SHORT-FORM VIDEO & LIVESTREAM COMMERCE IN CHINA
Douyin (TikTok) Marketing Services in China
HI-COM plans and executes Douyin campaigns from creator casting to livestream commerce, backed by a China-based team and published results including a 4.48-million-view campaign and a multi-city activation that reached more than 31 million people.
PROVEN RESULTS IN CHINA
What Is Douyin Marketing?
Douyin is China’s dominant short-form video and livestream commerce platform, the domestic Chinese app that is separate from the international version of TikTok, reaching hundreds of millions of daily active users across every age group and region in China. Douyin marketing covers creator and KOL campaigns, branded short-form video content, hashtag challenges and brand takeovers, and Douyin Shop livestream commerce, letting brands build awareness, drive engagement and convert viewers into buyers without leaving the app.
- Platform: Douyin, mainland China’s own short-video and livestream commerce app, separate from international TikTok
- Core services: creator and KOL casting, content production, livestream commerce, paid amplification
- Proven results: a published 4.48M-view campaign and a 31M+-reach multi-city activation
- Team: China-based, integrated with Xiaohongshu and WeChat campaign planning
WHAT WE HANDLE
Full Douyin Campaign Coverage
CONTENT STRATEGY & CREATIVE
Formats built around Douyin’s algorithm and audience behavior.
CREATOR & KOL CASTING
Screening and selecting Douyin creators by audience fit and engagement quality, not follower count alone.
LIVESTREAM COMMERCE & DOUYIN SHOP
Livestream planning, host coordination and Douyin Shop setup for direct in-app sales.
PAID AMPLIFICATION & ANALYTICS
Douyin ad campaigns, performance tracking and post-campaign reporting.
PAID AMPLIFICATION, EXPLAINED
Douyin Ad & Content Formats
Douyin campaigns combine organic and paid formats depending on the goal. HI-COM plans around the formats below as part of the paid-amplification and content-strategy services covered above.
In-Feed Video Ads
Native video ads that appear between organic content as users scroll, bought on a cost-per-click or cost-per-impression basis.
TopView & Brand Takeover
Full-screen video or image placements shown when the app opens, used for maximum-visibility brand awareness moments.
DOU+ Content Boosting
Extra paid distribution behind an existing organic video, without a sponsored label, to extend reach past organic performance.
Branded Hashtag Challenges
A branded hashtag with a seed video that invites user-generated participation, built for sharing rather than a one-off ad.
Livestream & Shop Ads
Paid promotion that points viewers into a live broadcast or a Douyin Shop listing for direct in-app purchase.
Search Ads
Placements against Douyin’s in-app search results, reaching shoppers already looking for a product or brand by name.
How a Douyin Campaign Comes Together
MARKET & AUDIENCE ANALYSIS
Review the brand’s category, occasion and target audience in the Chinese market.
CREATOR & CONTENT STRATEGY
Shortlist creators and define content formats, building a role matrix for multi-creator campaigns.
PRODUCTION & EXECUTION
Manage content production, creator delivery and the publishing schedule.
PERFORMANCE REVIEW
Track views, engagement and Shop/livestream sales, then report results.
Where Douyin Marketing Has Real Limits
Douyin content goes through the platform’s own review process before it publishes, so timelines need to allow for that, especially around sensitive dates or regulated categories. Content built for international TikTok cannot simply be re-uploaded: Douyin has its own algorithm, audience behavior and compliance requirements, so it needs to be planned natively rather than repurposed. View counts are also not a sales figure. A high-view video and a high-converting Douyin Shop listing are two different outcomes, and HI-COM tracks both separately rather than reporting views as the only success metric. Paid formats such as TopView placements and search ads run through Ocean Engine, Douyin’s own advertising platform, which sits outside Meta and Google entirely and requires a China-registered advertiser account. That is one more reason these campaigns are planned and placed by a China-based team instead of being run remotely.
Why Choose HI-COM For Douyin Marketing?
Proven on Douyin: From Gaokao to Father’s Day
A 10-creator campaign across Douyin and Xiaohongshu generated 4.48 million views, connecting one product to multiple occasions (Gaokao, Dragon Boat Festival, Father’s Day and fitness/nutrition audiences) rather than repeating a single message.
Douyin or Xiaohongshu: Which One Fits Your Campaign?
Douyin is built for short-form video reach and in-app livestream commerce. Xiaohongshu is built around product reviews, recommendations and search-driven discovery, closer to how a Chinese consumer researches a purchase before buying. Most of HI-COM’s stronger campaigns do not choose one over the other. They use Douyin for reach and conversion and Xiaohongshu for the research and trust-building that happens before and after, the same approach behind our published Douyin and Xiaohongshu case study.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Douyin the same as TikTok?
Douyin and TikTok share the same parent company but run as separate apps with separate content, users and rules. Douyin is the version used inside mainland China; a Douyin marketing campaign speaks to a Chinese audience specifically, not TikTok’s international one.
Does HI-COM manage the whole campaign, from creators to content to reporting?
Yes. HI-COM handles creator casting, content strategy and production, publishing coordination, and post-campaign performance reporting as one managed process.
Can Douyin marketing include direct sales, not just brand awareness?
Yes, through Douyin Shop and livestream commerce, which let viewers purchase directly inside the app during or after a livestream.
How many creators does a typical Douyin campaign use?
It depends on the goal and budget. It can range from a single well-matched creator to a multi-creator matrix like HI-COM’s 10-creator Gaokao/Father’s Day campaign.
Can Douyin campaigns be combined with Xiaohongshu or WeChat?
Yes. HI-COM regularly plans campaigns that run across Douyin, Xiaohongshu and WeChat together, with each platform playing a different role in the same strategy.
Does Douyin content need to go through official review before it goes live?
Yes. Douyin reviews content before it publishes, and timelines should account for that, particularly for regulated categories or campaigns tied to a specific date. This is one of the reasons content is planned natively for Douyin rather than adapted at the last minute.
How do you measure a Douyin campaign’s success beyond view count?
Views tell you reach, not revenue. HI-COM also tracks engagement rate, follower growth and, where the campaign includes Douyin Shop or livestream commerce, actual conversions and sales, reporting them separately rather than folding everything into one view number.
Can you launch a Douyin campaign for a brand with no existing presence in China?
Yes. The market and audience analysis step at the start of every project is built for exactly that case: reviewing the brand’s category, occasion and target audience in the Chinese market before any creator or content decision is made.
What is DOU+ and does a Douyin campaign need it?
DOU+ is Douyin’s own content-boosting tool: it pays for extra distribution behind a video that is already live, without adding a sponsored label. It is one of several paid options layered onto a campaign once the organic content is performing, not a required starting point.
Does a foreign brand need its own Douyin advertising account?
Paid Douyin formats run through Ocean Engine, Douyin’s own advertising platform, which requires a China-registered advertiser account separate from Meta or Google. HI-COM places and manages paid campaigns through its own China-based setup, so a brand does not need to register one itself to run a Douyin campaign.
How long does a Douyin campaign take from kickoff to results?
Timeline depends on scope, but every campaign starts with the market and audience analysis step, followed by creator and content strategy, production, and Douyin’s own content review before anything publishes. Occasion-based campaigns tied to a fixed date, like Gaokao or a shopping festival, need that full runway built in from the start, not compressed at the end.
Page reviewed and updated August 2026 by HI-COM’s marketing team.
Let’s Discuss Your Douyin Campaign
Contact HI-COM to plan a Douyin marketing campaign for your brand in China.