2020 KOL Social Media Marketing Report

In 2020, the KOL market size increased by 51% year-on-year; the automotive industry had the largest increase in investment in KOLs in 2020, up 171.46% year-on-year; Xiaohongshu and Bilibili became the strongest dark horses of 2020, with the amount of money advertisers spent on the two major social platforms increasing by 119.42% and 141.08% respectively in 2020...

Recently, Weibo released the "2020 KOL Social Media Delivery Report" (hereinafter referred to as the "Report") based on social delivery big data to explain the overall situation of the KOL market. What platforms do advertisers like to invest in? What are the number of platforms and combination preferences of advertisers? What trends will advertisers see in the future? ...answered practical questions that advertisers were concerned about, helping advertisers to better understand the KOL market, so that they can know themselves and their opponents and conduct KOL marketing efficiently.

It is reported that as a data-driven short video KOL trading platform, Weiboyi relies on the platform's social data, order transaction data and AI intelligent marketing technology to provide advertisers with one-stop KOL resource purchasing services, social big data services, and social media communication strategy services. Based on its years of practical experience and data accumulation, the relevant data reports released by Weibo have always received much attention and recognition in the industry, and are regarded as a marketing bible for social media and short video delivery.

What are the highlights of this report? Fmarketing makes some interpretations based on its own understanding of the industry, hoping to provide inspiration and guide everyone to find their own KOL marketing secrets from the report, helping companies achieve growth and master KOL marketing in today's world where traffic dividends are gradually disappearing.

The KOL market has grown steadily, and KOL has become a standard feature of brand marketing

In the past 2020, under the influence of the epidemic, advertisers have transformed online, and digitalization has become a new engine for business development. In this wave of digitalization, corporate digital marketing is experiencing further growth. The market size of China's digital marketing industry has been growing year by year, reaching 85.02 billion yuan in 2020, and is expected to exceed 100 billion yuan in 2021.

Among them, KOL marketing is an important engine driving the growth of China's digital marketing industry. In 2020, the KOL market size reached 68 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 51% compared to 2019.

In addition to the rapid growth of the KOL market, the average amount of content delivered by advertisers in a single project also reflects their love for KOLs. In 2019, the average number of content pieces delivered by advertisers for a single project was 15, while in 2020 this number increased to 142, an increase of 8 times. In addition, more than 30% of project orders have more than 50 pieces of content.

In 2020, which was affected by the epidemic, both the KOL market size and advertisers' investment in single projects showed strong growth rates. This to a large extent demonstrates the strong resilience and pressure resistance of the KOL economy and advertisers' love for KOL marketing. The report predicts that the KOL market will continue to maintain a steady growth rate in 2021, increasing by 44% year-on-year to 98 billion yuan. It can be foreseen that KOL marketing will become a standard feature of brand marketing and play an important role in product promotion, brand building, public relations marketing, marketing activities and other scenarios.

Beauty and daily chemicals are the most popular KOLs, and automotive advertisers have the fastest growth in investment

The report shows that the investment amounts in beauty and daily chemicals, 3C digital products, food and beverages, maternal and child care, and IT and Internet ranked in the top five. In fact, these industries have always been major investors in KOL marketing. One of the main reasons why they are keen on KOL is that their target consumers are mainly young users represented by those born in the 1990s and Generation Z. Relevant data shows that 52% of users will refer to KOL recommendation posts before purchasing, and 33% of users will make a purchase after seeing KOL recommendation posts. The younger the consumers, the higher their trust in KOL recommendation content. Beauty and daily chemicals are typical examples of this. In recent years, domestic beauty products represented by Perfect Diary and Huaxizi have emerged as a new force, thanks in large part to the promotion of KOLs.

The top five growth categories are automobiles and peripherals, luxury gifts, education and training, communication services, and home appliances. It is worth noting that compared with 2019, automobiles and peripherals topped the list with a growth rate of 171.46%, becoming the industry with the largest growth rate. In fact, it is not surprising that the automotive industry has become the industry with the largest growth rate. According to data recently compiled by the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers based on data released by the National Bureau of Statistics, in 2020, the automobile production and sales situation was significantly better than expected, and the industrial added value of the automobile manufacturing industry also grew steadily year-on-year, and the growth rate was significantly higher than the previous year. Under the influence of the epidemic, it is undoubtedly rare for the automotive industry to achieve such results, and KOLs have also played a huge role in achieving such results.

