I am thrilled to welcome Helene Chen as our WeChat specialist at Content Smith. She’s joined our team to build our service offerings in the WeChat marketing space.

We currently offer clients support in registering and verifying their own WeChat Official Account, support in renewing their registration with WeChat/Tencent each year, and ongoing management of their account.

For now? I thought I’d ask Helene a few questions so you can get to know her as well as discover her insights into marketing to Chinese-speaking customers/clients.

Tell us about yourself and why you chose to live and work in Melbourne?

I am a very energetic person with lots of hobbies, such as camping, hiking and going out with friends [not sure if that counts, haha!]. I came to Australia when I was 18 and before that, I was living with my parents in Wuhan China, I am sure now most of the people know this city because of Covid-19 [this saves me so much time explaining where it is!]. So far I have lived in Wuhan, Adelaide, Shanghai and Melbourne.

I decided to move to Melbourne from Adelaide in late 2018 because I think the lifestyle in Melbourne would suit me better, and I am so glad that I made that decision two years ago because I absolutely love Melbourne, not only because of the wide variety of food options but also because it's so culturally-diverse here.

Tell us what you enjoy about WeChat marketing?

I have been doing WeChat marketing for years and I still love it. I think the reason why I liked it in the first place was that back then I was very good at content writing, and WeChat marketing relied heavily on quality content, so it always gave me a sense of satisfaction when the content worked well. After years of experience in WeChat marketing, it still doesn't bore me, mainly because WeChat evolves quickly and it always challenges me with new functions, new designs and new marketing tactics.

WeChat didn't exist 10 years ago, and at the beginning, it only had chat functions. It's amazing to think about how much it has evolved and the huge potential it offers to marketers and organisations.

What are your favourite things to work on? What do you feel are your strengths?

I like working on projects and campaigns for clients. WeChat marketing needs to be more strategic than western social media marketing due to the nature of the platform, the limitations and the user habit. WeChat campaigns or projects normally cover longer timeframes and need to be thoughtfully planned, that's why I love working on them because it requires more experience and strategic thinking, and that's what I am good at.

Lots of people can develop good translations [I’m a NAATI certified translator], content writing or WeChat design, but these are not the critical factors for effective WeChat marketing. It's the strategy behind it and the ability to manage the whole project and make adjustments based on the response you get from the target audience.

What's the coolest project you've worked on?

I think the coolest project I worked on was a mini-program I delivered for a real estate company. Lots of organisations are keen to have WeChat but only a few know about the mini-program feature. It's pretty much an app in WeChat. Many organisations are struggling with CRM capabilities through WeChat, and a mini-program can resolve that easily. It was the first mini-program I worked on so I was very excited. The client was also super happy with it because after the mini-program was launched, it enabled the company to have a closer relationship with customers and they could send customised notifications to specific customers on WeChat while keeping Salesforce system updated.

One of my proudest moments so far, I think, was during the first year in my job. I won the Award for Best Use of Social Media at Customer Experience at the CXFS Financial Service Awards.

What’s something you do regularly outside of work that’s really important to you?

I talk to friends a lot! I am the kind of friend that always finds interesting places to go to or things to do and then organise group activities for my friends. So far I've organised Christmas in July in an igloo, an outdoor cinema Aladdin night, countless brunches, paint-your-pet sessions and so much more that I can't recall! I think having friends to have fun together makes my life so much better.

What trends are you seeing in Melbourne with respect to WeChat marketing?

I can see that many organisations are adding WeChat marketing to their marketing portfolio, organisations like City of Melbourne, NGV, University of Melbourne, retailers like Zimmermann, Alice McCall, Off-White Melbourne, Mecca Cosmetica are all on WeChat now.

Melbourne is a popular destination for Chinese tourists and it also has a huge Chinese community living here for the long-term. It's just a matter of time that most of the brands that have Chinese customers will eventually be on WeChat.

What are your top 3 tips for Australian retailers if they are deciding to open up an Official Service Account?

I think these are essential for Australian retailers if they are deciding to open up an Official Service Account:

• Be clear with your objective. WeChat is powerful and every Chinese is on WeChat, but does that mean you need to have a WeChat account? Not necessarily. Your best channel to approach customers might be Weibo or Little Red Book. Retailers need to be very clear with their marketing objective before opening up a WeChat account.

• Evaluate the commitment. I am sure most of the retailers have a Facebook account and they manage it in-house easily. But WeChat is a huge commitment. It's predominantly long-form content [800-1500 words] published once per week at the very least. You need to be consistent with your publishing activity on your feed to keep your audience engaged. Make sure you are aware of that before opening up an account.

• Let the experts do the job. It requires more skills and knowledge to manage a WeChat account than what you think. That includes precise Chinese translation, copywriting, design, community management, social listening, and so much more. Simply having an intern who sort of speaks Chinese won't make your campaign successful, if retailers want to do it, it’s better to have a WeChat specialist to support no matter if it's in-house or outsourced.

Do you have 3 tips for service-based Australian businesses?

I think for companies that sell services, they also need to consider the three tips I just mentioned above. But what's more important to them is to manage the relationship they have with clients, while for retailers it's more one-way communication. So I suggest them to consider:

• How do you want to use WeChat to manage your existing clients

• How to do want to use WeChat to acquire new clients? Is it through WeChat referral program or organic reach?

• Compliance. Is it ok for your company to chat with clients on WeChat? How would you ensure your client’s privacy?

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Here at Content Smith we can help individuals and businesses register, verify and manage their WeChat Official Account. If you’d like to know more about these services, head over to our content shop. Or send us an email if you’re interested in having us set up your account today.