WeChat has been slowly ramping up its ad game since it opened up “Moment ads” a bit more than 2 years ago (in January 2015).
But there is one target demographic that is the prize of many marketers: Chinese tourists traveling outside China. And WeChat now offers solution to target this very group of customers.
How do WeChat ads target Chinese tourists?
Through the geo-location feature of WeChat, WeChat knows exactly where users area. And Tencent therefore offers foreign brands to target customers:
- Who have logged in on WeChat in a country on a specific day
- Who have logged in on WeChat in a country in the past week
- So far, no city-level targeting is possible, but the feature is on the roadmap
Type of ads: WeChat Moment ads. At the moments, it’s still not possible to run banner advertising.
How much do WeChat ads cost?
WeChat moment ads are priced based on CPM (Cost per Mille, or cost for 1,000 impressions – it’s the cost of having 1,000 users seeing your ad, no matter if they click on it or not). The CPM for targeting Chinese travelers is between 150-180RMB.
For WeChat Moment ads with a picture format, the CPM cost is 150RMB, and for video advertising, the CPM is 180RMB.
What’s the minimal spending of the WeChat overseas advertising?
50,000 RMB if companies wants to target tourists in HK, Macau, Taiwan, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, United States, and Australia.
10,000 RMB if targeting Germany, France, England, Italy, Canada, and New Zealand.
Which countries’ tourists can you target?
At this moment, WeChat overseas advertising is open for 16 countries/regions.
Asia: Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand
North America: United States, Canada
Europe: Germany, France, England, Italy
Oceania: Australian, New Zealand
*The list may change as Tencent expand the service scope. Contact info@walkthechat.com to learn more.
Case studies of moment ads
Infiniti
Infiniti ran a campaign to promote a test-drive of its new car model. The engagement results were the following:
- 40 million interactions
- 300k followers
- 15,000 people signed up for a test-drive
We can see that 40 million interactions for 15,000 test-drives is not exactly a very high conversion rates. This is because the campaign is focusing on branding rather than pure conversion, which is often the case for moment ads.
Dama MeiYi
The fashion APP “Dama Meiyi” conducted a campaign to generate more APP downloads. The outcome was the following:
- 1.3 million interactions
- 40,000 followers
- 30,000 APP downloads
The campaign impact must be considered from a broader point of view: a combination of exposure, followers and downloads.
What does Tencent have to say about Moment Ads?
Andrea Ghizzoni, the head of Tencent in Europe, went on the air for Bloomberg to talk about these new evolutions of WeChat advertising in Europe.
He confirmed that:
- Tencent will open an office in UK to help improve communication with Western brands
- Focus will be put on UK and Western Europe to start with
- Beyond fashion brands, WeChat targets new industries such as design and furniture
This push of Tencent toward European advertisers is a true opportunity both for marketers of Tencent and for brands. For WeChat, it’s the best way to get a foothold in a market where network effects make a direct access to customers difficult. And for brands, it is most likely the best opportunity so far to digitally reach out to Chinese travelers.