How to End a Promotion on TikTok

So, you need to turn off your TikTok promotion. Whether it’s because you’ve hit your goal, the budget is getting tight, or the ad just isn’t performing as expected, ending a campaign is a normal part of the process. This guide will walk you through exactly how to stop your TikTok ad, what happens when you do, and the important steps to take afterward to make sense of your results.

Understanding Why You'd End a TikTok Ad

Before jumping into the step-by-step instructions, it helps to be clear on why you're pressing the stop button. Your reason for ending a promotion often dictates your next move. Most people end campaigns for a few common reasons:

• Budget Reached: You've spent what you set out to spend, and it's time to E.G.P. (End Gracefully. Period).
• Underperformance: The metrics just aren't there. Your cost per click is too high, you're getting views but no conversions, or the engagement is next to zero. It's better to cut your losses and reinvest in a different strategy.
• Objective Met: The ad did its job! You got the followers, sold the product, or drove the sign-ups you wanted. Mission accomplished.
• Creative Fatigue: Your ad has been running a while, and the audience is likely getting tired of seeing it. Performance is tapering off, and it's time to cycle in something new.
• A Strategic Pivot: Business needs have shifted. You've launched a new product or marketing initiative, and your ad budget needs to be redirected.

Pinpointing your reason clarifies things instantly. If an ad did well, you’ll want to analyze why it did well. If it flopped, you’ll want to figure out what went wrong. We’ll get to all of that, but first, let’s stop the ad.

How to End a Promotion on TikTok: The Step-by-Step Guide

TikTok gives you two primary ways to run ads: through the professional TikTok Ads Manager platform or by using the simple Promote feature directly within the app. The way you stop your ad depends on how you started it.

Method 1: Using the TikTok Ads Manager (For Professional Campaigns)

The Ads Manager is a desktop platform that gives you granular control over your campaigns. If you set up your ad on your computer with specific objectives like conversions or lead generation, this is where you'll need to go.

Here’s how to do it:

1. Log in to your TikTok Ads Manager account. Navigate to the "Campaign" tab on the main dashboard. This page shows you an overview of all your advertising efforts.
2. Locate Your Campaign Hierarchy. TikTok Ads are structured in three levels: Campaign >, Ad Group >, Ad. A Campaign holds your overall objective, Ad Groups hold your targeting and budget, and Ads hold your creatives (the actual videos and text).
3. Decide What to Turn Off. You have options here. You can turn off an entire campaign, a specific ad group within that campaign, or just a single ad creative.
   • To end everything: Stay on the 'Campaign' page. Find the campaign you want to stop in the list.
   • To end a specific ad group: Click on the name of the campaign you want to edit. This will take you to the 'Ad Group' page where you can see all ad groups within that campaign.
   • To end a specific video ad: From the 'Ad Group' page, click on the name of an ad group. This will take you to the final 'Ad' level, showing a list of your individual video ads.
4. Flip the Switch. To the left of the Campaign, Ad Group, or Ad name, you'll see a blue toggle switch. If it's on, your ad is running. Simply click the toggle to turn it off. The switch will turn grey.

And that’s it! Once the switch is grey, your promotion is no longer active, and it will stop accruing charges. Your content will remain on your profile as a regular organic video, but TikTok will no longer push it out as an ad.

Method 2: Stopping a "Promote" Feature Ad (Boosted Directly from an iPhone or Android phone)

The "Promote" feature is TikTok's way of letting creators and businesses quickly boost a post directly from their profile on mobile. If you tapped on a video, hit the three dots, and selected "Promote," this is the method for you.

You can turn this off just as easily as you turned it on.

