9 Ways to Gain Followers on Your WeChat Official Account

To get followers on a WeChat Official Account, make the account easy to find and worth following. Publish posts people share to Moments, time them well, write strong headlines and spread your QR code online and offline. Name cards, WeChat advertising, invitations after payment and WeChat Search bring in the rest.

Key takeaways

• Publish posts people want to share: posts are the format your followers can share to Moments and chats, which brings new readers to your account.
• Use the statistics of your admin dashboard to publish when your audience is most active, and write headlines and summaries that make people click.
• Add your QR code to your web pages, your articles, your products, your packaging and your marketing materials.
• Name cards, WeChat advertising with its one-click follow button, an invitation after payment and WeChat Search bring in more followers.
• Invite people to follow, but never make an answer, a red packet or an activity depend on it: WeChat’s rules forbid this on web pages opened in WeChat.

Your online presence in China will never be fully effective unless you have a WeChat Official Account. WeChat is dominating social media in China; therefore, your brand can use this social media platform to reach millions of people throughout the country using well-crafted marketing campaigns. A WeChat agency in Shanghai can run these campaigns with you.

What is a WeChat OA?

A WeChat Official Account can be compared to a Facebook page. However, opening and managing it is completely different and may present challenges to foreign companies.

Primarily, opening a WeChat Official Account is not as easy as opening a Facebook Page. If you are in the process of applying, you may want to refer to our comprehensive guide on the different types of WeChat Official Accounts and how to open one.

Once your WeChat Official Account is up and running, learning how to manage a WeChat Official Account and reach as many users as possible may require a lot of time and effort. However, considering how large the audience is that you have the potential to reach and the probable impact of your marketing campaigns, it is well worth the effort.

Gain Visibility on WeChat and Reach Your Target Audience

Your main goal is to make sure your users can find your WeChat Official Account, otherwise, your message will not reach your target audience. Since the functionalities are somewhat different than other popular social media platforms, it is important for you to understand how to use your WeChat account to its full capability.

The following guide will introduce you to the most effective way to reach your audience so that users will be able to find your WeChat Official Account.

9 Ways for Users to Find Your WeChat Official Account

Here are the most effective ways for WeChat users to find and follow WeChat Official Accounts. You may use several, or all of them, depending on your goals.

1. Posting. This first point may sound like a no-brainer, but even simple steps cannot be taken for granted on WeChat. For instance, on WeChat you can create a post or publish text, images, videos, and voice messages. Even though these are all important ways to engage your audience and convey your message, it is important to know that among these formats only the posts can be shared by your users. When your post is shared it means that it will appear on the user’s Moment Wall and, therefore, be visible to their contacts, enhancing the opportunities to reach more users. However, text, voice messages, images and videos can be powerful as well to interact with your audience, and you must use each of these formats according to your specific marketing goals. To write posts people want to share, read how to make a viral WeChat post.

   

2. Good Timing. If the quality of a post is important, choosing the right time to publish new content is critical as well. When you look at your WeChat admin dashboard, you will find statistics about your posts, including information about how they perform throughout the day. Determine the time that you get the most visitors and then you will know when the best time to publish your content is.

3. WeChat Social Moments. If you are familiar with Facebook Timeline, WeChat Moments is the equivalent on Chinese social media. If the user clicks on your article that appears on WeChat Moments, they will reach your WeChat Official Account.

4. Optimize your headlines and summaries. This rule applies to WeChat exactly as it applies to any other social media platform. Your headline and summary are all that users care about. If these elements are interesting, intriguing and compelling, users will click on them and read your content. Otherwise, they will move on and you will lose your window of opportunity to have them visit your WeChat Official Account.

   

5. QR Codes. Scanning a QR Code is a big deal for WeChat users and you should use that to your advantage. You can add a QR Code to your web pages, or within your WeChat articles and have the QR Code redirect to your WeChat Official Account. However, QR Codes are also perfect for offline use. You can add them to your products, packaging, marketing materials and wherever possible. Use them as an alternative way to engage your audience.

   

6. Name Cards. You can share the name card of your WeChat Official Account to encourage a friend to follow it. Besides friends, name cards can be shared with groups, but cannot be shared on your timeline.

7. Advertising. WeChat runs a program that allows you to display your advertisement on another user’s timeline, or at the bottom of your articles. You can use this feature to acquire more followers to your WeChat Official Account and drive traffic to your website as well. An interesting feature of WeChat advertising is the possibility to add a “One Click Follow” button to your messages. The user simply clicks on the button, and they will start to follow your WeChat Official Account. Our guide on Tencent Ads vs WeChat Ads shows how to set up a follower campaign.

8. Offline Payments. When a user finalizes a purchase, this is a great opportunity to invite them to follow your WeChat Official Account. Their interest in your products or services is evident by the fact that they were ready to pay for it. Therefore, there is a greater likelihood that they will be interested in following your official account also. After the user has completed the payment, you may implement a field in the notification form where you ask them to follow your WeChat account. Invite, but do not force: on web pages opened in WeChat, the WeChat rules for external links forbid forcing or inducing users to follow an Official Account, for example by making following a condition to see an answer, receive a red packet or take part in an activity.

9. Search. WeChat’s built-in search (微信搜一搜) surfaces Official Accounts in its results. Users can search by account name, keyword, or topic. While organic discovery via search is still limited compared to other platforms, it is a reliable channel for users who already know your brand and want to find and follow your account quickly. Our guide to WeChat Search explains how users find accounts and content.

More Ways to Engage Users on WeChat

Even though a WeChat Official Account is very important for your business, currently, WeChat offers other opportunities to reach your audience.

For instance, WeChat Mini Programs are proving very effective for both marketing purposes and to close sales. The advantage of a WeChat Mini Program is that it works like an app, but the user can access it directly on WeChat without downloading it on their device. This makes it very easy for users, giving you more opportunities to connect with your audience, promote your products and close sales.

What should you do next?

WeChat is a necessary tool to access and break into the Chinese market. Start with the channels you control: posts worth sharing, a QR code on every support and a clear invitation to follow after each purchase. Then add advertising when you want to grow faster, and check your statistics to keep what works.

QPSoftware is a digital agency in Shanghai specializing in the Chinese market. Our WeChat agency can assist you in creating and managing your WeChat Official Account to drive the best results. Our WeChat Mini Program developers also build H5 pages and WeChat web apps for your specific business.

Our expertise in the Chinese field will be advantageous for you to succeed in the local market. Contact us today and we will explain how we can help your business grow in China.

Frequently Asked Questions