The Top KOL Marketing Platforms in China

The Top KOL Marketing Platforms in China

1. Weibo: The China Twitter

Weibo is China’s version of Twitter. With a large and stable user base, KOL marketing on Weibo helps raise brand awareness. According to a report by Weibo with iResearch, 53.9% of all the KOLs’ followers are aged under 25.

If your business is targeting a younger audience, Weibo may be your platform. Weibo is a highly visual platform, so ensuring that you have high-quality visuals and interesting content is very important to succeed on this platform.

2. WeChat: The 1st Social Media in China

WeChat is a multi-platform platform in China that provides everything from messaging to electronic payments. KOL on WeChat is more like a blogger. The content they post is long and usually consists of text and visual effects. WeChat KOLs are released regularly, and most of them will contribute or manage their own WeChat official accounts. As users are more willing to read, KOL marketing on WeChat is more suitable for providing more information.

A unique feature provided by WeChat is KOL advertising. In this way, brands can place banner ads in KOL’s post content. Brands must negotiate with KOL separately to purchase this form of WeChat advertising.

3. Xiaohongshu (RED): Where Reviews & Social Media Meets E-Commerce

The content type of KOL shared by Xiaohongshu is slightly different. Most of the KOLs on Xiaohongshu share personal stories, recommendations, product reviews, and even live broadcasts. Real and relevant content makes it a suitable platform to build brand awareness, trust and increase sales.

Like Weibo, Xiaohongshu’s audience is very young, more than 70% of which were born after the 1990s. However, unlike Weibo, Xiaohongshu’s user base is almost entirely female. A report from iResearch stated that over 80% of Xiaohongshu’s users are female.

4. Tiktok: The Fastest Growing Social Media Platform

Tiktok is China’s first short video platform and the first China social media platform to gain appeal abroad. The video on TikTok has a strict length limit, the maximum allowed is 15 seconds!

Due to the length of the video, you usually see the content posted on the platform very quickly, and it is likely to spread viruses. KOL marketing on Tiktok is like viral marketing. Compared with increasing sales, it can better brand awareness and promote activities. Compared with Xiaohongshu and Weibo, Tiktok’s audience is younger, with 50% of its users born after 1995.

5. Kuaishou: The second Short Video Platform in China

Kuaishou is now the second largest video platform. Although it has many features of TikTok, it also adds real-time streaming to the platform. With the digitization of the buying cycle, real-time streaming live broadcast becomes more and more important for obtaining online sales in China. The demographics of Kuaishou users are similar to Tiktok, with the main difference being that Kuaishou is more popular outside Tier 1 and Tier 2 cities.

Although you may not like TikTok, Kuaishou is not a platform that cannot be ignored. On July 4, 2019, Chinese artist Guo Fucheng collaborated with KOL Simba to broadcast live. The total number of recorded viewers exceeded 1.1 million, and the total sales of streaming media recording reached 4 million.

The five tiers of KOLs are divided by the number of followers.

Many brands choose to work with a mix of KOLs at different levels to measure ROI and determine their strategy going forward.

There are five main criteria businesses should consider before making their KOL selection:

1. Relevance 

Refers to the similarities between your target audience and your KOL fan base. Investigating KOL’s follower demographics can be a great way to determine if KOL is right for your business. Like all other marketing strategies, KOL marketing is more effective if it can attract the right audience.

2. Reach 

Is the promotion effect of KOL content. For example, total views and shares. Coverage is highly dependent on the number of followers KOL has and the overall quality of the followers. If KOL contains more relevant keywords and posts during peak traffic hours, the coverage of the content will also be better.

3. Engagement 

It is the interaction between KOL and the audience. How many followers comment on these posts, and how often or how often does KOL respond? All these factors increase user trust in KOL. When the audience has more trust in KOL, the promotion will be more effective.

4. Influence

It is the actual return that KOL marketing brings to the enterprise. Sales conversion is the most common metric, and the average conversion rate for most KOLs is 1-5%.

5. Consistency 

It means maintaining a consistent image for your business. KOL will be your communicator, and his / her image should be consistent with your brand image. For example, a protein powder company should look for KOLs with a healthy athletic image. Inconsistent or misbehaving KOLs can damage the brand, so it is important to choose a KOL that values ​​your image and maintains consistency.

These 5 key metrics should be observed before launching any KOL marketing campaigns

These standards are for reference only. KOL marketing is very flexible and therefore not subject to the rules! Always try to work with KOLs from different backgrounds, genders or walls to get a more unique impression.

For example, cosmetics brands often prefer to work with female KOLs. However, MAC has collaborated with male artist Zhang Yixing and other micro KOLs on an event and has achieved outstanding results!

To maximize the effectiveness of promotions, multi-layer KOL marketing is a common practice. Collaborating with large and small KOLs can optimize campaign reach.

Resource from : https://www.dragonsocial.net/blog/kol-marketing-success-china/