Xiaohongshu’s maternal and infant insights: What content are brands paying for?

In recent years, the size of the maternal and infant market has gradually increased, and brands have also gradually increased their marketing investment in maternal and infant products. This article decodes the changing trends of marketing investment and user content consumption in the maternal and infant industry in 2023 to help practitioners better understand industry dynamics.

In recent years, the market size of the maternal and infant industry has increased year by year, and maternal and infant brands have continued to increase their investment in online marketing.

Faced with a new generation of parents with new consumption concepts and content browsing habits, how do brands use online social media channels for marketing? What are the changes in maternal and infant marketing? These have become issues that have attracted much attention from industry insiders.

In this context, Xinbang relies on its own big data capabilities and insights into the content ecosystem to produce the "2023 Maternal and Infant Industry Digital Marketing Report", decoding the changing trends in marketing investment and user content consumption in the maternal and infant industry in 2023, and helping practitioners better understand industry dynamics.

1. The scale of maternal and infant content is growing rapidly, and the digital marketing ecosystem is active

1. Brand investment continues to grow, and content platforms are becoming an important marketing platform

Brands' marketing investment in maternal and infant products is still increasing. According to research data, more than 50% of maternal and infant brands will maintain or increase their marketing budgets in 2022. Among them, more than 70% of new maternal and infant brands within 5 years have this figure.

2. The scale of content is growing rapidly, and the maternal and infant content ecosystem is thriving

With the increase in brand investment and the awakening of users' awareness of content consumption, the scale of maternal and infant content has grown significantly.

According to statistics from Xinbang, based on the Douyin, Kuaishou, Xiaohongshu, and WeChat Video platforms, in April 2023, the total amount of maternal and child-related content more than doubled year-on-year. At the same time, users' willingness to interact also increased significantly, and the total number of likes for maternal and child content increased by nearly 1.5 times.

3. The layout of public and private sectors is accelerating, and digital marketing of maternal and infant brands is accelerating

From the public domain perspective, the frequency of commercial launches by maternal and infant brands has increased significantly, and the layout of the public domain has accelerated. In April 2023, the average monthly launch volume of maternal and infant brands on the Xiaohongshu platform increased by 149% compared with the same period last year.

From the perspective of the private domain, the scale of corporate accounts, which are important private touchpoints for maternal and infant brands, has also increased significantly. In 2023, the scale of Xiaohongshu's maternal and infant corporate accounts increased by 19% year-on-year.

2. High-value content becomes the cornerstone of word-of-mouth marketing for maternal and infant brands

Judging from the Xiaohongshu platform, where maternal and infant brand promotion and commercial cooperation results are relatively quantifiable, the commercial placement of maternal and infant brands presents the following characteristics:

1. Value is king, and mothers’ experience notes are the focus of commercial placement

Professional and high-value content is highly recognized by brands, and maternal and infant brands are willing to accumulate content in the field of high-value content. According to Xinbang data, in the distribution of maternal and infant business notes on Xiaohongshu, mothers' experience content accounts for the highest proportion and is more favored by brands.

2. Pragmatism: infant food and maternal and infant products account for a high proportion of investment

In addition to mothers' experience content, content with high practical value, such as baby food and maternal and infant products, also accounts for a high proportion. From the top 10 brands in the maternal and infant category of Xiaohongshu in April 2023, the brands on the list are all related to baby food and maternal and infant products.

3. Entertainment comes first, and the effects of daily maternal and child content are far ahead

Judging from the communication effects of various subcategories of maternal and child products, the content dissemination effect of maternal and child daily life is far ahead, and the average number of likes for maternal and child daily life business notes is more than twice that of the second place.

Since daily content has a wider audience, the target group has spread to the entire platform users and is no longer limited to the mother-and-child group.

In addition, daily content has a higher leverage in providing entertainment and emotional value to users, and has a better overall communication effect. From the perspective of content creation, topics such as "Dad taking care of baby" and "baby creative photos" are relatively popular in maternal and child content.

In addition, Xinbang found that early education content is also popular among users, with the average collection of notes being nearly 1.8 times the industry average.

4. Text and pictures are popular, but video content is more effective than text and pictures

From the perspective of maternal and infant commercial content media, graphic content is more favored by brand owners. On the Xiaohongshu platform, the scale of graphic content far exceeds that of video content, and the content volume is nearly three times that of video content.

In terms of communication effect, on the contrary, video content receives much more likes than text and picture content on average. Among the commercial content on Xiaohongshu, video content receives more than twice as many likes as text and picture content on average.

In addition, there is a large gap in the number of explosive articles. Among the content produced by bloggers with 50,000 to 500,000 followers, the total number of explosive articles with more than 1,000 likes differs by nearly 5 times.

It can be seen that video content has a higher average number of likes and a higher rate of virality, indicating that video is a better vehicle for communication.

5. Long-tail strategy: tail bloggers have higher communication cost-effectiveness

In terms of the types of bloggers, the majority are still mother-child daily life and mothers' experiences, which echoes the content types with more commercial cooperation. However, in terms of the number of fans, the cooperating bloggers are mainly the tail group, and the number of fans is less than 50,000, accounting for more than 70%.

If we compare the data from 2022, we will find that the proportion of tail bloggers has increased among brand-cooperating bloggers, and the scale of accounts with less than 50,000 followers has increased by more than 2 times. By digging deeper into the data, Xinbang found that tail bloggers have a higher communication cost-effectiveness.

Considering the communication effect, the total communication volume of bloggers with less than 50,000 followers is nearly 2.7 times that of top bloggers with more than 500,000 followers.

At the same time, combined with the estimated quotes for business cooperation with bloggers, the amount invested by all the tail bloggers is only 65% ​​of that of the head bloggers. In summary, the brand invested 65% of the cost and got 2.7 times the communication effect.

Behind the long-tail of brand advertising is actually the brand’s pursuit of cost-effectiveness in advertising, seeking higher communication effects through lower costs.

The above is an interpretation of part of the report. In addition, how do users view maternal and infant content? What opportunities will emerge in maternal and infant content marketing in 2023?

Report produced by: New List Research Institute, jointly released by: Zhuang Jun

Author: Zhuang Jun, public account: Zhuang Jun