How to use Weibo marketing and promotion in 2022!

Brushing teeth and checking Weibo are the first things most Chinese Internet users do after getting up.

As a mature social product that has been developed for 12 years, Weibo has experienced changes in content formats such as graphic content, short videos and long videos. It has maintained its position in the context of the popularity of live streaming, the rise of the metaverse, and the impact of the epidemic.

According to Weibo's prospectus for its listing in Hong Kong, Weibo's revenue showed a steady upward trend in the first half of 2021. Weibo's revenue in the third quarter of 2021 was US$607 million, a year-on-year increase of 30%. At the same time, Weibo's monthly active users reached 573 million and daily active users reached 248 million in the third quarter.

After 12 years of development, Weibo has gradually become a social platform with multiple content forms coexisting. Topics cover 46 fields such as fashion, beauty, finance, and games. It has both circle influence and a wide range of people. "Weibo Hot Search" has become the leader of daily hot topics.

For brands, whether or not to do Weibo marketing is no longer an issue between brands. What market decision makers care about is how to do it better.

Recently, we have had a discussion around Weibo marketing. Combining the actual experience of many brand operators and institutional service providers, data reports released by third-party institutions, and our continuous observation of Weibo marketing, Daofa has summarized 53 elements in five categories of Weibo marketing.

1. Topic Marketing

According to the data officially released by Weibo in March this year, 48% of Weibo users were born after 1990, and 30% were born after 2000; 54.6% of users were female, and 45.4% were male; among them, 61.6% were female after 2000, and 38.4% were male; 54.1% were female after 1990, and 45.9% were male.

Young users who love to share, as well as a relatively balanced gender ratio, give Weibo strong topic and community attributes, making it naturally suitable for the spread and fermentation of various topics.

1. Public Opinion Field & Hot Spot Marketing

1. Ge Jingdong, senior vice president of marketing at Weibo, once said: "Unlike other platforms, Weibo's public opinion field is naturally formed, and it aggregates hot topics that people are really concerned about."

2. Weibo is the fermentation and detonation platform for almost all current hot topics, with characteristics such as real-time news and massive information. “Check Weibo’s hot searches for hot events” is one of Weibo’s biggest competitive advantages.

3. Weibo’s search function has become a new window for some people to understand the world. As an open scenario for media, KOLs and ordinary people to share content, it also brings stronger reference value.

4. As an indispensable carrier in social marketing, Weibo has been providing a social space for brands to spread their voice and manage their reputation. Thanks to its characteristics, hot topics can often spread in a ripple-like manner in multiple circles.

5. Some topics that are popular among the whole nation, such as #520# and #Shenzhou 13 launch#, have high public participation and can seize the opportunity of hot topics and secondary fermentation. Even without celebrities and top Vs, they can still gain good exposure.

6. Taking #520# as an example, compared with topics where celebrities and big Vs contribute the most volume, more than half of the participating users have less than 100 fans. This shows that for topics involving the whole nation, users are more enthusiastic to participate, the user groups are more diverse, and more in line with life scenarios. Therefore, it will be more suitable for brands to do cross-circle or pan-circle marketing.

7. When brands are running multi-platform marketing campaigns, Weibo is the most important public opinion platform to pay attention to. Brands need to always pay attention to whether any users are disseminating the materials for a second time, as well as the direction of their user reviews. First, the heat of user discussion triggered by marketing represents the attention received by the marketing activity at that time; second, user word-of-mouth affects the nature of the traffic attracted by brand marketing - whether it is word-of-mouth fermentation that is both applauded and praised, or opposition voices that may lead to a brand crisis.

8. As for the content direction and user comments of the daily operation and maintenance of the brand official blog, the brand also needs to conduct self-inspection and adjustments in a timely manner to avoid loopholes triggering crises and causing word-of-mouth to be backfired by marketing.

9. At the same time, consumers’ UGC comments on Weibo can be used as a radar for brands to judge the effectiveness of marketing strategies. The direction of these evaluations and feedback will become a yardstick for other users to judge their impression of the brand image and products, thus affecting the brand’s reputation. The opinions and feedback of some “super users” may also provide brands with inspiration and direction in future product planning.

