WeChat is the single most powerful social network platform in China. In terms of a U.S. equivalent, it is essentially the Chinese version of Facebook with a tremendous reach into the Chinese market.
One of the most powerful communication mechanisms within the WeChat platform is WeChat Moments ads.
For North American companies looking to carve a larger foothold in China, WeChat is a great tool to expedite and increase their presence. The question is how those companies can optimize that growth. The answer is simple: through a strategic, targeted WeChat Moments ad campaign.
If you want to do business in China, a strategically placed WeChat Moments ad campaign is a valuable way to increase your bottom line.
Let’s take a look at your business can use WeChat Moments ads to target the Chinese demographic from North America.
WeChat is a Chinese social network owned by Tencent, the world’s fifth most valuable brand. Chinese users spend over 55% of their mobile internet usage on Tencent products.
What is WeChat?
WeChat is Tencent’s most popular app with over 1 billion monthly active users (MAU). Last year it was one of the most downloaded apps in the world. Recently, WeChat allowed North American companies to begin setting up WeChat user accounts.
What Are WeChat Moments Ads?
As with most social networks, WeChat gives its users the ability to make multimedia posts which can consist of text, links, or other content. These posts are known as “Moments.”
Similar to status updates on other platforms, WeChat Moments has an advertising platform as well. WeChat Moments ads natively appear in users’ WeChat Moments social feeds. Users can only see one ad a day within their feed. These ads are 6-15 second photo or video ads and click out to HTML5 pages (e.g. branding URL or canvas pages) native to the WeChat app.
WeChat Moments ads have a click-through rate of 1-2% with an engagement rate of 3-8%.
Why You Should Buy WeChat Moments Ads
WeChat Moments ads are now available for North American companies. That makes the development of WeChat Moments ad campaigns for any companies looking to appeal to the Chinese demographic an easy decision.
Consider a few factors that underline the impact of WeChat on the Chinese market:
- In 2018, WeChat reached 1 billion users worldwide.
- WeChat is viewed as the top workplace communications platform for 90% of Chinese professionals.
- WeChat’s active users use the app, on average, more than 50 minutes a day. They check it anywhere from 9 to 11 times a day.
WeChat is one of the most popular apps in the world. It has an ever-increasing community of users that check it often and for long periods of time. Its users also use the app for a variety of reasons, both personal and professional. While localized and geolocation targeting is not currently available, WeChat Moments ads still represent the perfect vector and a great opportunity for breaking into the Chinese market.
How to Set Up a WeChat Moments Ad Campaign
Running an effective ad campaign means establishing a timeline prior to launch. This process includes four major components:
- Creating Your WeChat Account
- Advertising Placement and Campaign Confirmation
- Campaign Launch
- Reporting
Let’s take a closer look at each step of the process:
Creating Your WeChat Account
In order to run and launch WeChat Moments ads, you’ll need to have an existing WeChat official account. If you have yet to establish an account, this process typically takes 6-8 weeks. Official account registration has to be affiliated with an advertising account and cannot be a third party business license. To help this go as smoothly as possible, it helps to have an experienced advisor who can help you seamlessly navigate the process in a short amount of time.
Advertising Placement and Campaign Confirmation
Next, you should engage in advertising placement and campaign confirmation. This is where you confirm all the details of your campaign and typically takes anywhere from 2-4 weeks. It will require an agency authorization form, an insertion order, creative and targeting approval by Tencent, and prepayment of your budget. These are all required prior to your campaign’s launch.
Campaign Launch
Once you complete these initial steps, you’re now ready for your campaign launch. This can take anywhere from 1-4 weeks. In this part of the process, you’ll launch your ad campaign. You’ll monitor the campaign’s progress and update ads accordingly based on performance. It is during this phase that you also work on an optimization strategy with Tencent.
Reporting
Finally, you’ll enter the reporting phase of the process. This is where you measure overall impressions, click-through and engagement rates. This is where you evaluate the ultimate effectiveness of your campaign.
This is a large amount of administrative and operational support to handle for a company unfamiliar with Tencent and WeChat. That’s why it makes sense to partner with a marketing firm who understands the process, platform, and providers involved.
Conclusion
Now that WeChat Moments ads are available for North American companies, it’s a perfect fit for brands looking to expand their reach into China. WeChat Moments ads provide companies with a platform that’s extremely popular. It’s one of the most downloaded and used in the world. It’s also a versatile platform. The WeChat community uses it for a variety of reasons – from personal content creation to professional collaboration, meaning most users are on it numerous times a day. WeChat Moments are a popular component of the app that rivals Facebook ads or Instagram stories as a way to communicate with prospective Chinese customers.
Whether you want to launch a successful WeChat Moments ad campaign or need a WeChat account set up, Periphery Digital can help guide you through the process.
Periphery Digital is a designated agency with Tencent, offering Tencent advertising products both domestically within China, and internationally in the US, Canada, Asia, Western Europe, Australia, and New Zealand.
For more on what Periphery can do to help your company successfully market to the Chinese demographic, contact us today!