Faced with the increasingly younger age of car buyers, many brands including BMW and Lincoln are using KOLs and short videos to better communicate and interact with consumers, thereby generating direct sales leads and closing deals. In addition to the automotive industry, the investment amounts for luxury gifts, education and training, communication services, and household appliances also maintained a relatively fast growth rate, recording an increase of 69.19%, 64.50%, 44.20%, and 43.06%, respectively.

From the perspective of the industry distribution of the main customer numbers, beauty and daily chemicals, and food and beverages ranked first and second with 17% and 12% respectively, followed by IT Internet and home appliances, both at 10%, and automobiles and peripherals, and clothing and luggage also accounted for 7% respectively. Even the home furnishing and medical care industries, which are considered extremely traditional, accounted for 4%. It is not difficult to find that in the face of the general trend of KOL marketing, advertisers in many industries are trying it out and spending more and more budget on KOL.

Xiaohongshu and Bilibili have become dark horses in growth, and the trend of circleization is becoming more and more obvious

The report shows that in 2020, the top five social platforms in terms of the amount of money spent by advertisers are Sina Weibo, Xiaohongshu, WeChat official accounts, Douyin, and Bilibili. However, although Weibo still ranks first, it has dropped by 13.88% year-on-year. The fastest growing channel was Moments, which increased by 155.87% year-on-year, followed by Bilibili and Xiaohongshu, which ranked second and third with growth rates of 141.98% and 119.42% respectively. It is not difficult to find that social platforms like Xiaohongshu and Bilibili, which have more circle-based, more segmented and relatively "niche" users, are rising across the board. This phenomenon has been most evident in the past two years. Take Bilibili as an example. From the first New Year's Eve Gala held on New Year's Day 2020 to the screen-sweeping drama "The Next Wave" in May, Bilibili has successfully broken the circle through a series of actions. Bilibili's circle culture has been increasingly valued by brands and has become the main battlefield for brands to activate young marketing power.

The report also pointed out that 3C digital advertisers prefer Bilibili when choosing social media platforms. In mid-2020, many brands including Huawei, OPPO, and vivo held new product launches on Bilibili. The third-quarter financial report released by Bilibili showed that Bilibili's advertising business revenue in the third quarter increased by 126% year-on-year to 560 million yuan. Xiaohongshu is a paradise for recommending beauty and daily chemical brands, Douyin is popular in the food and beverage industry, and WeChat public accounts are preferred in the IT and Internet industry...Behind this phenomenon is a reflection of the redistribution of traffic on social platforms and the full manifestation of the imbalance in social dynamics. It can be foreseen that based on the product attributes of different industries and the trend of circle segmentation, they will also choose corresponding KOLs to output content on various social platforms according to the preferences of people in the circle, so as to truly win their love and trust.

The mid- and long-tail categories are growing strongly and have become the new favorite in brand marketing.

Judging from the number of top, middle and tail trading accounts on the entire platform, the number of tail accounts increased by 25.52% year-on-year in 2020. From the perspective of each specific social platform, the phenomenon of the overall rise of mid- and long-tail accounts is more obvious, especially on the two major platforms of Douyin and Xiaohongshu. The number of mid-level accounts on Douyin increased by 86.31% year-on-year, and the number of accounts at the tail end even reached 122.73%; Xiaohongshu’s mid-level and top-level accounts increased by 99.43% and 206.18% respectively.

The reason why mid- and long-tail accounts are more popular is inseparable from the change in advertisers' KOL advertising strategies. Under the influence of the epidemic, advertisers' brand effectiveness goals are being reconstructed and ROI has been raised to an unprecedented level. This has driven advertisers to no longer pursue top KOLs in social media advertising as they did in the past, but to select mid- and long-tail KOLs through big data analysis based on their own brand and product characteristics, striving to achieve "ultimate cost-effectiveness." This has largely driven the increase in the transaction value of mid-tier accounts.

Author: Micro Easy Broadcast

Source: Weiyibo