This Guide will help marketers understand where each platform sits in the marketing funnel and how metrics and KPIs can be translated into actual business success
China’s social media platforms are diverse, unique and present a challenge for brands who are investing millions in reaching your audience, but may not have the right tools to measure results and impact. We hope that this Guide to China Social Metrics will present brands with a framework to understand the Chinese social media landscape and allow you to astutely leverage each platform across the customer journey – be it in China, or among the millions of Chinese diaspora around the world that uses these platforms.
Overview of Mainstream Chinese Social Platforms
With the social media landscape in China constantly changing, it is imperative to have a broad understanding of the ecosystem before diving deeper into how success is measured across platforms. In the Guide, KAWO provides a snapshot of the current state of Chinese social platforms along with the type of content popular with Chinese consumers.
Utilising the Right Social Metrics for the Right Stage of the Customer Journey
With an understanding of the entire ecosystem in place, brands must next understand the intersection of each social platform with the different stages of the customer journey – and the suitable social metrics to measure success.
KAWO’s Guide to China Social Metrics: The Customer Journey
For example, brands must pay attention to building trust in the consideration funnel – where audiences weigh their options before they decide to invest in a brand. A suitable metric during this period is whether followers are won, or lost, during this period.
A common mistake by marketers is moving too quickly from awareness to purchase without nurturing their audience properly. In this case, losing followers upon publishing content can be an insightful metric to evaluate a brand’s performance at the consideration stage of the customer journey – revealing that audiences fall off after awareness and are not yet convinced further down the funnel.
Brands are Becoming More Efficient at Retaining Followers
KAWO has found that over recent years, brands on a whole have become more efficient in retaining followers. In an analysis of WeChat Service and Subscription accounts, KAWO data showed that the Win-Loss Ratio – a comparison of the amount of followers lost per every 100 gained has decreased since 2020.
In 2020, Service accounts – used mainly for managing and maintaining customer relationships – were mostly losing more followers than they gained, while this improved to as low as 47 lost followers per 100 gained in 2023. For Subscription accounts – focused mainly on raising awareness and promoting the brand – the ratio dropped from a high of 0.94 in 2020 to a low of 0.37 in 2022 before creeping up in 2023.
The Case for an Alternative to Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
We would also argues that an alternative to traditional KPIs – Objectives & Key Results (OKRs) – should be considered for social media metrics as it is suitable for creative and collaborative works that are hard to measure through typical KPIs.
To achieve long-term ambitions, OKRs should be clearly defined and differentiated from KPIs.
Generally, this guide will systematically cover the following topics:
1）An overview of mainstream social platforms in China
2）Key metrics and social listening considerations
3）Customer journey and the marketing funnel on social media
4）KPI selection for the various social platforms in China
5）Making KPIs work
6）Measuring conversion
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