Will Bilibili Become A New Advertising Platform For Luxury Brands?

In our last blog post, we talked about the tremendous growth of Bilibili and how brands can promote themselves on the Chinese short video social platform. Bilibili has already surpassed Youku to become the 3rd most popular Chinese video platform. 

According to Bilibili’s most recent earnings report, their total net revenue in the 2nd quarter of 2021 reached $696 million USD, which was a 72% increase from the same period in 2020. Moreover, they reported a 62% growth in paying subscribers to 20.9 million paying users.

As we mentioned before, Bilibili is not just an ACG (Anime Comics Gaming) content platform, it has also tapped into other lifestyle categories such as travel, food, fitness, fashion, and technology. Bilibili has attracted the attention of brands in cosmetics, skincare, food...etc because of the tremendous growth in users. 

Bilibili has also developed into a major fashion and beauty platform for Gen Z netizens. 70% of Bilibili contributors create beauty and fashion content. The number of beauty brands with an official Bilibili presence increased 20 fold from June 2020 to June 2021 making the industry a leader in official account categories on the platform. A few premium beauty brands have started to invest in Bilibili to promote their brands and products. Shiseido held a live-streamed product launch and gained 1.34M engagements and almost 200K bullet comments on the video. Chanel Beauty also invested in landing page ads showing on the Bilibili home screen and Lancome has created branded content with Bilibili influencers. 

However, is Bilibili the right advertising platform for luxury brands?

In our last blog post, we also shared the reason why Dior’s branded content performed poorly on Bilbili. The brand did not tailor their content for Bilibili, knowing that the average age of Bilibili users is 20 years old and very into ACG. Dior’s experience on Bilbili has proven that posting aesthetic and highly post-produced content without interactive elements is deemed to fail. It’s a classic case of using social media as simply a tool to broadcast and ‘talk at’ your customers and not engaging them on a meaningful level.

On the other hand, other luxury brands like Louis Vuitton and Fendi were very innovative and flexible in promoting their brands on Bilibili. Fendi launched a “Peekaboo Bar” campaign on Bilibili, where users can customize Fendi’s well-known Peekaboo handbag. On the advertisement banner, you can see a well-dressed girl illustrated in comics having a drink in Fendi’s Peekaboo Bar with different styles of fancy handbags displayed on the shelves in the background. It shows up across personal and discovery feeds in the Bilibili app. 

In 2019, Louis Vuitton collaborated with Bilibili to launch an AR featuring transformed users from a game to look like Qiyana (an LOL Character) inspired by the runway collection: a crop top, high-waisted trousers, and LV’s classic Dauphine bag. 

Also, we explained why the luxury consumption potential of Gen Z in China should not be underestimated in our previous IG carousel. Gen Z is distinctive from Millennials and Gen Xers with their optimism and impulse spending that outpaces their income. Over 60% of university students in China think their annual income will reach $1M ($155,000 USD) within 10 years of graduation. Despite the average age of luxury consumers being 28, it is expected to see that the average age of luxury consumers will decrease gradually in the future when Gen Z’s earning ability increases.

If luxury brands can strike the optimal balance between maintaining their prestigious brand image and implementing tailored marketing strategies for the Gen Z audience by creating genuine,not overly produced content, and integrating ad campaigns with ACG elements, Bilibili could potentially be the most ideal platform for brands promoting themselves to Gen Z, one of the most lucrative consumer segments in China.

Need our help on Bilibili?

If Gen Z is your target customer and you want to expand your business to China, Bilibili is one of the ideal platforms to do so. Do you have any further questions on what you’ve read today? Or are you ready to take your brand to the next level? Send us an email at info@catalystagents.com or fill in the contact form below and let us help you get started.