The Chinese Instagram, known as Xiaohongshu o Little Red Book, is one of the most important social networks in the Asian country. For brands interested in effectively penetrating the Chinese market, it is essential to know how to advertise on Xiaohongshu.
In this complete guide we will see in detail what this social network is, and then move on to see how to advertise on it and the different options that brands have when choosing their strategy.
For brands interested in effectively penetrating the Chinese market, it is essential to know how to advertise on Xiaohongshu.
1. What is Xiaohongshu?
Xiaohongshu is a Chinese social network that combines aspects of user-created content, e-commerce, opinions, and reviews of products and services. Being known in the West as the Chinese Instagram, it already has more than 300 million users and 100 million active monthly.
The creators and developers of this critical social network were Charlie Mao and Miranda Qu in 2013, with the aim of creating an online guide for Chinese tourists, the main advantage being to evaluate products and share shopping experiences with other users; however, Xiaohongshu has significantly evolved over the years.
According to one of the platform’s own reports, almost 70% of users of Xiaohongshu are less than 35 years old, being 30% of the total men and the remaining 70% women, which in some way marks one of the application’s target audience biases.
70% of users of Xiaohongshu are less than 35 years old, with 30% being men and the remaining 70% being women.
Furthermore, taking into account the percentages, we realize that the Generation Z is of vital importance for the social network, so it would be one of the potential target audiences of any brand that intends to promote its business on Little Red Book
Main functions of Xiaohongshu
As we have said, the main functionalities of Xiaohongshu are related to e-commerce, reviews of products and services and user-generated content. In addition to that, the users have a multitude of possibilities such as:
- See posts from brands and other users: Little Red Book has a built-in search engine where users can filter their interests by topic.
- Have interactions: All users can comment, “like” and share the publications, in addition to having a private chat with any user of the platform.
- Users have the opportunity to go to a brand page through live broadcasts, from the shopping center of the application itself or from the publications of users and brands, generating a direct and straightforward purchasing process, we can see an example in the photo below:
- The Chinese Instagram also has its own store, in addition to integrating around 30,000 additional stores from different brands within the social network itself.
- In the aspect of online shopping, Xiaohongshu has a wide variety of products, in addition to having many promotions.
- Post videos and images and broadcast live streams.
All these functions are not exclusive to independent users but can also be used by brands. Therefore, all the mentioned functionalities can represent an excellent opportunity for foreign companies in terms of advertising on Xiaohongshu.
All the mentioned functionalities can represent an excellent opportunity for foreign companies in terms of advertising on Xiaohongshu.
2. The impact for a brand of advertising in Xiaohongshu
Xiaohongshu plays a significant role in the purchasing decision-making process of Chinese consumers. Among some possibilities offered, we find:
- Brand awareness: Xiaohongshu It is an excellent channel to discover new brands, so brands have the opportunity to make themselves known among consumers in the great Asian country.
- Interest and desire: Xiaohongshu will promote relevant content based on your browsing habits, making it an excellent channel to create multiple touchpoints with the consumer. Additionally, before users make a purchase, they will open Xiaohongshu to read reviews of these products.
- Action: When making a purchase, users often go to e-commerce platforms such as Taobao,Tmall, JD.com and Pinduoduo. Although Xiaohongshu has a native store system, most brands choose to open stores in markets where they could generate more traffic.
- Loyalty: After converting a user to a customer, WeChat official account and WeChat groups are the best channels to create a closer relationship with customers.
Xiaohongshu offers great knowledge of the brands that are promoted on its platform, but other platforms such as WeChat or Tmall are better to create audience loyalty or sell directly, respectively.
3. Limitations of marketing on Xiaohongshu
Compared with WeChat and Douyin, Xiaohongshu is a much smaller social media platform. User demographics are also heavily skewed towards women and top-tier urban users. Furthermore, the main industries promoted in Xiaohongshu are skin care, cosmetics, and fashion.
Another limitation of Xiaohongshu is that it’s almost impossible to track sales conversion data. Xiaohongshu blocks any third-party links and any mention of other apps (such as WeChat and Tmall), so brands will need to think of creative ways to drive traffic to the right sales channel.
4. How to advertise on Xiaohongshu?
The ads for Xiaohongshu work just like Instagram. It’s a promotional tool for generating the best-performing content, and ads can further enhance the reach to achieve the best result.
However, when it comes to targeting and retargeting, the advertising system of Xiaohongshu It’s not as sophisticated as Instagram:
- Xiaohongshu offers only one limited level of targeting category (less than 20 interest groups)
- No way to retarget or track followers
- There is no integration with other platforms. Data is limited
- There are only 3 types of ads.
- The traffic is also limited, given that Xiaohongshu has only 100 million monthly active users (WeChat has 1.2 billion).
Advertise on Xiaohongshu It is one of the best options for brands whose main objective is to integrate into the Chinese market. In addition, there is not only one way to choose, but there are many options to advertise on this platform. Below we will see the options available to brands.
Advertising on Xiaohongshu through official account
Having an official account on Xiaohongshu is a sign of authenticity for all users, in addition to being a tool to interact with the community, increase brand awareness, and drive sales.
In addition, thanks to the official account, brands will be able to share images and videos, respond to reviews and comments from the community, sell products and services, and share news about the brand itself. If the content is well done and generates interest, your followers and community will increase exponentially.
On the other hand, the increase in followers will lead to an increase in people’s confidence who do not know the brand but come across the official account, since they will see that they have authentic followers and it is reliable, which is of great importance for Chinese consumers.