2. Sports may become the next hot topic on Weibo

10. This year is undoubtedly a big year for sports. Relevant data shows that from July 1 to August 30, the number of blog posts related to the "Olympics" on Weibo reached 966,900, the number of bloggers posting the posts reached 120,000, and the total number of likes on the blog posts exceeded 624 million. Among these bloggers, bloggers from the sports industry account for 4.08%, and bloggers from industries other than sports account for 95.92%. At the same time, during the event, Weibo's hot searches were dominated by related hot topics every day, with a total of 3,462 "Olympic" related topics on the hot searches.

11. Many athletes have gained popularity through their outstanding performances in the Olympic Games. There is even a phenomenon where Weibo users help athletes find brand endorsements. The "hotspot + social" attributes of Weibo are fully reflected in sports topics. Everyone can participate and express their views and opinions on sports.

12. At this year's Summer Olympics, Su Bingtian is one of the athletes with the highest commercial value. Thanks to his outstanding performance in the Olympics, Xiaomi announced on its official blog that Su Bingtian became its brand spokesperson. This is also the first brand spokesperson since Xiaomi was founded. After the news was announced, it immediately became a hot topic on Weibo. The topic #Su Bingtian endorses Xiaomi brand# received 250 million views, and the topic #Lei Jun and Su Bingtian look a bit alike# even became a hot search.

13. Ice and snow sports such as short track speed skating, ice hockey, figure skating, and skiing are entering the vision of the general public. The fields of film, television, and variety shows have also launched many "peripheral works" around these sports. For example, the recently concluded TV series "Flying with You" received 1.61 billion views and 1.017 million discussions on Weibo, and the 2020 "Snow Pear Stewed in Rock Sugar" received 7.84 billion views and 2.986 million discussions. The feedback from this series of works has made the brand more excited about the 2022 ice and snow event.

14. Sports marketing has always been an area of ​​great concern in the advertising and branding circles. Especially in the current era of strong sports competition atmosphere, sports stars can bring huge traffic, endorsement benefits and sales conversions to brands. According to incomplete statistics from DaoFa, Chinese freestyle skier Gu Ailing has already won endorsements from 16 brands, including big names such as Mengniu, Anta, Luckin Coffee, and By-Health.

2. Emotional Marketing

15. Today’s young users prefer communications that are authentic, close to life, and resonate with their spirit. Therefore, when marketing on Weibo, brands must be good at finding "topics", either to provide topics for conversation, hot topics, or emotional value.

16. For example, the high acceptance of Chinese style and trends by Generation Z has led to many new and old brands focusing on Chinese trends gaining more attention on Weibo. Take China's Li Ning as an example. After participating in the New York Fashion Week, it teamed up with Weibo to create national trend marketing, detonating from all angles such as traditional culture, new national trends, and new attitudes. With the blessing of national confidence, it achieved rapid growth in brand voice and sales.

17. In addition to national self-confidence, friendship, family affection and love are also eternal topics.

18. There is a lot of emotional resonance happening on Weibo every day, and brands also see opportunities in it. For example, during the Children's Day on June 1st, Telunsu released its brand movie "A Better Childhood", and collaborated with popular writers, emotions, mother and baby, fashion and other circles. Nearly 1,600 celebrities posted film reviews on Weibo, bringing back childhood memories. In the end, the topic of Telunsu #BetterChildhood# received 1.6 billion views and 19 million video views.

19. Santonban, a boutique coffee brand, mainly posts content about lifestyles that young users like on Weibo, such as camping, traveling, flying radio stations, art exhibitions, etc., continuously demonstrating the brand's attitude of "playing with lifestyle lovers". In addition, the brand has also been carrying out the environmental protection themed activity #Return Plan# with the recycling of empty coffee cans for many years, and continuously communicates with brand users on Weibo in an emotional way, allowing users to form a sense of identity and belonging to the brand through participating in offline brand activities, and ultimately converting the activity enthusiasm into brand favorability, bringing a wave of gains to the brand.

