Wechat Business Download ~REPACK~
Sandy Bendele
The most effective way to market your business on WeChat is by opening an Official Account. There are two types of accounts for WeChat marketing, Subscription accounts and Service accounts.
Official Accounts must be verified (usually via phone call) and pay a $99 USD annual fee to the platform. It takes 1-2 weeks to get an answer but, once set up, your business will benefit from the same access and features as businesses registered in China.
Any business, with or without an Official Account, can reach out to KOLs on WeChat. KOLs can endorse or promote your product or service, which means you can access their audience without having to build your own on the platform.
For example, in 2016, WeChat partnered with 60 Italian companies based near their office in Milan. These companies were allowed to sell on WeChat without having to apply for a license to operate a business in China, or have an Official Account for overseas businesses.
These partnerships are less common in 2021 because businesses can now apply for a WeChat account without a license. But brands still frequently partner with WeChat to create promotional innovations that require new functions.
WeChat is now a go-to channel for merchants to promote their brand and sell their products in China. If you want to leverage WeChat to grow your business in China, here's your guide to getting started.
WeChat for Business is a promotional tool that allows businesses to set up a presence on the WeChat platform. By setting up a WeChat store, businesses can sell their products directly to Chinese consumers.
Everything is social in China. To buy a restaurant meal, a hotel room or a rental car, users can read reviews and ratings, comment on the business, and even rate the services the business provides, just like on TripAdvisor.
For a business in China, customer testimonials on WeChat matter a lot. Make sure to constantly interact with users on your WeChat Moment and WeChat Official Account posts to turn them into your loyal customers.
There are several different types of WeChat account that businesses can open. The three main options are the Service Account, Mini Program, and WeChat Work.
The registration process is largely the same now for Chinese and foreign businesses. There used to be different processes, and more restrictions for overseas companies. You will likely find that some parts of the registration process are in English, while others are only in Chinese. Google Translate works well here, though, or you may find a Chinese speaker useful.
To be verified, all companies must supply business license details. WeChat will review the legitimacy of each business applying. This is much simpler if you have a Chinese-registered company, but a foreign business license can also be used.
Once your WeChat account is set up and verified, you can start marketing and selling (with a Service Account). A verified account from a foreign business has access to the same marketing, advertising and selling tools as a domestic Chinese business.
WeChat business accounts are useful for companies with a debit or credit card issued in China's Mainland. The business accounts can be used to market and sell in China, as well as handle sales, payments, and customer support.
Because Chinese consumers already trust these influencers, you have the opportunity to tap into a ready-made audience who trusts you. However, keep in mind that your influencer should link to your WeChat business account in their promotions, not your website. Chinese consumers are used to learning about products via WeChat, and asking people to click through to your website can result in lower ROI.
Rely on WeChat to build an eCommerce channel in China, localize your content, partner with influencers, and tap into the power of Mini Programs. Even as a foreign entity, you can set up your WeChat business account with 4 simple steps that will help you reap the benefits for years to come.
So, which type of account is best for you depends largely on how you plan to utilize this account for your business. Namely, in terms of marketing your products and services. Keep in mind that overseas companies can only register a service account. For a subscription and enterprise account, you need a company registration in mainland China.
Each day, businesses can publish once a day with 1-6 articles at the time of each publishing. The great thing about the subscription account is that it prioritizes the time of published content and places it at the top of the WeChat search engine.
There used to be some tough restrictions on who could reach users from the mainland. In the past, there were separate platforms for Chinese users and international users. The Chinese platform was only in Chinese and required a Chinese ID, phone number, and business license. The international users were limited to a different version of the platform with a foreign-only audience. But today, international official WeChat accounts are visible to everyone.
First, let us congratulate you on this decision! Setting up a WeChat account (subscription, service, enterprise) is a great tool for any business that wants to enter the Chinese market and win new customers. For example, when you set up a WeChat store, you can manually connect it to WeChat Pay. This allows customers to make one-click payments within the platform.
For businesses on the international and mainland platforms, you can use the WeChat generated QR code as part of your marketing strategy. Post it on business cards, brochures, and social media channels to direct potential customers to your WeChat ecosystem.
For work purposes, companies and business communication, a special version of WeChat called WeCom (formally known as Enterprise WeChat (or Qiye Weixin) and WeChat Work before Nov 2020) was launched in 2016.[61] The app was meant to help employees separate work from private life.[62] In addition to the usual chat features, the program let companies and their employees keep track of annual leave days and expenses that need to be reimbursed, employees could ask for time off or clock in to show they were at work.[62][63][64][65]
WeChat Business (微商) is one of the latest mobile social network business model after e-commerce, which utilizes business relationships and friendships to maintain a customer relationship.[88] Comparing with the traditional E-business like JD.com and Alibaba, WeChat Business has a large range of influence and profits with less input and lower threshold, which attracts lots of people to join in WeChat business.[89]
WeChat salesperson in this mode is for promoting products by individuals, which belongs to C2C mode. In this mode, individual sellers post relevant photos and messages of their agent products on the WeChat Moments or WeChat groups and sell products to their WeChat friends. Besides, they develop friendships with their customers by sending messages in festivals or write comments under their updates on WeChat moments to increase their trust. Also, continuing to communicate with the regular customers raises the 'WOF' (word-of-mouth) communications, which influences decision-making. Some WeChat businessmen already have an online shop in Taobao, but use WeChat to maintain existing customers.[91]
As more and more people have joined WeChat Business, it has brought many problems. For example, some sellers have begun to sell counterfeit luxury goods such as bags, clothes and watches. Some sellers have disguised themselves as international flight attendants or overseas students to post fake stylish photos on WeChat Moments. They then claim that they can provide overseas purchasing services but sell counterfeit luxury goods at the same price as the authentic ones.[92] Other popular products selling on WeChat are facial masks. The marketing mode is like that of Amway but most goods are unbranded products which come from illegal factories making excess hormones which could have serious effects on customers' health.[93] However, it is difficult for customers to defend their rights because a large number of sellers' identities are uncertified. Additionally, the lack of any supervision mechanism in WeChat business also provides opportunities for criminals to continue this illegal behavior.[94][95] In early 2022, WeChat suspended more than a dozen NFT (non-fungible token) public accounts to clean up crypto speculation and scalping. The crackdown on NFT-related content comes from domestic digital collectibles, which cannot be resold for profit.[96]
In 2016, WeChat partnered with 60 Italian companies (WeChat had an office in Milan) who were able to sell their products and services on the Chinese market without having to get a license to operate a business in China.[102] In 2017, Andrea Ghizzoni, European director of Tencent, said that 95 percent of global luxury brands used WeChat.[102]
There have been some reported issues with the Web client.[112] Specifically when using English, some users have experienced autocorrect, autocomplete, auto-capitalization, and auto-delete behavior as they type messages and even after the message was sent. For example, "gonna" was autocorrected to "go", the E's were auto-deleted in "need", "wechat" was auto-capitalized to "Wechat" but not "WeChat", and after the message was sent, "don't" got auto-corrected to "do not". However, the auto-corrected word(s) after the message was sent appeared on the phone app as the user had originally typed it ("don't" was seen on the phone app whereas "do not" was seen on the Web client). Users could translate a foreign language during a conversation and the words were posted on Moments.[113]
Though it started as a simple messenger platform, WeChat has become far more than that. Through its mini programs platform, WeChat has essentially become the home screen for many Chinese smartphone users, as almost every function can be completed from inside the app.- Advertisement -User acquisition & revenue growth for mobile publishers15+ million new users for our customers worldwide
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