Crushing TikTok

To smithereens I tell you.

Author

Kent Wilson
April 18, 2025

We thought TikTok was a waste of time for our 45+ audience. We were wrong.

Things have shifted:

  • More 40–60 year olds using TikTok to find products

  • Brands making 5, 6, even 7 figures directly from TikTok Shop

  • Tools that make affiliate marketing easier than building a brand account

I finally did a deep dive.

Here's how small brands are driving millions in revenue using creators without building a TikTok following.

Going viral is great — but long-term growth comes from free, repeatable traffic.

>Find what people are searching for with:

>Then create content around it.

💡 Even one evergreen blog post can keep sending you customers for years.

Why You Need To Be On TikTok

Let’s kill the myth first.

TikTok now has over 1.5 billion users globally, with the fastest-growing cohort being 35+. Nearly 40% of U.S. adults over 30 now use the app monthly.

And they’re buying. Impulsively. Because that’s what TikTok is made for.

See video → few taps → product on the way.

But here’s the best part: if your product is on the TikTok shop, any user can start selling it for commissions at any time.

→ no friction

→ no outreach

→ no brief

→ no upfront payment

Only commissions paid for real sales.

Brands that are winning aren’t necessarily the biggest or flashiest. They’re the ones who’ve figured out how to weaponize this affiliate system.

Let’s get into that…

🧪 3 Brands Crushing TikTok — and What They’re Actually Doing

1. Comfrt – $5M in Just 30 Days

What they sell: Weighted hoodies that feel like a “hug”

What makes them dangerous:

  • 86% of revenue from affiliate creators

  • Sell a feeling (calm) instead of a fabric (hoodie)

  • Content focuses on problem-first hooks ("struggling with anxiety?")

  • Created intentional scarcity via limited drops + preorder cycles

What’s wild is that their brand account doesn’t matter. They don’t waste time trying to go viral themselves. 

Instead, they’ve built a network of over 5,000 creators, most of whom are micro-influencers shooting lo-fi content that blends into the feed.

What you can steal:

👉 Skip the brand account
👉 Sell a feeling, not a product

2. BRĒZ – $30M Annualized Revenue in 15 Months

What they sell: THC + Lion’s Mane drinks that get you high… without a hangover

What makes them dangerous:

  • They have the kind of product people WANT to promote on TikTok — looks great and rides on two big trends: “sober curious” and “functional mushrooms”.

  • They sent a lot of free samples through TikTok shop to conquer new creators

  • They let creators come up with formats and Spark Ads (boost) the ones that worked

  • They didn’t stop at TikTok: TikTok for first time buys, Meta for retargeting and Subscription models for LTV.

What you can steal:

👉 Choose a product creators actually want to promote (visually strong, trend-aligned, impulse-buyable)
👉 Use TikTok Shop’s built-in affiliate system to list it with 20–30% commission
👉 Seed early creators manually, Spark Ad the ones that work
👉 Stack Meta and subscriptions to increase value per customer

3. Zenfulnote – $40K/Month…from Journals(!)

What they sell: Journals for “shadow work” and personal transformation

Why they’re quietly dominating:

  • 82% of sales from video content, 83% from affiliates

  • They tap into a massive cultural movement - mental health and wellness.

  • They promise a potential and unverifiable resolution (unverifiable because fixing mental health takes so long)

  • They templatized 3 super simple video formats for people to follow and let TikTok decide what wins before boosting

  • They geared their page toward conversion with super clear CTAs

What you can steal:

👉 Big cultural movements
👉 Easy formats
👉 Geared their page toward purchases

🧵 Takeaways for small brands

✅ You don’t need a brand account
Affiliate creators drive the bulk of TikTok revenue for brands like Comfrt and Zenfulnote. Start with sending free samples 10–20 micro-creators. Let them sell for you.

✅ Polished ≠ profitable
Zenfulnote’s top videos were people talking to their phone. Don’t overthink content — just help creators tell relatable stories.
→ Talking heads, demos, and “before/after” still work.

✅ Proximity v.s. reach
You don’t need big influencers. Nano- and micro-creators perform better thanks to stronger bonds with their audience.
→ Look for creators with the right audience, not the biggest one.

✅ Test before you spend
TikTok is a free testing lab. Post 3–5 variations. Spark Ad what performs.
→ You’ll learn what works before spending real budget.

✅ Go beyond Meta
Sell directly in TikTok, retarget with Meta, build LTV with subscriptions.

✅ Don’t sell the product — sell the outcome
Lead with pain points like anxiety, poor sleep, or burnout.
→ The product is the resolution, not the star.
→ Frame it around moments, not features.

⚠️ Key Insights to build your creator army

Don’t bother with a full influencer platform out of the gate.

 Start with:

  • A Google Sheet for outreach tracking

  • 20 creators you DM directly

  • A templated offer: “Hey, love your content. Want to try our product and earn from TikTok Shop? No pressure to post — if you love it, we’ll help you monetize it.”

  • An onboarding brief that explains your brand, products, key talking points, and ideal customer

💡 Pro tip: Personalize the template for each outreach — these people get a lot of asks.

🚨NOTE: DO NOT overly script or direct the content. Give guidance and recommendations, but you want the content to feel authentic to the creator, or it will feel like an ad and defeat the whole purpose.

🔧 The Tools That Make This Work

If you’re curious but don’t know where to start, these tools help:

💡 Pro tip: Use these tools to reverse-engineer what’s working before you start spending.

That’s it for today. Signing off,

Kent

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