Having an official account on Xiaohongshu is of great importance so that brands can build trust and a community within the social network.
Xiaohongshu provides a variety of advertising tools for brands. If you have doubts about the effectiveness of influencer marketing or organic marketing, you can choose one more traditional way, which can be a safe way to start. The minimum advertising rate is 5.000 RMB and the cost per click for paid ads starts at 0.3 RMB/CPC.
We must take into account that companies have three ways to advertise on Xiaohongshu:
- Pop-up ads: Pop-up ads are those that are displayed when you open the application. In addition, the ad allows access to the store page directly just by pressing the button.
- Integrated ads: Embedded ads appear in the news feed, showing users which accounts you are subscribed to. Newsfeed ads have relatively higher traffic compared to other types of ads on Xiaohongshu.
- Keyword search ads: This is the only type of ad on Xiaohongshu which allows brands to be more specific in their targeting as you can bid on keywords. However, due to traffic limitations, it is not easy to invest in specific keywords.
Advertising placements on Xiaohongshu: through pop-up ads or through integrated ads
Collaboration with influencers
Collaborating with influencers is one of the best and most effective strategies when advertising on Xiaohongshu since these influencers have a high influence on the purchasing decisions of Chinese users, especially Generation Z since they are considered authentic and reliable sources of information.
Chinese consumers tend to be cautious in their purchases and do a lot of research before ultimately making a purchase. Therefore, in addition to information about the brand and its products, there is an influencer who confirms the quality, the Chinese consumer will be willing to buy from said brand.
Collaborating with influencers is one of the best and most effective strategies when it comes to advertising online on Xiaohongshu
Social-commerce and paid advertising
Xiaohongshu stands out within the Chinese market as a unique and special platform regarding social-commerce, perfect for targeting Chinese consumers belonging to Generation Z who, as we have seen, are the most frequent in this application.
The Chinese Instagram serves in this regard as a starting point for iEnter the digital and online world, giving the possibility of socializing, buying and searching in the same place; That is why Xiaohongshu users belonging to generation Z enter the application numerous times daily.
Little Red Book users can participate in live broadcasts and share texts, images and short videos on the platform, covering all aspects of lifestyle such as food, beauty, cosmetics, travel, exercise, clothing and childcare items.
Xiaohongshu allows Chinese users to buy foreign products through the application itself, which has led international brands to create official accounts, launch collaboration campaigns with influencers and pay for ads to sell products from outside the Asian country.
Xiaohongshu allows Chinese users to buy foreign products through the app itself
Live broadcasts
According to the ViceClicks source, 90% of Xiaohongshu’s sales come directly from live broadcasts, which highlights the effectiveness of this format in converting sales. Even so, we must be clear that the magnitude of live broadcasts on this social network is smaller compared to other platforms.
90% of sales on Xiaohongshu come from live broadcasts
Below are two high-ranking influencers streaming live on Xiaohongshu. The average sales created during these campaigns are less than $10,000. This is a small amount compared to other channels. For example, Douyin’s main live streamer, Luo Yonghao, moves 1.6 million dollars in a campaign.
5. 4 tips for advertising on Xiaohongshu
As marketing professionals in Chinese social networks, we leave you 5 key tips for marketing on Xiaohongshu:
- Choose attractive images: Your ad cover image has a huge impact on the click-through rate of your content on Xiaohongshu, so it is important to use a clear image, not blurry and taken by a real client, to generate trust in users.
- Hold giveaways: Users can participate by following, favorite and liking content to win a gift. It’s a very good way to quickly push a new account to a wider audience.
- Make long content: Some influencer posts may include only two emoticons and have many interactions, but for a brand account it is more beneficial to make long-form content; a 500-characters copy is more likely to pick up trending keywords, so it benefits from search traffic.
- Optimize keywords and avoid censored words: content on Xiaohongshu is driven by algorithms, performance is strongly related to search volume and post engagement. Therefore, optimizing keywords in your post title is a path to success.
6. Conclusion
As we have seen, advertising on Xiaohongshu and, in general, on Chinese social networks, is the most effective marketing strategy for any company interested in effectively penetrating the Chinese market.
If you are interested in advertising on Xiaohongshu, you can contact InfluChina, a Chinese influencer agency dedicated to promoting foreign brands in the most profitable market in the world, the Chinese market.
If you are interested in advertising on Xiaohongshu, you can contact InfluChina, a Chinese influencer agency that is dedicated to promoting foreign brands in the most profitable market in the world, the Chinese market.
FAQ
Frequently asked questions about advertising in Xiaohongshu
What is the name of Chinese Instagram?
The Chinese Instagram is called Xiaohongshu, and it is one of the most used and most profitable Chinese social networks to promote a brand.
What is Xiaohongshu?
Xiaohongshu is a Chinese social network that combines aspects of user-created content, e-commerce, opinions, and reviews of products and services, being known as the Chinese Instagram, and already has more than 300 million users.
How to advertise on Xiaohongshu?
To advertise on Xiaohongshu, you can choose between various options: through an official account, collaborating with Chinese influencers, through paid advertisements or in live broadcasts.
What is Xiaohongshu, the Chinese Instagram for?
Xiaohongshu, the Chinese Instagram, has a multitude of functions: publish images and videos, interact with users and brands, buy products and services, see reviews, follow influencers…
How to collaborate with influencers to advertise on Xiaohongshu?
To collaborate with influencers on Xiaohongshu you can contact InfluChina, a Chinese influencer agency that promotes foreign brands in the Chinese market through strategic collaborations with Chinese influencers.