One of China's most trusted social media and e-commerce platform, Little Red Book (know as Xiaohongshu 小红书 in Chinese), brings some big numbers to the table: 300+ million users, 100+ million monthly active users, 70% of users are between 20-35 years old, 300% user growth, and nearly 1 billion exposures per day. Impressive. With numbers like that, it goes without saying that a lot of brands both in and outside of China are looking for ways to promote their products on what has been described by some as ‘China’s answer to Instagram’, while actually packing a lot more weight.
What are some of the unique advantages of Little Red Book and should this app be a part of your Chinese social media marketing strategy?
An App Conducive to Brand Promotion
Little Red Book is known in Chinese as the "national grass planting artifact" (国民种草神器), which is basically internet slang for doing a really good job to make people want something that a friend, family member or advertisement features. One of China's most dominate beauty brands, Perfect Diary, has taken the Chinese market by storm by employing smart digital strategies including Little Red Book's platform to go from zero to hero in no time. At present, the valuation of Perfect Diary exceeds 2 billion US dollars, inciting many other beauty brands to employ similar digital savvy methods on the Little Red Book platform to gain insight and access into the lifestyles of their audience. Big players like Lancome and Chanel rely heavily on Little Red Book to connect with their consumers in China, encouraging more western brands to take note.
Lots of Hungry Users
The Little Red Book platform has more than 300 million users, mainly comprised of young people with new ideas, open minds, and a strong desire to consume. Most of the app users are young, independent women (90% of users are female) with high consumption level and a strong desire to spend, generally focusing on beauty and skin care products. Well-known celebrities and KOLs (Key Opinion Leaders) are able to leverage their fanbase to join Little Red Book, which only helps to expand the number of users on the platform that much more.
Quality Content = Attractive Conversions
Little Red Book's official platform includes posts called “notes", which can include anything from published images, videos, or written content to recommend products. These notes bring a sense of authenticity to the platform and help ensure high-quality content for users. Subject matter on Little Red Book isn't strictly related to beauty, personal care, or hairstyle, but also welcomes film and television, fashion, photography, painting, technology and digital-related themes. In order to be successful, brands on Little Red Book need to adopt a soft advertising approach, as this will produce more wins with their audience instead of a straightforward advertising strategy. Little Red Book users view the app as a platform to share experience amongst themselves and not necessarily go there to interact with corporate brands. So if you're a brand wanting to leverage Little Red Book as part of your Chinese marketing strategy, it's important to remember that there's a proper tone to be struck.
As a platform with a lot of influence over Chinese female consumers, how to effectively promote Little Red Book among your current and future customer base has become a question worth thinking about by any brand who's serious about attracting a Chinese audience. Are you looking to promote your product on Little Red Book? Fill out the form below to learn more about how we can help you succeed on this not-so-little social media and e-commerce platform.
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