BackOpinion | China’s influencer ecosystem holds lessons for India
Influencer incubators have propelled influencer marketing in China
PremiumWhen Terry Peigh, managing director of Interpublic Group came to India last year, he spoke of consumers’ declining faith in influencers. Though he didn’t say that influencer marketing was dead, he certainly raised issues around the medium’s trust deficit. But GroupM’s South Asia chief executive officer, Prasanth Kumar, believes the medium will grow in India. “More young influencers will start coming into the system as youngsters play a huge role in our choices of content consumption and brands," he said.
Influencer marketing firm BuzzOne’s founder Sanjay Vasudev agrees with Kumar. He believes brand promotion via mini celebrities online and niche bloggers is increasing with more brands coming on board. “E-commerce firm Amazon, for instance, has launched its own influencer programme," he said. Today, most brands have influencer marketing in their media mix, a fact endorsed by journalist colleagues who now find influencers at press conferences and plant visits organized by brands. Nestle India, for instance, invited food and nutrition bloggers to Ludhiana to visit its plant in Moga. When it launched a variant of its pain relief brand Moov last year, Reckitt Benckiser also engaged influencers and celebrities to use #MakeYourMoov and #FitIndia to promote their favourite fitness moves. Swedish apparel brand H&M is a regular user of social media influencers.
If your target audience is aged between 15 and 35, then social media is an important channel, of which influencer marketing is the mainstay. The key categories using influencers, bloggers and vloggers are beauty, travel, food, lifestyle, mobile tech, and automobiles. While Instagram and Facebook have been the preferred social channels, Chinese company ByteDance-owned short form video app TikTok has gained momentum.
Singapore-headquartered internet firm has also introduced its live streaming app BIGO LIVE and its short video app Likee in India. BIGO LIVE’s deputy country head Nagesh Banga, claims influencers on Likee, most of whom are from small towns, are working with brands.
However, India’s high-decibel buzz around influencer marketing cannot match China’s evolved ecosystem. A report by data analytics firm Qoruz says China’s influencer marketing business grew 10 times in the last five years. Currently pegged at $15.5 billion, the industry has been riding on the back of its own home-grown social networking platforms even as the Western markets (and India) are ruled by Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. The local apps in China have allowed the influencers’ business to flourish. China’s video sharing platform Douyin is popular as is its social commerce site Xiaohongshu. The latter is an e-commerce site dealing in luxury goods and a social media platform that allows users to post content.
The report cites several reasons for the rise of influencer marketing in China. The country has developed the medium both as an art and science. It nurtures, tutors or “engineers" its influencers for a particular niche with the help of a team of experts in e-commerce, social media, and branding. The ecosystem helps build strong relationships between influencers and brands with the former being responsible for sales as well.
Second, social media and mobile innovations have contributed to a digital multi-channel ecosystem. Home-grown social networking platforms allow users multiple functions. On a single app, a consumer can shop, play games and even pay utility bills. They allow commercial transactions through embedded links, which lead to a seamless buying experience, the report said.
Besides, live streaming of shopping has also become big. Users can broadcast their shopping experience live or model for clothes encouraging others to follow suit. Purchase is made easy through embedded links. According to the Qoruz report, the impact of live streaming was seen during Single’s Day sale 2019 where more than 17,000 brands live streamed during the one-day fest. Another factor propelling influencer marketing in China is influencer incubators. Companies such as Ruhnn look for influencers with expertise in different fields and substantial following. Talent managers train them and sign them up for e-commerce sales. Such influencers post and involve their fans in the development of the products, said the report.
Praanesh Bhuvaneswar, co-founder, Qoruz, said that in India, influencer marketing means brand-sponsored posts looking only for reach. “There is no conversion model here that directly affects sales. In China, brands and partners work on a revenue share basis. On every sale made, there is 30-40% revenue share. For the company, the influencer is a joint venture partner," he said. It will take India’s influencer marketing industry another four years to mature, he said.
Shuchi Bansal is Mint’s media, marketing and advertising editor. Ordinary Post will look at pressing issues related to all three. Or just fun stuff
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