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Jul 9, 20216 min read

How to target Chinese with WeChat and Weibo Advertising?

Updated: Sep 28, 2021

Want to target Chinese customers in Australia, but do not know which advertising platforms are the best for you? Want to place ads on Wechat or Weibo, but not familiar with rules and limitations? MediaMo has conducted several advertising campaigns on various Chinese platforms successfully. We will introduce two effective Chinese advertising platforms, to help you understand the features and provide examples of past ad campaigns.

WeChat Advertising

What is WeChat?

WeChat is a social media app that contains similar functions to Paypal, WhatsApp and Instagram or Facebook which obtains Chats, Moments (social feed) and WeChat Pay, which allows users to share images, videos, or texts and pay and transfer money through the app. WeChat has often been described as a “super-app” since it integrates all the functions we need into an app, it provides a one-stop-shop experience for its users.

Significant facts in Australia:

Australia has more than 1.2 million people with Chinese ancestry, of which 41% is born in Australia.
There are about 3 million WeChat users in Australia and about 63% of these users are native Chinese and 38% of these users are not native Mandarin or Cantonese speakers.
There are 2,900,000 monthly active Australian users approximately

Features of WeChat:

It is a semi-closed platform which builds personal communication between public accounts managers and users.
Businesses can create their own official account or mini-program and generate traffic through Moment or other marketing strategies.
It is not very friendly for external linking. It has its own rules and regulations for external links. There are 14 industries that are allowed to advertise to overseas Chinese audiences, which include lifestyle services, cosmetics, Fashion and clothing, retail, transportation, travel and more.

What and why WeChat Moments Ad?

Moments is a key feature that businesses could potentially utilise because it is where users pay most of their attention to apart from chatting. It allows users to share their lives or news or businesses with texts, images, videos, official accounts or mini-programs.

Moment ad is one of the WeChat advertising features that allow businesses to connect with local users including Australian and inbound Chinese tourists. Moments Ad would appear directly on your target customers’ social feed, similar to Facebook Feed. However, if we compare the 2 platforms, Facebook is more saturated with Advertisements and user’s retention rate would be lower than WeChat.

WeChat Moments Ad Case Study

In early 2021, we conducted a Lunar New Year (LNY) digital campaign for Pacific Fair (PF) on WeChat. We mainly targeted consumers aged 18-60 and living in Queensland especially in Brisbane/Gold Coast that love to shop in shopping malls with friends/family and tend to spend money on clothing, footwear and cosmetics. We utilized WeChat to increase brand awareness across Australia throughout all communication stages and created original articles on the WeChat official account to interact with customers from all states.

Results of PF LNY digital campaign:

We have reached over 71,703 potential visitors through Moments Ads and
increased 7% WeChat followers through this advertising campaign.

Weibo Advertising

What and why is Weibo?

Weibo is a micro-blogging platform. With 516 million monthly active users in China, it is the most popular microblogging site in China. With Weibo, users can upload videos, images, and gifs. The platform offers informational and trendy content, similar to Twitter and Instagram. There are three main advertising formats for Weibo: Weibo search engine promotion, Fans Headline and Fans Tunnel. We would mainly cover the last two formats.

Weibo is an open social media that allows users to access trending topics and hashtag, share articles or opinions with the public, it encourages people to comment and share their purchases and user experiences about different brands or products. There are many Key Opinion Leaders (KOL) with a huge amount of followers that are persuasive and they can direct users to other platforms and websites with external links.

It is a must for industries that target Chinese because they still refer to Weibo to evaluate the credibility of a brand. Therefore, Weibo is a must-have for a B2C company.

Weibo user statistics in Australia (data in 2020):

Approx. 845,089 Monthly Active Users on Weibo in Australia.
2.1 Million posts are published in Australia monthly.
1.2 Million posts are published by travel users about Australia monthly.
20,817 Key Opinion Leaders (KOLs) have talked about Australia on Weibo.
Australia is one of the most popular topics among travellers on Weibo.

What is Fans Headline?

Fans Headline offers effective and efficient promotion of Weibo posts and accounts based on your existing followers. It requires you to register an official account with Weibo approval. A “Fan Headline” Weibo post will usually appear at or near the top of users’ feeds within 24 hours. The post can be promoted to potential followers based on the relationships of your original followers, as well as based on different industries, interests, life stages.

The price for Fan Headline varies greatly according to your number of followers; the price relatively increases with your number of followers. Once you promoted with this function, a tag will be shown on the top left, like “推广” (Promoted), “热门” (Hot) or “推荐” (Recommended).

Fans Headline is an alternative advertising method that allows you to test the effectiveness of posts before you decide to pay. This is more suitable for an account that has its own fans based. It is similar to Facebook boost post, you can choose audience interest but not demographics.

Fans Tunnel/ Fans Talk

The differences between Fans Headline and Fans Tunnel is that Fans Tunnel allows advertisers to choose the demographic of the target audience. However, it does not allow you to test the ad, you are required to choose the target audience and post it as an ad in the beginning. This is an official advertising method for your ads. The advantages are the promotion is based on the mass users of Weibo and it does not require you to have an official account, you can leverage others’ accounts to post an ad, which is more flexible, precise and accurate.

The pricing of Fans Tunnel is based on the expected results of the promotion, evaluated by CPE or CPM.

CPE is Cost Per Engagement, which refers to effective interactions from the target audience, including clicks, comments, reposts and likes. The price based on CPE starts from ¥0.5 RMB per engagement and the minimum price raise unit is ¥0.01 RMB.

CPM is Cost Per Mille, which refers to the amount of post/account/app exposure you have in your audience’s feed. The price based on CPM starts from ¥5 RMB per thousand exposures and the minimum price raise unit is ¥0.1 RMB.

Weibo Ads Case Study

In March 2021, we conducted an advertising campaign for Griffith University on Weibo. This campaign aimed to collect leads from social media, and boost awareness of Griffith College in China. We targeted high school students (16-20 years old) and their parents (40-55 years old) that are well-funded families, with intention of studying abroad, and a high interest in higher education, ideally the student hopes to study in Australia. We utilised Fans Tunnel and Fans Headline in this campaign which had reached more than 700k Weibo users.

Results of Griffith University advertising campaign:

Reached 700k+ Weibo users
Has 300+ clicks
Has 1000+ interaction

Why MediaMo?

We are a team of friendly professionals who work hard to deliver highly engaging content and effective marketing strategies to raise online awareness and increase conversions for your brand. At MediaMo, our mission is to help businesses of all sizes with a smooth transition to the era of digital marketing.

We are experts in Chinese marketing in Australia. We understand the characteristics of Chinese and we know which marketing strategies and platforms are the best for your business. The two platforms we mentioned above are the most effective platforms to target Chinese customers, not only in China but also Chinese in Australia. However, Chinese platforms including WeChat and Weibo have plenty of rules and regulations. To advertise on these platforms, you have to own an official account which requires plenty of paperwork and going through difficult procedures, it is not as easy as you think. Apart from getting an official account, the content of ads are strictly monitored. All the sensitive words are not allowed and these are not clearly stated, for example, “好运” which means fortune is not allowed to appear on these platforms, if you contained sensitive words in your text or graphics, you are required to remove them or swap to other words. Posting ads on Chinese social media platforms can be frustrating and time-consuming, you have to understand all the rules that are changing frequently.

So, MediaMo is here. We can help you to develop your advertising campaign, provide the best marketing strategy for your business to target Chinese AND we can help you to monitor and process all the advertising procedures. The only thing you have to do is wait for the incredible results. We provide the best service and the most effective campaign to reach your goal.We are your one-stop-shop Chinese marketing agency.