WeChat now hosts more than 14 million WeChat official accounts, used by companies, retailers, and brands to interact with the public.
A team from Shanghai Jiaotong University analyzed data collected between February and April of 2017 to glean more information about how users interact with these accounts and how companies use them.
98% of WeChat official accounts are subscription readers. Official accounts most commonly publish information about companies and content related to people’s lives.
About 5.4 million WeChat official accounts published at least once in the past three days; and, 38% of users are active. 1,917 accounts have published at least one post that generated at least 100,000 views, accounting for 0.01% of total.
6.99% accounts have published at least one article that has at least 1,000 views. The vast majority don’t have a single post which has reached 1,000 views.
Aside from the four first-tier cities, Chongqing, Xi’an, Suzhou, Hangzhou, Wuhan, Changsha, and Xiamen are locations most prominently featured in official account posts.
Chongqing ranks at the top, being mentioned nearly 34,000 times in the three months during which data was harvested.
Most WeChat official accounts are used for PR and marketing purposes; eating out, leisure, shopping, and automobile are the most common topics, with the automobile in the lead, especially among accounts with over 100,000 followers.
Some 14-16 million companies in China have hired full- or part-time social media experts. Find out why most corporate WeChat official accounts fail and more insights here.