6 Social Media Hacks for Publishing Your Mobile App & Game in China
In China, a whopping 91% of Chinese online users have social media accounts, compared to just 67% in the USA (Tech in Asia, 2013). This phenomenon makes social media a very key component of any marketing plan in China.
However, facebook, twitter, Google, and other western social media are banned in China. To do social marketing in China for your mobile app, you need to use Tencent WeChat (China’s Facebook) and Sina Weibo (China’s Twitter) instead.
Chinese always has it own ways of doing things, and social media marketing is of no exception. I’ve summarized some of them below:
Sina Weibo (China’s Twitter)
- Official Account (similar to Twitter Verified Account)
You can register an official mini-blog account in Weibo for your app. Every official account will have a “V” sign on the profile picture, and people can recognize the account as a genuine account.
2. Sticky Mini-Blog
If you share a mini-blog with your official account and you don’t want your followers to miss it because of too many mini-blogs from other people, you can bump your mini-blog to the top of your followers’ wall. There’s a cost for this though in which Sina charges on a per-bump basis (just like how ad banner is paid by the number of impressions).
3. Sponsored Mini-Blog
This is the exact same thing as the sponsored post on Facebook. You can inject mini-blogs on walls of your target audience who are not your followers. Sina charges this on a per-impression basis.
4. Lucky Draw with Incentives
Sina Weibo officially offers a unique lucky draw feature for official account. You can set up a lucky draw which their followers have to retweet your mini-blogs before they can enter the draw.
Tencent WeChat (China’s facebook + Whatsapp Messager combined)
5. Service Account
Service account is a special account in WeChat for your app. The presentation of the service account can be coded so that it appears as a mini website. The owner can integrate additional features, such as mobile payment, GPS locator, mini games, and even an online store into the site. However, you can only broadcast four instant messages a month. This type of account is recommended for retail or service app companies.
6. Subscription Account
Subscription account appears like a simple account in any messenger, and the owner usually uses this account as a customer service hub. Users can ask you questions in private through instant messages with this account, and go to your wall to read blogs and announcements. You can also broadcast one instant message to all your followers every day. This type of account is recommended for software or game app companies.
Nowadays, almost all Chinese mobile apps use these social network features to keep their communities posted. These are becoming the standards of what social media marketing plan should have in China.
I hope you find the above points interesting. If you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment below.
P.S. Wanna ride on the big wave of the Chinese mobile market?
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