20. Jiang Xiaobai can be said to be the first new consumer brand to become popular on Weibo with its “emotion bottle”. Its marketing positioning is very clear, which can be summarized in two sentences: find an outlet for users to release their emotions and let consumers participate in expressing brand attitudes.

21. The marketing plans of luxury brands on Weibo are increasingly moving closer to the spiritual world of consumers. According to the 2021 China Luxury User Survey, many consumers own their first luxury item at important moments in life, such as birthdays (19.6%), travel (12.3%), and starting work (11.9%). Therefore, more and more luxury brands are beginning to explore the possibility of connecting young consumers’ “important moments” with their own brands.

22. For example, Bulgari has chosen the 18-year-old coming-of-age ceremony as one of the nodes to accompany young users through important moments in their lives. The brand once collaborated with Chinese female director Mai Zi to shoot the "That Year Flowers Bloomed" series of micro-films, with the theme of "Coming of Age Ceremony", showing the psychological state of three Chinese girls on the eve of their 18th birthday. At the same time, Bulgari also launched a special coming-of-age gift edition of the Divas' Dream series online.

23. These real cases that happened on Weibo show that the establishment of brand value on Weibo must not rely on numb and cold propaganda, but on being inspired by the feelings and outputting stories and content that resonate with users emotionally, gradually amplifying the brand's values ​​and gaining user recognition.

3. Celebrity Marketing and Influencer Marketing

24. Celebrity marketing and entertainment marketing are important forms of marketing on Weibo that cannot be ignored.

25. For brands, KOL recommendations, celebrity endorsements, and supporting brand overall marketing campaigns can maintain a healthy exposure rate and have a continuous driving effect on enhancing brand power.

26. In the first half of this year, "Creation Camp" was the hottest variety show, and Liu Xuxiu was the member who appeared on the most hot searches in the entire camp. After the competition, Tangdao and Luckin Coffee Coconut Latte invited Liu Luxiu to be their spokesperson, and the timing was when he was at the peak of his popularity. These two brands also benefited the most from their business cooperation with Liu Luxiu.

27. Collaborating with celebrity spokespersons during periods of peak exposure and attention can maximize brand power.

28. The cooperation between brands and celebrities is, to some extent, a transmission of the chain of trust.

29. Brands need to focus on two key points when choosing artists for business cooperation: one is the overlap between their fans and the target group, and the other is their user recognition on social platforms such as Weibo.

30. Before the official announcement of the endorsement, some information can be released in advance to attract attention. Specifically, you can follow the following rhythm: release a countdown and news a few days before the official announcement; arrange the opening screen, resource position, homepage, and hot searches on the day of the official announcement; and the artist studio interacts with the official blog and fans.

31. After a brand signs a business cooperation agreement with an artist, how can they make the best use of their talents? Taking advantage of the popularity of artists also requires skills. Currently, the most commonly used methods for brands are: 1. Using celebrity head posters, or brand posters of celebrities holding products; 2. Finding nodes related to the product, and asking the artist to cooperate with publicity and promotion activities, such as customizing limited edition gift boxes for the artist, forwarding prize draws for autographed photos, and having the artist enter the live broadcast room, etc. If new products are launched later, the same operation can be performed again as long as it is within the contract period to increase the number of product purchases and user repurchases.

32. Now that Weibo is cooperating with the country in launching the Clear and Clean Movement, some people are beginning to worry about the failure and stalling of celebrity marketing. However, some practitioners believe that in the long run, after entertainment returns to the right track, the creative space for platform creators will be better, the platform ecology will be healthier, and it will have a more positive effect on brands.

33. Compared with celebrities, the selection of Weibo influencers is a greater test of the brand’s judgment.

34. There are two main purposes for brands to choose Weibo celebrities to promote and conduct brand marketing: 1. To enhance brand favorability and accumulate social assets; 2. To enhance the conversion efficiency of the consumption chain.

35. On Weibo, it is normal for two celebrities with the same number of fans but in different vertical fields to have different quotes.

36. On Weibo, what influencers post are not simple notes, but rich interpretations of brands and products from different perspectives.

