1. 20 USEFUL TIPS
WHEN DEVELOPING A CHINESE SOCIAL
MEDIA MARKETING PROGRAM
Dr. Mathew McDougall
Founder & CEO, Digital Jungle
matt@digitaljungle.com.cn
REALLY
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2. 1. TELL STORIES
Marketing is no longer about ads. Storytelling is the most powerful tool we have
to develop a relationship with customers and prospective customers.
The communication is not any more about the message calling for
action, but more a story that immerses customers in the brand
experience.

3. 2. BE USEFUL
Help people with your content. Provide tips, advice, apps to solve problems and
answer questions. Even if the solution isn't your product or service. If they're people
you'd like to do business with, help them however you can and you will establish
trust.
To be useful means first really listening to your consumers to find out what problems
they have. You might think you know, but you won't really know until you talk to them.

4. 3.
KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE
Not everyone in
China likes rice.
Know your
audience, their
likes/dislikes,
interests and what
they do digitally.

5. 4. BE ENTERTAINING
This is especially true if you're marketing to a consumer audience. If you want great
word of mouth recommendations and shareable content, make your audience smile.
Try a #Fun Friday or #Monday Madness topic

6. 5.
MEASURE SUCSESS
So how are you going to know when you reach your goal? What are you
tracking, how are you tracking? Does this make sense?
Is a Like, Share or Engagement the right metric?
INTERESTING FACT
68% of respondents claimed to share content as a way to give people a better
picture of who they are and what they care about.

7. 6. BE EDUCATIONAL
Be a teacher and provide your audience with content that makes them excited
because they’ve learned something new that will help them be better in business or
in their lives.
What's quality content? The moment that someone
reads it and goes 'ah, now I get it'. That's quality content.”

8. 7. BE PROVOCATIVE
Provide true thought leadership for your sector by challenging people's assumptions.
Inspire debate, provoke discussions, and use research to support your arguments
and make people think differently.
Challenge the status quo that's in your customer's minds. Every customer
thinks 'everything's fine, I don't need that new product'. The most successful
salespeople help to challenge the customer's thinking - that there's a problem
or need that they didn't know about. Identify trends. Look into the future and
show where they are now and where it's going to go, and here are the things
you need to change.”

9. 8. BE VISUAL
Humans process images 60,000 times faster than text. Visual content is a powerful
way to tell stories. Images in social media, infographics, video, Slideshare and
Pinterest are all great examples of ways that visual content has exploded around
the world.
Chinese love visual content – Over 90% of Chinese netizens watch videos online,
surpassing the amount of traditional TV users.
INTERESTING FACT
67% of Chinese take photos and post them on Weibo before eating

10. 9. BE STRATEGIC
Content marketing used to be about generating awareness and raising
your brand's profile. It's still about that ... and more. Unless you set strategic
objectives that lead to sales, you'll have a hard time convincing your
managers (or your clients) to keep spending money on the content you
produce.
Content marketing has six main goals: build your brand profile, attract new
prospects, increase lead generation, build thought leadership, drive sales and
increase customer loyalty.”

11. 10. BE SCIENTIFIC
Test your calls to action. Measure against your KPIs and success metrics.
Analyze the behavior of your audience to gain insights. Utilize technology to help you.
People can't tell you what they think of your brand. You have to look at their
behavior. Behavioral data tells you what's really happening, not traditional
surveys.

12. 11. DISTRIBUTE PURPOSELY
Outside the top four apps, the next most popular social apps individually have a
limited following, with none reaching over 9% of mobile netizens.

13. 12. LEARN TO ITERATE
It's not about having the biggest budgets (although that helps!). Make the best use of
the budget you have.
Every time you produce a piece of content, create iterations of it: an article, a video,
a webinar, a whitepaper all on the same topic or from the same interview.

14. 13.
“
REMEMBER IT’S ABOUT
PEOPLE
Speak to your
audience in their
language about
what's in their
heart.
Jonathan Lister,
VP North American
Sales for LinkedIn

15. 14. PEOPLE LIVE IN TRIBES
Your target audience maybe using a specific platform now but over time tribes
may move. Just like nomadic people of the past our digital tribes can quickly get up
and leave – remember Renren, Kaixin, P1.com
Regular testing your tribal assumptions will ensure you are not investing in areas
that no longer make sense.

16. 15. TAKE RISKS
Be willing to fail sometimes. Not every story or piece of content will work, but
sometimes the most engaging content comes from being brave.
“
If you don't have room to fail, you don't have room to grow.”
Jonathan Mildenhall
“
Keep trying to get the thing right and eventually you will.”
William Shatner, Actor, Author and Film Maker

17. 16. GO MOBILE
While the vast majority of netizens still access social platforms via desktop
and laptop, they have significantly shifted their use onto mobile devices.

18. 17. QR MANIA
QR codes are an inevitable gateway to branded digital and social events. They
now serve as an entry to the digital experience.
Insights:
• Use QR codes as an entrance and bridge between online and offline
• Leverage a users’ curiosity and playfulness when putting your QR codes on
different locations with different end purposes.
• Use the 4Ps of your product to provide consumer solutions for users who
will scan your QR codes

19. 18. LEVERAGE KOLs
When it comes to purchase decision, Chinese social media users are highly
influenced by their friends and colleagues, esp. the younger demos

20. 19. INTRODUCE GAMIFICATION
Brands are leveraging “time” as an element in the experience design, getting
users to explore and shaping behavior for engagement as well as purchase.
.
Adding on timed mechanics is a common method adopted by many game
designers to create and increase the challenge, so as to immediately draw a
player in.
For Example, At a specific time, users have a chance in taking part in the lucky
draw on their mini site, in addition to the voting campaign on what type of
flavor and man would win the princess’ heart.

21. 20. KEEP GOING
Greatest social media failing for a Brand is to run out of social steam. Either
under resourced, under estimated, under financed.
Consider being invited to a party and finding out that the host left ½ way
through and the venue was closing without notice. Impressions will drive
perception.

22. For more information about Digital Jungle,
please visit our Linkedin page, and follow
us on Twitter.
www.digitaljungle.com.au

23. www.digitaljungle.com.au
BEIJING | SHANGHAI | SYDNEY | AUCKLAND