Earlier this year, Facebook announced changes to its Ads Manager and Business Manager to improve user experience. These changes include:

Simpler design

A more streamlined and cleaner Ads Manager interface has been introduced. Its simplified navigation features allow more space to manage ads and promote tools that help gauge ad performance.

Copy & paste functionality and auto-naming

Advertisers are given more flexibility when creating ads with the launch of a copy and paste functionality. An auto-naming feature has also been added for businesses to customize their ads in a much shorter time.

Adding new clients made easy

Business Manager has been updated to allow agencies to activate their clients’ campaigns more efficiently. These updates include a streamlined process for agencies to add new clients, making it easier to manage clients’ historical reporting, as well as to assign and organize assets within a Business Manager account.

Over the past month, Facebook has also updated page posts and ads on mobile to provide a more consistent look across the Facebook’s family of apps and longer term value for its clients. These updates include:

These updates include:

visible primary text being shortened from 3 to 7 lines, with a prompt at the end to read remaining text.

maximum media height being revised from a 2:3 to 4:5 aspect ratio for photos and videos.

As part of its continuous efforts to refine targeting options, Facebook has removed targeting options that are outdated or had not been popular among businesses.  For instance, options associated with older song titles, albums or games are no longer available. The aim is to make it easier for advertisers to identify and take advantage of the right targeting options. In the meantime, guidance is available to those who are looking for options that have been removed.

With Facebook always evolving to deliver the best user experience and products, advertisers can simply kick back, relax, and quite literally, let Facebook do their work! Share with us your thoughts about the latest updates.

In June 2019, Facebook IQ released a study about consumers’ engagement with food-related social media posts across 9 countries. The results reveal the tendency of turning to mobile devices and social platforms for exploring eating options.

In July, we pulled off a social media campaign for Fete-Up, a Singapore-inspired healthy takeaway to build brand awareness and promote eating cultures in a fast-paced city.

Fete Up aims to offer healthy and well-balanced meals that are both tasty and reasonably priced, available in-store and via delivery. The eatery targets office workers and individuals who are health-conscious, yet hard to find time to prepare balanced meals at home.

Based on the brand vision and target audience, we’ve adopted “Right food, right away” as the core campaign idea⁠ — to enjoy healthy food delivered right to your doorsteps. Our campaign is tailored to achieve four key objectives:

1.Raise brand awareness

2.Promote healthy eating cultures

3.Boost sales in physical stores

4.Drive online sales and traffic to their website

We believe quality content is all about being informative, relevant, sharable and actionable. With this consideration in mind, we’ve suggested four core pillars revolving around:

1.Fetebox unwrapped: Menu promotion by showcasing nutrition facts

2.Healthy secrets: Informative health tips to raise awareness on balanced diets

3.Eat Well, Live Well: Engaging, sharable food quotes that speaks the brand vision

4.Deliver Right Away: Practical information on how customers can order to drive sales

Successful content marketing fulfils the needs of both business and customers: drive revenue and deliver relevant, engaging messages. This begins with industry-focused research and understanding about the company, products and clearly-defined target audience. Want to know more about content marketing and its myriads of rules and tricks? Speak to our specialists to maximize your business potentials.

Moving beyond social networking, WeChat has transformed itself into an enclosed, all-in-one platform with the new function ⁠— WeChat Mini Program. It takes pride in enhanced features ranging from e-commerce, games and news within the social networking app. In July 2019, we’ve expanded payment gateways for AJ Hackett, a bungee pioneer based in New Zealand with this build-in function.

Traditionally, WeChat official account is a business platform dedicated for content marketing only, while payment requests would be directed to external websites. With this mini-program embedded in our client’s account, users can now purchase admission tickets directly within the app while browsing creative content. In other words, we’ve achieved content marketing and e-commerce in one single platform. This equates to elevated customer experience and extra revenue to the business.

More about WeChat Mini Program

WeChat Mini Programs are considered to be “sub-applications” operating within WeChat, allowing access to web apps without the need to leave the main app.

The mini-programs can serve four main purposes, including e-commerce, utility, mini-games and news. More advanced features are available such as geolocation, task management, coupon redemption, etc.

The Main Benefits of Mini Programs for businesses

-Massive user base

As announced on 15 May 2019, WeChat Monthly Active Users in Q1 2019 has exceeded 1.1 billion

-Less expensive than traditional apps

Mini programs cost less to develop due to its reduced size and complexity. It also runs smoother and faster.

-Easy access to various functionalities

Users gain quick access via multiple entry points without prior installation, such as scanning QR code, direct message or searching nearby programs.

WeChat Mini Programs have almost limitless potential. Connect with us to find out more about how WeChat Mini Program can benefit your business today!

Facebook announced on 02 July 2019 that it has changed its ranking algorithm in an attempt to curb “sensational health claims.”

“In our ongoing efforts to improve the quality of information in News Feed, we consider ranking changes based on how they affect people, publishers and our community as a whole. We know that people don’t like posts that are sensational or spammy, and misleading health content is particularly bad for our community.” the announcement said, explaining the reason behind the move.

