WeChat vs. TikTok: Analysis report on 4 major categories!

In 2019, WeChat’s monthly active users reached 1.164 billion, making it the best place for private domain operations. Tik Tok has grown from a single short video application focusing on singing, dancing and music to a comprehensive short video application that records a beautiful life, with 567 million monthly active users.

As two representative platforms of private and public traffic forms, WeChat and Douyin each have their own advantages in bringing goods, and their product launch strategies also have different rules.

As traffic becomes increasingly expensive, how to achieve accurate delivery has become one of the most pressing issues for businesses. This report selects four major categories: skin care, cosmetics, food and beverages, and maternal and child products. It compares and analyzes the market data, category data, account data, and brand data of these four major categories on the two major platforms, WeChat and Douyin, hoping to provide some reference for merchants to accurately place orders.

The data in the report are collected from Xigua Data and Feigua Data under Mianchao Technology, as well as public information. You can follow the official account "Mianchao Interactive" to obtain more in-depth reports.

Key points:

● WeChat focuses more on maintaining social relationships, while Douyin focuses more on content creation; Douyin users are younger and live in lower-income areas than WeChat users, but the average daily usage frequency per person is lower than that of WeChat; advertisers have different preferences for advertising on WeChat and Douyin. The internet, fast-moving consumer goods, and financial industries prefer to advertise on WeChat, while the beauty, daily chemicals, e-commerce, and food and beverage industries prefer to advertise on Douyin.

●The four major categories of skin care, cosmetics, food and beverages, and maternal and child products have all increased their investment in the Douyin channel, with food and beverage products having the largest investment. There is a significant seasonal pattern in the launch of food and beverage products, which are mainly concentrated in the fourth quarter and January (New Year's Goods Festival).

● In the advertising of the four major categories of skin care, cosmetics, food and beverages, and maternal and child products on the WeChat and Douyin platforms, the strategy of a small number of top accounts + some mid- and low-end accounts + a large number of long-tail accounts is followed.

●On the WeChat and Douyin platforms, the largest number of skin care and cleansing products were launched in the category of skin care, the largest number of lipsticks were launched in the category of makeup, the largest number of tea and snacks were launched in the category of food and beverages, and the largest number of cleaning and care products were launched in the category of maternal and child supplies.

● Among the four major categories of skin care, cosmetics, food and beverages, and maternal and infant products, on the WeChat platform, accounts related to emotions, life, information, and education have posted more frequently; on the Douyin platform, accounts related to grass-roots promotion, beauty, drama, food, and maternal and infant parenting have posted more frequently.

●On the WeChat platform, skin care and cosmetics are mainly foreign brands, food and beverages are mainly Chinese traditional health brands, and maternal and child products are mainly mosquito repellent and sunscreen brands; on the Douyin platform, skin care and cosmetics are mainly domestic emerging brands, food and beverages are mainly Chinese traditional health brands, cereals, and seasoning brands, and maternal and child products are mainly cleansing brands.

01 Basic data performance of the two platforms

Analysis of the platform’s product attributes

According to public information on the Internet, there are differences between WeChat and Douyin in terms of traffic patterns, content media, user interaction, fan stickiness, stores with goods sold, consumption types, and consumption levels. This also leads to different attributes of goods sold on the two platforms, corresponding to two different sets of gameplay.

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Platform user portrait analysis

According to the user portraits of the two platforms, in terms of age, WeChat users aged 25-35 account for 47.9%, and Douyin accounts for 42%. In terms of geography, WeChat users in third-tier and below cities account for 54.6%, and Douyin accounts for 61%. In terms of usage time preference, WeChat users are active at 22:00, while Douyin users are active between 19:00 and 23:00. Compared with WeChat, Douyin platform users are younger and live in lower-income areas, and the average daily usage frequency per person is lower than WeChat.

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Industry distribution of KOL advertisers on the platform

The industry distribution of KOL advertisers on the platform shows that advertisers from different industries have different preferences for KOL advertising on WeChat and Douyin platforms. The Internet, fast-moving consumer goods, and financial industries prefer to place native advertisements on WeChat official accounts, accounting for more than 53%; while the beauty and daily chemical, e-commerce, and food and beverage industries prefer to place KOLs on Douyin, accounting for more than 63.6%.

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Distribution of the four major categories

Among the four major categories of WeChat and Douyin advertising data in 2019, the largest number of ads was in food and beverages, and the number of ads on Douyin was 13.8 times that of WeChat; the second largest category was skin care products, with the number of ads on Douyin being 3.8 times that of WeChat; the number of ads on Douyin for cosmetics was 13.2 times that of WeChat, and the number of ads on Douyin for maternal and child products was 21 times that of WeChat. It can be concluded that all four major categories have increased their investment in the Douyin channel, with food and beverage products having the largest investment.