37. There are many bloggers on Weibo who are paid low but create content seriously. Their fans generally do not exceed 500,000. Some bloggers with 50,000-100,000 fans have stronger fan stickiness than bloggers with hundreds of thousands or millions of fans. Correspondingly, the product categories they can sell are more segmented and vertical. Brands that are willing to invest in this type of blogger really understand cost-effectiveness. How to discover such bloggers has become a new challenge for brands and service providers.

38. A three-dimensional structure with multiple circles, from celebrities to grassroots bloggers, is taking shape on the Weibo platform, namely the "small waist". When most events occur, we can see that the top KOLs and celebrities can bring the greatest volume to related topics, but these voices alone are not enough, because the hot searches on Weibo are clicked and searched by everyone, so the real topic creation is inseparable from the participation of industry media, industry IPs, a large number of blue Vs and multi-circle KOLs. Only with everyone’s joint participation can we break through the circle and create more business possibilities.

39. From the perspective of content gameplay, reviews/evaluations and collections/lists are generally more likely to produce popular content. On Weibo, the IP gameplay of #100-person evaluation team# is worthy of brand attention.

4. Weibo Brand Marketing Tools & Suggestions

During discussions at the Knife Skills Brand Operator Club, we found that many people have a general understanding of Weibo marketing methods, but when it comes to the practical level, such as what tools to use to heat up the topic, what kind of content is more suitable for which products to promote, etc., some people are still at a stage of half-understanding.

After reviewing the advertising activities of multiple brands on Weibo, we selected several commonly used products/tools and gave a basic introduction.

Currently, Weibo has established a mature social marketing system that covers multiple categories such as information flow advertising, hot topics, search, and open screen exposure. At the same time, it connects commercial and social content scenarios and shortens the advertising conversion path.

1. Weibo Marketing Tools

40. The Treasure Bowl is called a magic tool for planting grass by many service providers. Through customized account recommendations and convenient blog post delivery functions, Jubaopen helps advertisers quickly find more suitable celebrities and influencers and efficiently and accurately disseminate content, maximizing the influence of celebrities and influencers and improving marketing efficiency. For example, Biotherm used the Cornucopia to target Deng Lun's audience, targeting female fans born in the 1980s and 1990s, people who stay up late to watch TV series, and white-collar workers, using the celebrity influence to drive user purchasing power.

41. After the iterative upgrade in December, Fans Headlines has more comprehensive functions. Heating content, marketing promotion, helping to make headlines, different products have different focuses on independent content and commercial content.

42. Many brands will purchase short-term fan headlines to view the content data released by KOLs or brand blue Vs, and then continue to release high-conversion content after finding it. Therefore, Fan Headlines is actually an efficient way for bloggers and brands to test the quality of their content.

43. The billing method for Fans Headlines is based on the purpose of delivery. Real-time bidding is performed based on the number of active fans selected, the number of fans of the target account covered, and the number of people interested in the tag. There is no fixed price. To sum it up in one sentence: the more active fans you select, the more expensive it will be. In addition, the "Help to get on the headlines" function derived from Fans Headlines when it is doing blog posting can effectively cover the active fan base of the target blogger, so the brand can actually judge the activity of the blogger's fans by the unit price of helping to get on the headlines. What needs to be noted about Fans Headlines is that once the content is posted on Fans Headlines, it cannot be modified, so multi-party review of the content is required.

44. Super Fans Pass: This product was used in the promotion of Ubras’ new base layer underwear on Weibo this winter. Its strategy is simple and clear: first, young women are identified as the brand's target audience, and targeted at high-conversion groups and high-net-worth groups on Weibo e-commerce; second, a targeted plan is established for the selling points of the base layer clothing, and different creative materials are cross-combined and tested to obtain the best creative combination, and finally the optimal combination of "Use the big move" title + Liu Wen version video + blog post advocating the same style as celebrities and high elasticity and seamless selling points" is determined. According to official data from Weibo, this time Ubras' programmatic creative delivery achieved a 16% decrease in landing page costs and a 17% increase in interaction rate.

