What is Chinese KOL | Check this top KOL list

Chinese KOL is much more than a Celebrity, in this article I will explain what is the KOL and present my top KOL list!

How boring our life could be without following the Kardashians or another celebrity social media account? While in the western world, there is a phenomenon of celebrities, in China it's called “KOL” Key Opinion leader.

However, in China it is far beyond the admiration of a celebrity. This is a person we identify and 100% trust therefor we will probably buy some the products according to his/her recommendations.

Add to that the number of potential followers in China and you have got a powerful person that knows what his audience need, add to this millions of fans and you have a money making machine.

KOL definition

KOL is a key opinion leader. This word was first used in 1940 by a researcher in mass media produced by Paul lazarsfeld and Elihu Katz. They discover that one person has more influence on an audience than radio advertising. According to their research, the key opinion leader uses the information of the mainstream media and filter it with its own opinion in his own community. According to researches KOL is an individual who is an expert in his field, his opinion is powerful and affects his audience behavior.

KOL in China

KOL phenomena is very common in China and called: Wang Hong 网红an online celebrity.

Chinese viewers watch their celebrity activity on the Internet via social media.

View their photographs, content and videos. They become their followers and find the recommendations credible, as if he were their friend.

The KOL’s can collaborate with brands by publishing articles or videos using the brand products. That way, the fans would love to purchase it as well. Sometimes the KOL make their own line of products or create their own e-commerce shop and so their fans can buy the product fast.

Some Chinese KOL such as gogoboi charge more than $40,000 as a promotion post in WeChat!

Each KOL is an expert in his field, so each can find a KOL in his loved subject: Food, fashion, beauty products, music and so on. You can follow them in their Weibo and WeChat official accounts.

We would like to introduce three KOL’s which you must know:

This one is so famous; he has 29 million followers on Weibo due to his special niche and sales ability.

King of Lipsticks and Live streamer Austin Li

Weibo and Wechat account name: 李佳琦 Austin

His real name is 李佳琦Li Jia Qi, he is a male KOL known as “the king of Lipsticks “due to the fact he can Try over then 300 hundred lipsticks during 2 hours! his nickname is ，买它！ as he allways say Buy it! he even have a song with this title!

Li is one of Chinese under 30 Millionaires! He is not just a “pretty face”, this guy is particularly talented in marketing and sales. He became the anchor of Tao Bao, the biggest e-commerce platform in China belongs to Alibaba.

In is live streams he shows many beauty products and try it on his skin. You can see him trying lipsticks, makeup, mascara and products who usually used by women.

He also has a cute family of Bichon dogs called “The Never Family” which have their own line of products and even their own coffee shop! Check out our video about the richest dogs in China and look for the Never family and their gorgeous coffee shop here.https://youtu.be/JjTWecTE1oM

*Credit photos to Austin Li Weibo and WeChat official accounts

Next KOL is known as “Queen of sales in China”.

Viya-China's sales queen

Weibo name:微娅viyaaa

WeChat account name: 微娅viya

Viya is a live streamer and one of the most famous faces in China who known as china’s sale queen.

Her real name is Huang Wei and it’s all start at the age of 18 when she decided to learn from her family retailing business and to open her own women's clothing store in Beijing.

She was so good at sales that a couple of years later, she became a marketing genius, a live streamer and a millionaire.

In 2005, she decided to join the show «Super Idol», winning a prize and a singing contract. After playing in a female pop band, she decided to return to her love to sell retail clothing and set up her own store chain in Xian.  In 2012 she transferred her business to be online, using the Chinese platform “TaoBao”.

When Taobao released their new live streaming and e-commerce platform, they asked her to join them and be one of their faces and like Austin Li she became a Taobao Anchor.

By doing so she has become one of China's favorite live-streamers. Her activity is mainly about lifestyle, her reputation is so good that she cooperated with the biggest celebrities such as Kim Kardashian and Victoria Beckham to promote they cosmetic products.

She has almost 18 Million followers in the Weibo and a big team checking and confirming the products and make sure her audience gets the best deals and prices.

According to some articles, her sales volume was more than 300 million dollars in a workday in 2019 , November 11.

For full details and fun facts like why her nick name is Dora-Viya, check out this link.

Last but not least, a make-up artist that will blow your mind!

Yuyu | Make-up transformation

Weibo, wechat and instagram name : yuyuzhangzou

Meng Da Yue is known as Yuyu, she is a make-up artist KOL.

She has more than 4.4 million followers on her web and her videos are all about makeup transformation. How big is her transformation? The Chinese audience says it looks like she had surgery or replaced by other women!

On Weibo can see short videos showing her make-up process. She is showing herself without any makeup and showing us the stages. Starting from the face, eyebrows, and eyes.

Another strong video platform she uses is Bilibili, it used to be a place for animation, comics, and video games. Today it’s a bit like Tok-tok and YouTube. We can check her old videos from 2016, and the new videos- you can see she used the same process- she starts without any makeup, and then she put it on and show us the products in each step. The video quality and background are much better, and she is presenting it with more confidence. The interesting part about this platform is that while playing the video, you can see all the comments vertical (bullet comment) on the video screen which makes it feels more alive as if you watch it together with other people at the same time. You can see her beautiful make up process in my video here:

KOL work hard and like the work they do, and you can see that.

We gave here only a small taste of the Chinese KOL, which you should not miss, however, there is a long list of many other interesting KOL’S like Becky Li, Mr. Bags and Sunnie. To be KOL’S Expert learn about tradition KOL and Trendy KOL here.