After reaching nearly 1 billion registered users, WeChat continues to reign supreme in China social media landscape. From marketer’s standpoint, the platform is still limited in many way due to its more private nature compared to other social media channels. On the other hand, some unique features of WeChat for marketers that can be used quite effectively.
In this post we are going to have a look at top 5 of them.
5 Most Useful Features of WeChat for Marketers
WeChat groups
One of the most often overlooked WeChat features for marketers is WeChat groups where members can participate in discussions. Inviting customers to join a group can be an effective way to keep them engaged with a brand. Each group is issued a unique QR code that users can scan in order to join, however, as soon as the group reaches its maximum allowed capacity (currently 100) scanning QR code would no longer work. An easy work around this limit is to send an invitation to users to join a group – a group owner can invite unlimited number of participants to a group.
Payments
After launching its own payment system, WeChat quickly became one of the major ecommerce platforms in China, along with Taobao, Tmall and JD. Every official service account has an option to setup its own ecommerce outlet and receive payment from customers. Capability to handle payments “on the go” is one of most powerful features of WeChat for marketers. Instead of directing potential customers to a website where they can complete the purchase, WeChat now enables a near instant conversion.
Lucky draws
WeChat service accounts can incorporate many types of lucky draws that can be another effective way to keep customer engaged as well as acquire new followers. Lucky draws can take multiple forms – from quizzes to virtual scratch cards. There are number of 3rd party add-ons that can enhance WeChat accounts by “gamification” of the user experience.
Loyalty cards
As businesses and brands are constantly looking for new ways to improve their customers’ loyalty, membership and loyalty cards are increasingly moving into WeChat. This is another excellent feature of WeChat for marketers as it offers both convenience to customers by not having them carry their cards and increases app usage. Latest version of WeChat even allows managing and storing loyalty cards and coupons in one place, much like AppleWallet does.
Targeting
One of the most powerful features of WeChat that is used for marketing is ability to target specific groups of followers with messages tailored just for them. Unfortunately, basic WeChat backend targeting function is quite limited and only allows to sort followers by their gender, and declared location which is also often different from the actual one. However, there are number of companies who offer a more customized approach that is based on behavioral patterns of followers. This way, followers can be grouped in new categories and targeted with specific marketing messages that they are more likely to respond to.
