In the last blog post, I talked about how small businesses use the news feed, moments, to market their product. Some might argue that the target consumer base is still limited as one can only push photos to their friends, and thus generating new client base is difficult. Also, the authenticity and reliability of these business is quite limited because it got no business license nor legal credential to prove its authenticity.

So, WeChat delivered another function which is called “Public Platform” where companies, public figures, and institutions can register for an official WeChat account with ID verification . Their  authentication act as a product warranty for consumers. All users with authentication will get a “V” beside their display picture.

 

 

 

If WeChat Moment where like Facebook where users can see feeds from other friends, the Public Platform is the mirror image of twitter where users can follow individual whom they are interested and get tweets from them. For example, the Chinese Central Television (CCTV) has its official WeChat account where it can feed the latest news to its followers. Some popular Public Platforms have millions of followers and the marketing effect works as well, if not better, as marketing with twitter.

I am a intense WeChat user who follows a lot different public platforms such as my favourite online clothing stores, local news, interesting shops, restaurants, and many celebrities. The official clothing account will notify me if there is a new collection coming in or if there is a sale going on on a regular basis. And because they come as messages and i cannot miss it,  I was always up-to-date with their events.  By having Public Platform, users receive instant messages about companies’ most up-to-date promotion events, new products and other related news. Many companies use this platform as direct B2C marketing channel. 

At the companies’ end, WeChat marketing is every effective and it is just a few clicks away. It is the same idea of tweeting on twitter. The marketing team just need to feed informations and photos on their end with a few clicks, the information will appear on the users’ end instantly. Public Platform is used as authorized marketing engine where it enables companies to reach a vast number of consumers directly with marketing materials. Its extremely effective nowadays and it is becoming a frequent marketing channel in China. It generated over billions dollars of indirect and direct sales, and most companies start to use this platform.

How big is the user base of WeChat? Here are some numbers:

Users: 400 million

Age range: All age group

Geographic Area: Global

 

WeChat users are growing dramatically and its marketing channel is evolving rapidly as well. I believe it will become one of the most frequent used marketing strategy for many small business in the near future.