45. Brand Accounts: In order to address the pain points of users leaving after a brand campaign, difficulty in retaining high-quality KOL content, and difficulty in retaining brand customer data assets, Weibo upgraded and launched Brand Accounts this year to help brands reach consumers more efficiently and conveniently through the linkage of public and private domains, realize a "public domain + private domain" social self-circulating ecology, gradually build brand private domain barriers, and help brands achieve the linkage of public and private domains to feed back marketing.

2. Brand placement suggestions

46. ​​From current observations, beauty and skin care products that can be sold in large quantities on Weibo can be divided into three categories: Cleansing products: facial cleansers, cleansing masks, shower gels, toothpastes; Care products: whitening tooth strips, oral care products, whitening masks, eye masks; Cosmetics: loose powder, pressed cakes, air cushions.

47. Some domestically produced small household appliances, beauty devices and other products with relatively high average order value have won the hearts of consumers through the combination of “higher cost performance + selling points comparable to leading brands”, with good results.

48. Mengyajia once posted 8,000 messages on Weibo in three months, which also became the origin of the saying "A big V who doesn’t get an electric toothbrush advertisement is not a real big V." When giving briefs to KOLs, Mengyajia requires bloggers to use colloquial and everyday language to talk about their personal experiences. For example, what problems unclean teeth can cause, and how their oral problems have improved after using an electric toothbrush, so as to embed the product. After the tweet is published, Mengyajia will purchase fan headlines and display the blog post to the blogger’s fans first, allowing the content to reach users more efficiently, thereby leading to more exposure and interaction; at the same time, the brand will also select some non-advertised "tap water recommendations" to post on the fan headlines to advertise the brand for free.

49. Brands that have just started on Weibo and have a limited budget can try performance information flow advertising, which is content-oriented, provides guidance in the comment area, and then uses Super Fans to increase exposure.

50. Weibo can still be used to cold start brands. In addition to Mengyajia, a large part of Wang Baobao's sales during its cold start from 0-1 also came from the guidance of Weibo.

5. Build brand power

Traffic is just a tool, planting grass is just a means, and brand is the core.

51. When doing hot marketing and event marketing, many big brands still use Weibo as the main platform for communication and placement, especially during important time points such as Double 11, Christmas, New Year's Day, and Valentine's Day. The opening screen of Weibo is almost always filled with international first-line brands such as Estee Lauder, Armani, and Dior. They also have a clear purpose in choosing Weibo. Through opening screens and hot searches, they grab users' attention at critical moments, increase brand exposure and boost brand voice.

52. Weibo is a public platform. If properly deployed, it can reach potential customers that are difficult to reach at other times. Therefore, when brands conduct Weibo marketing promotions, they often consider not only ROI, but also long-term benefits. The long-tail effect of the campaign can be well reflected on Weibo.

53. Integrated marketing agency Weishidun concluded that the “standard three-piece set” has gradually formed to increase the overall platform influence on Weibo: Weibo opening screen + Weibo hot searches + Weibo information flow. Take PROYA as an example. When the brand officially announced Cai Xukun as its spokesperson, it grabbed the first visual attention by placing a splash screen ad on Weibo, and used Weibo hot searches to receive the traffic brought by the splash screen ad and the KOL content placement on the site, and converted it to the Weibo brand homepage. Finally, Cai Xukun’s personal account posted videos and activated fans, leveraging the voice of the entire platform to help the brand achieve rapid popularity explosion at large marketing nodes.

VI. Conclusion

The podcast "Random Fluctuations" asked a question that many people have thought about in one of its episodes: "Can we imagine a better social media than Weibo?"

This seems to be an unsolvable problem. Some people quietly withdrew from Weibo, some returned after leaving, and more new blood joined Weibo, supporting the current 248 million DAU.

But if we put it into the system of brand marketing and ask: "Can brands imagine a better communication medium than Weibo?" the answer may be clearer.

It has a young and large user base, hot searches that are sensitive to social emotions and topics, and a community atmosphere that has been established for 12 years - these are still unique and important characteristics in today's social environment, and are the reasons why brands still revolve around Weibo.

Author: Knife Research Institute

Source: Knife Skills Research Institute (ID: DigipontClub)