1. Open the TikTok app and go to your profile.
2. Tap the three lines in the top-right corner to open the menu. Select "Creator tools" or "Business Suite" (whichever appears for your account type).
3. Select "Promote." This will take you to your Promote dashboard. Here you can see an overview of all your past and currently running promoted videos.
4. Find your active promotion. Active promotions will be clearly marked. Tap on the video campaign you want to end. This will open the details page for that specific promotion, showing your stats, budget, and duration.
5. Turn off the promotion. At the bottom of this details screen, there should be a button that says something like "Pause Promotion" or access to settings (sometimes via a gear icon). From here, you’ll see an option to pause or completely end the run. Tapping it will prompt a confirmation. Confirm, and your promotion will stop.

The process is straightforward on either platform. The real work comes after you’ve ended the campaign.

What to Do After You’ve Ended Your Promotion

Stopping the ad spend isn’t the finish line. A smart marketer’s job is to learn from every dollar spent. Diving into the results of a finished campaign is where you find the insights that make your next one even better.

1. Check Your Final Spend and Final Billing

When you turn off an ad, the spending stops instantly. However, there can be a slight delay in reporting. Give it a few hours (or up to a day) for the dashboard to reflect the final, accurate numbers. Check your "Billing" section in Ads Manager to see the final tally. Any remaining funds on a prepaid account will stay in your account balance for a future campaign.

2. Analyze the Performance Metrics

This is where the learning happens. Go into your completed campaign's dashboard and look at the results. Don't just glance at the views, look at the whole picture.

• Cost Per Mille (CPM): How much did it cost you to show your ad to 1,000 people? A high CPM might mean your targeting is too narrow or competitive.
• Cost Per Click (CPC) / Click-Through Rate (CTR): A high CTR (and low CPC) suggests your creative and headline were compelling enough to make people take action. If it's low, your video probably didn't connect with the audience.
• Cost Per Acquisition (CPA) / Cost Per Conversion: If you were running a conversion campaign (e.g., product sales, sign-ups), this is the most important metric. How much did it cost to get one person to complete that goal? This tells you if your ad spend was profitable.
• Play-Through Rate: Look at stats like Video Views at 100%. A high rate means your video was engaging enough to hold attention. If almost everyone dropped off after 2 seconds, you know the hook needs work.

3. Understand What Worked (And What Didn’t)

Look beyond the numbers and think critically about the ad itself.

• The Creative: Which video worked best? Was it UGC-style? A slick, polished ad? A trending sound? Your best-performing ad creative gives you a template for what your audience likes. Your worst-performing ad teaches you what to avoid. If one video ad had a killer CTR while another one bombed, that’s a massive clue about the visuals and storytelling that resonate.
• The Audience Targeting: Who saw your ad? In Ads Manager, you can often break down performance by demographic details like age, gender, location, and interests. Did a specific targeting group perform way better than others? Double down on them next time.
• The Copy and Call-to-Action (CTA): Did your caption work? Was your CTA clear? Sometimes a simple wording change like "Shop Now" vs. "Learn More" can make a world of difference.

4. Repurpose Successful Organic Content

One of the best outcomes of a stopped ad is identifying a video that pops off. If an ad performed incredibly well, its life doesn't have to end. You can - and should - amplify it more organically. You can feature it in your other social media posts, pin it to the top of your TikTok profile, or create "part 2" videos that build on the themes of the successful ad. You’ve just paid to learn what works, now use that knowledge for free.

Final Thoughts

Knowing how to end a promotion on TikTok is a straightforward but essential skill for anyone running ads. Whether you're using Ads Manager or the simple Promote button, you can pause or stop your campaigns in just a few clicks. The most valuable work, however, happens after you hit the switch - analyzing your performance, understanding your audience, and turning those insights into a better strategy for your next move.

Planning and tracking what content resonates organically before you even think about putting ad spend behind it can save you a lot of guesswork and money. For our own content strategy at Postbase, we rely heavily on our visual calendar to see our entire content plan at a glance and track performance with our unified analytics dashboard. This helps us spot which TikToks, Reels, and Shorts are picking up steam naturally, giving us an internal signal of what’s worth promoting long before a campaign goes live.