TikTok Ads success story · Auto loan marketplace for buyers with credit challenges

How AdvantageAutoLoans won more than 24K leads at $3.19 each on TikTok.

Name: Overtop Media Digital Marketing
Address: 933 Louise Ave Suite 101-18, Charlotte, NC, 28204, US
Telephone: (704) 237-0707
Price range: $$

Credit advertisers on TikTok get fewer targeting options than most. AdvantageAutoLoans focused on what it could control, its creative and its bids, and generated more than 24K leads at a $3.19 average cost per lead.

Business: AdvantageAutoLoans
Market: Not stated by TikTok
Goal: High-quality loan leads at the lowest possible cost

Driver holding a coffee cup with one hand on the steering wheel on a rainy day

The results.

TikTok did not publish a comparison period or a previous cost per lead.

24K+leads
$3.19average cost per lead
34%submit form rate

Reported in a TikTok case study published March 29, 2024. The company began advertising on TikTok in April 2023; TikTok did not state the end date or how the submit form rate was calculated.

The challenge.

AdvantageAutoLoans connects car buyers who struggle to get approved with a network of lending partners. Its business runs on leads, and it needed many of them at a low price.

As a credit advertiser, it fell under TikTok’s Housing, Employment and Credit ad rules, which limit how those industries can target people. Many of the usual targeting levers were simply not available.

Send people to its own formWebsite lead generation with built-in qualifying.
Rotate 3 to 5 adsFresh creative ready before older ads tire.
Cap the bid$3K a day, bid cap just over $3.
Switch to hybrid biddingMore than 24K leads at $3.19 each.

What they did.

Website lead generation · Bid cap bidding · Hybrid bidding · Rotating creative batches

Leads on its own website: The campaign used website lead generation, sending people to the company’s own form so it could ask detailed questions and qualify applicants with its existing logic.
Fewer ads at a time: It started with 10 creatives running at once, then moved to 3 to 5 on the advice of its TikTok account manager, keeping fresh ads ready to rotate in without overwhelming viewers.
A cap on what it would pay: Testing began at $3K a day with a bid cap just over $3, which set a ceiling on the price paid per result.
More flexible bidding: It then joined a beta of TikTok’s Hybrid Bidding Strategy, since made generally available, to switch between bidding approaches more easily as it optimized.

Why it worked.

Our read on the decisions behind the numbers, and what any business can take from them.

Control what you can: With targeting restricted, creative and bids became the levers. Treating them as the main tools kept results improving inside the rules.
The bid matched the goal: A bid cap just over $3 and an average cost per lead of $3.19 show the price ceiling doing its job.
Rotation kept ads fresh: Small batches of 3 to 5 ads, swapped regularly, kept the audience from tiring of the same video.
Its own form qualified the lead: Sending people to its own website form let the company ask the questions that matter for a loan, so cheap leads were also usable ones.

How we would run this play for your business.

You do not need a national budget to use the same ideas. This is how Overtop Media Digital Marketing puts them to work in our tiktok ads management.

Know the rules first: Lenders, insurers, landlords and employers face special ad rules on TikTok, Google and Meta. We set up the account inside those rules from day one so ads are not rejected or limited later.
Your videos, then local creators: Plain, friendly videos from your own team explain the offer best. When you need more, we book the best local creators directly with no agency markup, and use stock only to fill gaps.
Bids tied to your numbers: Our TikTok ads management sets a cost ceiling from what a lead is worth to you, rotates small batches of ads, and tests your website form against TikTok’s Instant Form.
Judged on funded deals: We send lead quality back from your CRM so the campaign learns which leads close, and pair TikTok with Google Ads management for people already searching for a loan.