How to Add an Admin to TikTok Business Center

Adding another admin to your TikTok Business Center is a quick way to share the workload, but getting the permissions right is necessary for keeping your account secure. This guide walks you through every step of inviting a new admin, assigning them the correct permissions, and best practices for managing team access without putting your brand at risk. We'll cover everything from the initial invite to assigning assets like your Ad Account and Pixel.

What is TikTok Business Center, Anyway?

Before getting into the steps, it's helpful to understand what you're working with. The TikTok Business Center is your command center for all business-related activities on the platform. Think of it as a central hub where all your marketing assets live together in one organized space. Instead of having things like ad accounts, creator collaborations, and pixels scattered and tied to individual profiles, the Business Center brings them under one roof.

Why does this matter? For a few big reasons:

• Organization: It neatly houses all your valuable TikTok assets, including your Ad Accounts, TikTok Pixels, catalogs, and audiences. This prevents the chaos of trying to track who owns what, especially as your team grows.
• Security: By centralizing ownership, you remove the risk of losing access to an Ad Account if an employee leaves the company. The Business Center owns the assets, not the individual.
• Collaboration: This is the big one. It allows you to grant multiple people access to your assets without sharing passwords or sensitive login information. You can give agencies, freelancers, and team members specific permissions to do their jobs without giving them the keys to the entire kingdom.

Effectively, the Business Center transitions you from managing TikTok ads like a solo creator to managing them like a professional marketing team. Getting your user permissions set up correctly is the foundation of that transition.

Understanding Roles and Permissions: Admin vs. Operator

TikTok gives you two primary roles to assign to team members in your Business Center: Admin and Operator. Choosing the right one is fundamental to account safety and efficiency.

Admin Role

An Admin user has the highest level of access possible. They are the super-users of your Business Center with full control over everything. An Admin can:

• Manage Users: Invite new members, remove existing members, and change the roles of other people (including changing an Operator to an Admin or downgrading another Admin).
• Control Billing &, Payment: View and manage all billing information, add payment methods, and oversee all financial aspects of the ad accounts within the Business Center.
• Edit Business Center Settings: Change the name of the Business Center, update business information, and manage security settings.
• Access All Assets: Admins can grant themselves access to any asset within the Business Center, including every Ad Account, Pixel, and Audience.

You should only give Admin access to team members who genuinely need total control, like a co-founder, the Head of Marketing, or a trusted agency partner responsible for the entire operation. Too many admins can create security vulnerabilities.

Operator Role

An Operator has standard, limited access. They can't manage users or see business-level settings. Their permissions are focused on doing the work within the assets they have been assigned. An Operator can only work with the specific Ad Accounts, Pixels, or other assets that an Admin grants them access to.

Even when an Operator is assigned to an Ad Account, their exact permissions can be further defined. For example, an Admin can grant an Operator:

• Operator-level Ad Account access: Allowing them to create and manage campaigns, edit ad groups, and create ads.
• Analyst-level Ad Account access: A read-only permission allowing them to view campaigns and pull reports but not make any changes.

The Operator role is perfect for the majority of team members: the social media manager running the ads, the analyst who needs to see performance data, or the freelancer managing a specific campaign. It follows the "principle of least privilege," giving them exactly what they need to do their job and nothing more.

Step-by-Step Guide: How to Add a New Admin

Ready to invite a team member? The process is straightforward. Just follow these steps carefully to make sure you assign the correct role.

Step 1: Log In and Navigate to "Members"

First things first, log into your TikTok Business Center. Once you're on the main dashboard, look at the navigation menu on the left side of your screen. Under the "Users" section, click on Members. This page shows you a list of everyone who currently has access to your Business Center and what their role is.

Step 2: Invite a New Member

In the upper left corner of the Members page, you'll see a prominent blue button that reads "Invite Member." Click on it. This will open a pop-up window where you'll enter the new user's details.

Step 3: Enter the User's Email Address

In the "Email Address" field, type in the email of the person you want to invite. It's always best to use a professional work email address rather than a personal one (like a gmail.com address). This keeps your user list clean and makes it easy to identify who is who as your team expands.

Step 4: Assign the "Admin" Role

This is the most important step. Below the email field, you'll see a section titled "Set Access." You'll have two options: "Admin Access" and "Operator Access."

Select Admin Access. TikTok will show a brief description of what this permission level entails, reminding you that admins have full control over the Business Center. Take a moment to read it and confirm this is the level of access you want to grant.

Step 5: Send the Invitation

Once you've entered the email and selected "Admin Access," click the blue "Next" button at the bottom of the pop-up. You'll be asked to assign asset permissions on the next screen (which we'll cover below). After setting those, you'll click "Confirm" to officially send the invitation.

The new user will receive an email invitation from TikTok for Business. They must click the link in that email and log in with their own TikTok account to accept the invitation. Their status will show as "Pending" in your Members list until they complete this step.

Assigning Your New Admin to Specific Assets

Simply making someone an Admin doesn't automatically give them permission to manage your campaigns. While they can grant themselves permission, it's a good practice to assign them to the necessary assets during the invitation process. The most common asset you'll want to assign is your Ad Account.

1. After selecting the Admin role on the invitation screen, click "Next."
2. You'll see a new screen with a list of all your assets, categorized by type (Ad Accounts, Pixels, etc.).
3. Select the asset you want to assign, for example, your main Ad Account.
4. A list of users will appear. Find the person you are inviting (their email will be shown).
5. To the right of their name, you will see dropdown menus to assign a specific permission level for that asset. Since they are an Admin of the business, you should also assign them Admin permission for the Ad Account. This gives them full control over campaign creation, management, and reporting within that specific account.
6. Repeat this for any other assets, like your TikTok Pixel or audiences.
7. Once you're finished, click the "Confirm" button to send the invite with these permissions pre-assigned.

This ensures that as soon as your new admin accepts their invitation, they can get straight to work without having to manually assign themselves to each asset.

Best Practices for Managing Your Business Center Admins Securely

Giving someone Admin access is a big deal. It's built on trust. To keep your Business Center and its valuable assets protected, follow a few simple guidelines.

1. Grant Admin Access Sparingly

The most important rule is to only give Admin access to team members who absolutely need it. For everyday campaign management, reporting, or creative work, the "Operator" role is almost always sufficient. The fewer people who have the ability to remove users or change billing details, the more secure your account will be.

2. Conduct Regular Audits

About once a quarter, take a few minutes to review everyone who has access to your Business Center. Click on the "Members" tab and ask yourself:

• Does everyone on this list still work with our brand?
• Is their permission level still appropriate for their current role?
• Are there any old agencies or freelancers who no longer need access?

Immediately remove anyone who has left the company or completed their contract. It's a simple piece of housekeeping that prevents security lapses down the road.

3. Use Professional Email Addresses

Always invite members using their company email address. When your user list grows to 10 or 20 people, an employee@company.com address is much easier to keep track of than a list of generic addresses like coolname123@gmail.com. This also helps formalize the process and makes offboarding cleaner when someone leaves.

Final Thoughts

Setting up your team correctly in TikTok Business Center is a foundational step for scaling your marketing efforts. By understanding the difference between Admin and Operator roles and following a clear process for adding new users, you can collaborate efficiently while keeping your ad accounts and data secure.

Properly managing team permissions helps organize your workflow on a platform, but it's only one part of the equation. We found that teams also needed a central hub to manage every part of their brand's presence across all social platforms. That's why we built Postbase from the ground up - to give social media managers a clean, modern tool for planning, scheduling, and analyzing content for TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, and more without the clutter of older management platforms.