WeChat tests out banner ads and promoted app installs in article view

WeChat, China’s most popular chat app, announced today it has begun testing out banner ads and promoted app installs on its “article view” pages.

WeChat tends to attract the foreign tech industry’s attention for its growing number of services, like taxi booking and mobile payments. But it’s also a popular destination for news reading. Publishers will often push out content daily through their official accounts, using WeChat’s own publishing platform or a third-party one. When followers click on a piece, they’re directed from WeChat’s native app to an in-app browser, where they can read the article in a (in theory) clean, ad-free format. These pages have their own unique URL, so even when they’re shared outside of WeChat, WeChat’s format is preserved.

Starting today, advertisers can apply to place banner ads or app install ads featured atop some of these articles. According to 36kr, upon receiving Tencent’s approval, promoters can select a list of categories that their ads fit into, after which WeChat will analyze user behavior and interests in order to determine who sees which ads. Advertisers can also access analytics reporting their ads’ performance.

Below are two screenshots we’ve lifted from our friends at 36kr. The banner on the left is a regular ad, while the banner on the right is an app-install ad.

WeChat has steadily but carefully experimented with ad placement for a year. In June 2014, it officially rolled out an ad platform that allowed official accounts with more than 100,000 followers to place banner ads at the bottom of posts written and pushed by the account itself. In January of this year, WeChat let selected big name brands like Mercedes test out advertising through WeChat moments, the app’s Timeline-esque social feed.

WeChat’s foray into ads resembles that of Facebook. In 2014, the social network company reported that 69 percent of its revenues come from mobile ad sales. WeChat has been conservative when it comes monetizing from ads, and the company appears to be experimenting with a formula that’s not too obtrusive. But it’s likely WeChat users will see these ads more and more. During Tencent’s last earnings report, analysts stated they expected ad revenue would make up 22 percent of the company’s revenue by 2016, up from 11 percent in 2014.

(Source: 36kr)

Editing by Steven Millward, top image by linsinchen