With the widespread adoption of the internet and mobile devices in China, video marketing is experiencing remarkable growth. The video has become a crucial tool for brand communication and marketing, attracting increasing consumer attention. This article will introduce the latest trends in video marketing in China to assist businesses in formulating effective marketing strategies.
1. Short Video Craze: Short video platforms such as Douyin, Kwai, and Little Red Book have become important sources of daily entertainment for Chinese users. Douyin alone boasts over 150 million daily active users and 300 million monthly active users, with an average of 140 minutes on the platform daily. Businesses are gradually realizing the potential of short videos and utilizing them as effective channels for brand promotion. In June 2022, Douyin achieved a year-on-year increase of 44% in video views. Users' engagement with content led to a substantial rise of 161% in the total transaction value of goods according to CNNIC data. By creating creative, engaging, and captivating short video content, businesses can better attract their target audience, enhance brand awareness, and boost sales performance.
2. Rise of Live-streaming e-commerce: Live-streaming e-commerce has become a unique and booming sales model in China. More and more users, especially young generations, are using live-streaming to shop. As of June 2022, the number of live-streaming users in China has reached 716 million, accounting for 68.1% of the overall number of internet users. Among them, live-streaming for shopping users reached 469 million, representing 44.6% of the overall internet users. Through live-streaming platforms, merchants can interact with consumers in real-time, showcase products, and directly facilitate sales. Live-streaming combines entertainment, shopping experience, and interactivity, creating a more personalized and immersive marketing environment for brands.
3. Cross-industry Collaborations and IP Marketing: The Chinese market increasingly emphasizes cross-industry collaborations and intellectual property (IP) marketing. Brands collaborate with popular TV shows, celebrities, or internet influencers to create engaging marketing activities. By partnering with well-known figures or successful brands, those short videos can reach a wider audience and generate more interest and engagement. Such collaborations not only expand brand exposure but also attract a larger audience, stimulate purchase desire, and strengthen the emotional connection between brands and consumers.
4. Creativity and Storytelling content with emotions, humor, and suspense: Users prefer interesting, creative, and captivating content. Short video marketing needs to attract users' attention through creative storytelling. Brands can use elements such as emotions, humor, and suspense to tell fascinating stories that resonate with users and encourage them to share with others. Brands can also create short videos that express their values with attractive funny stories to increase brand awareness.
5. Personalized Customization with AI-enabled technology: User demand for personalized content is increasing. Brands can utilize user data and artificial intelligence technology (AI) to customize personalized short video content based on users' interests and preferences. Brands should also identify and match their audience with the most appropriate short video platform, and create videos according to users’ preferences. Each short video platform has a distinctive type of users, for instance, Douyin has a large group of Generation Z users and the Douyin algorithm will recommend videos to GenZ if the video content and tags correspond to GenZ’s preferences. This enables more accurate fulfillment of user needs, increasing user engagement and sharing rates.
6. User-Generated Content (UGC) with user participation: UGC has become an essential trend in short video marketing. Brands can encourage user participation in short video creation, encouraging them to share their stories, experiences, and opinions. This not only increases user engagement but also fosters a sense of brand identity and loyalty among users.
7. Interactive Participation with user engagement: Interactive short videos enhance user engagement and stickiness. Brands can incorporate interactive elements such as voting, commenting, and more to engage users in the videos. This interactive participation stimulates user interest and increases user engagement and loyalty toward the brand. For example, Bilibili, one of China's largest video platforms, has achieved success by leveraging its highly interactive barrage (bullet comment) function. In 2019, Bilibili launched interactive video functionality, allowing viewers to choose different options within the video to advance the storyline. The interactive video feature gained immense popularity, particularly in astrology and fortune-telling videos, greatly appealing to Bilibili users and achieving tremendous success.
8. Cross-platform Dissemination for synchronizing video content channels: The dissemination of short video content is no longer limited to a single platform. Brands can distribute their short video content across multiple platforms such as Douyin, Kwai, Bilibili, and various social media platforms. Bytedance allows users to synchronize video content across five platforms, including Today’s Headline, Watermelon Video, Douyin, Douyin Volcano version, and Yovoh Q&A. This means that content posted on one platform can be easily synced to another platform with just one click. This allows brands to promote their content simultaneously on these five platforms, while only needing to invest the same cost and time as promoting on one platform. Cross-platform dissemination expands brand exposure and attracts more user attention and participation.
9. Diversification of business models: This refers to the continuous exploration of more diverse and deeper commercial monetization models after attracting a large number of users and traffic. It involves integrating multi-dimensional scenarios and engaging in cross-industry development. For example, the "short video + live streaming" model combines short video content with interactive live streaming, providing users with a more authentic and immersive experience while creating additional revenue sources for creators and platforms. The "short video + government services" model combines short video content with government services, offering users more convenient and efficient access to government information, while providing government departments with a broader and more effective promotional channel. The "short video + media" model combines short video content with media reporting, delivering users with more timely and comprehensive news and information, while offering media organizations more flexible and innovative communication methods.
10. Intelligent technological support: This refers to the continuous enhancement of technical and service capabilities by short video platforms. The technological support involves leveraging technologies such as artificial intelligence, big data, and cloud computing to achieve intelligent support for content production, distribution, and management. For example, artificial intelligence techniques can be used for content moderation, recommendation, and matching, improving content quality and user satisfaction. Big data technologies can be utilized for user profiling, behavioral analysis, market forecasting, enhancing user engagement, and market competitiveness. Cloud computing technologies can facilitate data storage, processing, and transmission, ensuring data security and efficiency.
The short video industry is experiencing rapid growth, and to leverage short video marketing effectively, businesses need to stay updated on the latest trends. RougeLink, as a professional e-commerce agent, could provide you with the power of video marketing in China and develop effective strategies to capture opportunities in this rapidly evolving landscape.
If you wish to know more about the live-streaming e-commerce analysis and tactics in China, please contact RougeLink for more information.
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