WeChat Official Account
Highlights
WeChat is a powerful tool for businesses looking to connect with a Chinese audience.
What are WeChat Official Accounts?
Consider a WeChat Official Accounts as an official Facebook or LinkedIn page or a business and it has more functions…
Once users follow your WeChat Official Account, you can send them push notifications and give them useful info about your brand.
You can also use your page to direct followers to your ecommerce website. Or, once you have the right WeChat Official Account, set up a WeChat store to integrate your ecommerce offering into the social platform.
For international brands trying to break into China, a WeChat Official Account is an essential first step. Here’s why:
There are three types of WeChat Official Accounts:
- Service Account (服务号)
- Subscription Account (订阅号)
- Enterprise Account (企业微信)
Service Account (服务号)
If you have a WeChat Service Account and create a post, users will see it at the top of their chat list, along with any posts or messages from their friends. You can only create four posts per month.
Who should use it?
Brands who want to offer great customer service to their user base. Also, brands who want to create a sales-oriented presence on WeChat.
Service Account users can apply for WeChat Pay and WeChat Store features. They’re also available to international businesses.
Subscription Account (订阅号)
Brands with a Subscription Account can send one post per day to their followers. These posts go into a user’s subscription folder. A user has to actively open the folder to view your content – it doesn’t appear in the standard chat list and users don’t receive push notifications.
Who should use it?
Subscription accounts are popular with bloggers, writers and celebrities. Information-based brands also use this type of account.
Subscription accounts are only available to brands with a Chinese ID or with a local Chinese business license.
For all of these reasons, we recommend local hosting instead of a local China CDN for most of our users. The Cost-to-Benefit ratio simply isn’t high enough in most circumstances, and you can free up the time and maintenance costs for use elsewhere.
Enterprise Account (企业微信)
They’re effectively an internal communication tool for companies, this is not for marketing or sales purposes externally. This is similar to Slack or Microsoft Teams.
Who should use it?
Brands with a base in China who want a way to manage internal communications by accessing internal chat rooms, video conferencing and file sharing. These accounts aren’t used by the public or by marketers and all users have to be verified internal staff.
How to create a WeChat Official Account
There are two ways to open a WeChat Official Account.
- Register directly with WeChat
You can go to the WeChat website, translate the page to English and click Register Now.
After choosing the type of account you want and entering your details, you’ll be able to set up your profile. Your profile must be written in Mandarin so your audience can understand it. You should also closely monitor the content of your WeChat official account to ensure compliance.
The next stage is verification. For this, you’ll need to hand over relevant business documentation and pay a $99 registration fee.
- Partner with a service provider, such as CloudX
This is by far the simplest option for international businesses without a base or business license in China. Our local team will set up your WeChat Official Account.
Contact us with more information.