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Distribution of the four major categories of product launch trends

In the distribution of the four major categories of WeChat and Douyin advertising trends in 2019, on WeChat official accounts, food and beverage products had the largest number of launches in January and August-December, skin care products had the largest number of launches in March-July, and cosmetics and maternal and child products were concentrated in March-May; on the Douyin platform, the four major categories all showed an upward trend, with food and beverage products having the largest number of launches, reaching a peak in November, with the largest amount of launches. There is a significant seasonal pattern in the launch of food and beverages, which are mainly concentrated in the fourth quarter and January (New Year’s Goods Festival).

Taking skin care as an example, the following comparative analysis of the performance of WeChat and Douyin in the skin care market is conducted from four aspects: market data, product categories, accounts, and brands.

02 Analysis of skin care product launch data

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Market data

According to Xigua Data and Feigua Data monitoring, skin care products were launched on WeChat official accounts mainly from March to July, and the overall launch on the Douyin platform showed a rapid upward trend, reaching its peak in December, with the number of related videos exceeding 270,000, and the number of related videos in each month in the fourth quarter exceeded 100,000.

The number of readings of a single article on WeChat official accounts for skin care products is concentrated below 10,000, accounting for 97.93%, and the number of readings is 10,000-40,000, accounting for 1.55%; the number of likes for a single related video on Douyin is concentrated below 10,000, accounting for 98.12%, and the number of likes is 10,000-100,000, accounting for 1.51%. Whether on WeChat or Douyin platform, the delivery strategy follows a small number of top accounts + some mid-level accounts + a large number of long-tail accounts.

The total number of likes and like-comment ratios for skin care products on WeChat reached a peak in November (Double Eleven promotion). Users paid more attention to content related to product promotions. At the same time, a large amount of marketing content also reduced users' desire for interaction, so the like-comment ratio reached the highest level of the year. The total number of likes for videos on Douyin for skin care products has increased month by month, with the highest number of likes from July to October. The number of likes was relatively low in November and December, indicating a strong willingness for user interaction.

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Category data

Cleansing products are the most popular, WeChat has more eye and hand care products, and Douyin has more facial products

The skin care products with the largest number of launches on WeChat and Douyin platforms are cleansing products, while eye and hand care products are launched in large numbers on the WeChat platform, and facial masks, facial essences, and lotions/creams are launched in large numbers on the Douyin platform.

The products highlight the efficacy, mainly basic skin care products, and Douyin's target users are more segmented

In the word cloud of product names in the skin care category on WeChat and Douyin, the main focus is on the efficacy of the products. Words such as "repair", "cleanse", "lighten", "pores", and "keratin" appear frequently, and most of them are basic skin care products, mainly for facial care. The target users of Douyin products are more segmented, and words such as "men" and "students" appear more frequently.

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Account data

WeChat platform advertising is mainly based on emotional accounts, while Douyin platform advertising is mainly based on grass-roots accounts

Skin care products are mainly placed on the WeChat platform by emotional accounts, followed by life, health, fashion, information and other types, and most of them are general life accounts;

The main accounts on the Douyin platform are those that promote content, followed by accounts for beauty, comedy, drama, internet celebrities, and other types.

WeChat platform has more emotional accounts, while Douyin platform has more popular accounts for planting grass/beauty/drama

Among the top 20 accounts for the top 100 products on the WeChat platform, 11 are emotional accounts, accounting for 55%;

Among the TOP20 accounts that promote the TOP100 products on the Douyin platform, there are 10 grass-growing accounts, accounting for 50%.

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Brand data

WeChat mostly promotes foreign brands, Douyin mostly promotes domestic emerging brands, and Banmu Huatian promotes the most products

Skin care products on the WeChat platform are mainly foreign brands, with a small number of products and promotional product links. Products are mostly sold on WeChat malls, which are mostly e-commerce platforms that select global products.

Skin care products on the Douyin platform are mainly emerging domestic brands. The number of products and promotional product links of Banmu Huatian are both 8, and multiple product promotions enhance brand awareness; the promotional product links of Dee Fragrance and Panda are concentrated on 2-3 products, and concentrated promotions create explosive products to enhance brand awareness; men's skin care brands such as Maifute and Zuoyanyouse have also become popular; Douyin's promoted products are mostly in the form of links that jump to the brand's official mall or expert-recommended stores for purchase.

WeChat promotion content focuses on product effectiveness, while Douyin promotion content focuses on fun

The promotion content of skin care products on the WeChat platform starts with the functional characteristics, highlighting the importance of skin care and the harm of not taking care of the skin, attracting the attention of users, and then highlighting the ingredients and efficacy of the products, using exclusive discounts to attract users to jump to the mall to make purchases; the promotion content of skin care products on Douyin starts with interesting content to attract users' attention, integrates product selling points and efficacy with the plot, and guides users to jump to the mall to make purchases through the shopping cart.

The above is an analysis of skin care products on WeChat and Douyin.

Author: Face to face interaction

Source: Mianchao Interactive