Facebook said the updates were designed to minimize the number of posts with misleading health claims, as well as posts that seek to promote sales of products or services based on health-related claims, e.g. pills that claim to contribute to weight loss.

Facebook implements this by predicting which posts are likely to contain health misinformation or solicitation based on phrases frequently used in such posts, and placing these posts lower in News Feed.

The announcement came only a week after an investigative report by The Wall Street Journal, which showed that Facebook and YouTube were inundated with false health claims.

One such claim is treating cancer with baking soda by a salesperson named Robert O. Young, who was convicted in 2016 in the US for practicing medicine without a license. Young got back on Facebook weeks after getting out of prison towards the end of 2017.  According to The Wall Street Journal, back in 2012, a cancer patient flew from the UK to the US to seek treatment from Young. After 12 weeks of treatments comprising baking soda injections and low acid foods which came to a total cost of USD 70,000, the patient passed away. Young now has a number of Facebook pages through which he and his affiliate sell products and services both nationally and internationally.

It should be noted that Facebook is not removing these posts or pages that are repeatedly posting health misinformation. In other words, while the ranking updates make it harder for these posts to reach their target readers, such misinformation is certainly still out there.

If you advertise on Facebook and Instagram, it’s time to update yourself with some of the latest creative tools.

Video creation

In Facebook’s Video Creation Kit, you will now have even more visually-engaging templates to choose from.

What’s more, seasonal stickers and templates are now available in the Effects tab to help “freshen up” your ads. Your ads will never be “the same old thing all year round” anymore!

Meanwhile, 20 new font options have been introduced, making it easier to add text overlays that tie in with your brand guidelines better.

Ever felt “trapped” working on a video because the moment you start, you can’t step away as you don’t want to lose all your work?  The Video Creation Kit has made it possible to save drafts of videos, so you can work on your video whenever you have a moment and pick up exactly where you left off later on.

Video editing

Ads Manager allows selection of an aspect ratio  (4:5, 2:3, 9:16, 1:1 or 16:9) to crop your video according to requirements of different placements (Facebook, Instagram, Messenger or Audience Network).

Similarly, you can trim the duration of a video for different platforms as well.

Dynamic ads

Whether you’re selling products, hotels, flights or vehicles, a dynamic ad might just work for you. Available in single-image, carousel and collection format, dynamic ads can be used across Facebook, Instagram, Audience Network and Messenger.

Branded content ads

Advertisers can now promote branded content posts as feed ads, reaching a wider audience. “Paid partnership with” along with the brand name will appear to ensure ads transparency.

ThruPlay

Available for Facebook, Instagram and Audience Network, ThruPlay allows advertisers to pay only when ads are played to completion or for at least 15 seconds. Optimize your video ad campaign for ThruPlay, and Facebook will deliver it to users that are likely to watch 15 seconds or the whole video.

Let your creativity run amok and have fun experimenting with these creative tools!

The overseas property market used to be dominant by parents who have sent or are planning to send their children to study abroad and those who plan to retire overseas. Not anymore.

Hong Kong property investors recognize the stable growth rate and rental value of properties in cities like Vancouver, Toronto and London. The higher profit margin attracts investors to switch their investment to overseas from the local market, where there are ever-increasing investment costs and a slower rate of return.

Let’s not forget the reverse migrants. For instance, there are an estimated 300,000 Canadian passports holders in Hong Kong. After their emigration to Canada in the 90s and return to Hong Kong, thousands are moving back to Canada with their children, Canadian census data shows.

Given the high demand for overseas properties, this is a great opportunity for overseas property investment businesses to build an online presence to capture business growth via effective digital marketing.

Seminars and trade shows are mainly where conversion occurs. And while many agencies still stick to promoting these offline events via traditional media platforms such as printing pamphlets and placing newspaper ads, potential buyers of the digital era are doing their research and obtaining information online. By appealing to your target audience with an engaging O2O campaign, forward-thinking agencies can be ahead of the game in no time.

NDN Group has been helping to build brand awareness for SQM Global Properties, a real estate agent focusing on overseas sales and marketing services in Hong Kong. Our campaign delivers curated content driven by comprehensive digital marketing strategies that encompass social media, media placement, search engine optimization, geo-targeting and data management.

We also utilize instant messaging applications such as Facebook Messenger and Whatsapp for Business. It gives SQM an enriched, more personal way of communicating with its customers — photos, videos, documents and more — all within the messaging App. All of these, in turn, help SQM raise the number of attendees in its seminars and trade shows with promising results.

Do not hesitate to get in touch with us if you are aspired to expand your overseas property investment business. We are more than happy to offer professional advice to help you achieve your goals. We look forward to working with you in this new digital era.

We are thrilled to announce NDN Group’s latest partnership with GELOS to introduce Douyin (抖音) TikTok marketing to Hong Kong. It is a short video app that has 500 million monthly active users and 250 million daily active users. Brands big or small are scaling fast and producing fun engaging content on their platform.

You are probably wondering what is the difference between Douyin and TikTok? In 2017, the apps’ parent company ByteDance brought TikTok’s competitor Musical.ly, merged the two together and became the app we know today. TikTok is the overseas name Douyin uses. ByteDance also owns Jinri Toutiao (今日頭條).

