record awareness arrived alongside falling quality scores. Our social media measurement training covers how to set this up properly.
Do TikTok campaigns work for B2B and small brands?
Yes, but rarely in the way people imagine. When Tom Basgil came on the show, I told him that as much as people ask Will and me to dance, I am not doing it. His view was that B2B brands should start with one video a week, built around one face, and commit for six months.
For small consumer brands, Little Moons and Made By Mitchell show the upside is enormous if you sell something people can buy on impulse. The risk is spreading a tiny team across five platforms and doing none of them well. Our TikTok training starts with deciding whether you should be there at all.
My view on this: give up some control
Looking back at my 2023 list, the brands were mostly trying to get people to copy them. A branded hashtag, a dance, a prize for the best entry. It worked for a while, but it was still the brand holding the microphone.
The best campaigns since then have done the opposite. Jet2 let the audience run the joke. Gap let a creator design the product. Stanley let a customer’s video become the advert. Even Duolingo, which planned everything, built the stunt around something only its users could do.
So my advice now is simple. Spend less time planning the perfect TikTok, and more time listening for the moment your customers hand you one.
Frequently asked questions about TikTok campaigns
What is the most successful TikTok campaign?
By reach, Jet2’s “Nothing beats a Jet2 holiday” meme is one of the biggest ever, with more than 80 billion views across 11.8 million posts in 2025. By direct sales, Made By Mitchell’s $1 million day on TikTok Shop is one of the strongest UK examples.
Do hashtag challenges still work on TikTok?
Hashtag challenges can still work, but they are far less effective than in 2020 to 2022. Creator partnerships, TikTok Shop and responding to organic trends now tend to deliver better results for the same budget.
How long does a TikTok campaign take to work?
A one-off paid campaign can show results within days. Building an organic presence usually takes three to six months of consistent posting before you see meaningful growth.
Should my brand use TikTok Shop?
TikTok Shop is worth testing if you sell physical products under around £50 that people buy on impulse. It suits beauty, fashion, food and gifts far better than services or high-value products.
How do I find the right TikTok creators?
Start by searching TikTok for creators who already talk about your category without being paid. Check their comment sections for real engagement, then offer them genuine creative input rather than a rigid script.
Want help planning your own TikTok campaign?
If you want your team to plan and make TikTok content that actually earns its place in the feed, our TikTok training is built around real campaigns like these. Get in touch and I will send over the options.
Chris Norton is the founder of Prohibition and an award winning communications consultant with more than twenty years’ experience. He was a lecturer at Leeds Beckett University and has had a varied PR career having worked both in-house and in a number of large consultancies. He is an Integrated PR and social media blogger and writes on a wide variety of blogs across a huge amount of topics from digital marketing, social media marketing right through to technology and crisis management.