With the sophistication of the Internet environment in Mainland China, where businesses are fully immersed into the online to offline model, it makes perfect sense that Douyin is more e-commerce-focused and brands use it as a sales funnel. On the contrary, TikTok is more entertainment-focused, at least for now. It has plans to be more.

This short video app is gaining momentum globally because it fulfills people’s need for instant gratification in today’s fast-paced world. KOL or influencers who became popular on their platform are producing captivating content and bringing high conversion rate to brands.

Look at popular beauty KOL Austin Li (李佳琦). He is known for his record of selling out thousands of lipsticks in an instance his personal best was 14,000 pieces in a minute. The novel idea of a man reviewing lipstick color live and his comedic ways of reviewing products is why fans love him and why mega beauty brands like Chanel, MAC, Shiseido and Tom Ford love to work with him. When Li says “Oh my god, buy it!” that particular color will sell out.

Well-known hot pot chain Haidilao was able to increase 1,000% ordering on a single dish because they created a live stream video on how to cook that specific meat for hot pot.

Austin Li and Haidilao are selling two very different category of products, yet they both enjoy a high conversion rate because of a strategic usage of Douyin TikTok. There are many more showcases where brands achieved exponential growth within a short period of time regardless of their product. The market is so optimistic, they believe that any product will perform well on the platform.

With ByteDance behind Douyin TikTok using powerful algorithms with machine learning, to aggregate and distribute content, your brand message will be optimized with precise targeting. So rest assured your marketing budget won’t go to waste.

Are you a local brand in Hong Kong with no payment gateway or setup in Mainland China, but keen to enter the market? We can assist and offer advice. Get in touch with us to discover more and learn about our trial package.

This year’s Earth Hour, where individuals and companies are encouraged to switch off lights for one hour, fell on 30 March 2019. While Earth Hour is a worldwide conservation event launched by WWF to raise awareness of climate change, it has become a marketing opportunity in recent years. Among the companies that took advantage of this thoughtful event this year was Gallo Family Vineyards.

Award-winning Gallo Family Vineyards is one of the ranges offered by the family-owned Gallo brand and is one of the top 10 best-selling wine brands in the USA.

To celebrate and in a show of support for Earth Hour 2019, Gallo Family Vineyards, in partnership with NDN Group, launched a campaign themed around “Happy Together.”

The objectives were to attract more WeChat followers, maintain fans’ loyalty and highlight Gallo’s core value – having good times with families.

A video was made for the campaign. It begins with a zooming-in on the planet Earth — from outer space down to one particular household where two friends are spending time together. Gallo Family Vineyards wines can be seen on the table and also in photos on the wall. The left bottom corner shows a clock, emphasizing the passing of time.  As the time rolls over from 08:29 to 08:30, which is when Earth Hour begins, candles are lit as the two friends clink glasses and continue having a good time, and lights in the city begin to go off. The clip ends with the company logo and the slogan “Happy Together on Earth. Connect to Earth,” echoing with the theme of Earth Hour this year and Gallo’s core value.

The campaign was a success, with the video garnering 3,000 views since its launch on WeChat and numerous positive comments.

Since 2017, NDN Group has been managing the WeChat accounts of Gallo Family Vineyards and Carlo Rossi for Gallo, and has boosted their number of followers by 8 and 17 times respectively.

Looking for creative ideas on your next campaign? Drop us a line and we’d be in touch soon.

WeChat Pay is already a part of everyday life in China, a popular payment gateway supported almost everywhere – taxis, supermarkets, hospitals and even as a way to facilitate communication between judges and litigants in court cases. Following the launch of the Chinese official website with UX/UI design for our client AJ Hackett in 2018, the international bungee jump business, we introduced WeChat Pay for their online ticket reservations in early May this year to streamline sales transactions for Chinese tourists.

Showcase

With abundant local knowledge about the app and the Chinese market, our team in Shanghai was invited to work closely with our Hong Kong team in this project, with the former responsible for setting up payment process and the latter for website interface and program design. Customers can now proceed to WeChat Pay from the booking page directly by simply scanning a QR code, achieving a seamless customer experience for Chinese tourists.

Why WeChat Pay?  

– Able to handle multiple payment methods including Quick Pay, QR code, In-App Web-Based or Native In-App payments

– Supports cross-border settlements in all major foreign currencies and is available in over 20 countries

– Allows foreign businesses to engage with customers in- and outside of China via their all-in-one services, reaching out to larger audiences

On-going development for AJ Jackett is underway to cater for the footprints from China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Macau. The website will be further revamped to include JETCO pay (credit card payment) and improve search engine optimization (SEO).

Outlook on WeChat Pay

Today, there are reportedly more than 900 million active WeChat Pay users on a monthly basis; by 2021, it is estimated that the number of Chinese users will increase up to 675 million while WeChat’s penetration rate of smartphone users and messaging app users will rise up to 82% and 89% respectively, according to eMarketer. It’s impossible to neglect the growing business opportunities on WeChat.

Speak to our specialists today to learn more about WeChat marketing and e-Commerce landscape.