Wannabe Socialites Leveraging WeChat Groups to Build Their Fake Lives
Recently a hot topic on Weibo and other Chinese social media channels has been the revelation that many of the rich people you see flaunting their wealth on the internet are fake. This phenomenon is not exclusive to China, Instagram is covered in girls having afternoon tea with their besties in some high-end hotels or restaurant with a full face of makeup and a Hermes or Dior bag at their side.
But what is unique to China is just how people are staging these images and creating these fake realities. In China the fastest way to appear rich on social media is, of course, a WeChat group.
The news that has everyone buzzing is a WeChat group called Shanghai Debutante that cost 500 RMB to join, filled with other people that have the same dream: to tell the world that they are living a high-end life and that they are socialites.
Appearing wealthy on social media
In these groups, people organize photo shoots with each other, split the costs of renting hotel rooms, luxury bags, etc.
For example, a wanghong hotel in China is the Bulgari hotel in Shanghai. Girls like to take the following images:
- Wearing the Bulgari towels lying on the bed
- Having afternoon tea with the Oriental Pearl in the back
- Their breakfast
- Celebrating their birthday at the hotel
When they are taking these photos, for example wearing the Bvgalri towel or having afternoon tea or having breakfast, they follow strict rules not to make the towel wet and not to actually eat the food so that everyone gets a chance to pose with it.
In the group, people also share the cost of renting a Ferrari for a day to take pictures with it.
On the Internet, these fake socialites are also called “Pinduoduo socialites” for their use of group buying tactics.
Appearing wealthy in real life
But it’s not all about the pictures, it’s also about real life too. One member might be renting a Hermes bag for a month, but she only wants to carry it for a few days so she asks other members whether any of them would like to share the bill and carry it for the rest of the month.
Some group members even go so far as to ask if others would like to share a pair of second-hand Gucci silk stockings.
Some people use these groups to build their social media following, while others do this because they want to show others that they are living well and they want to get into a relationship with a rich person.
For example, a screenshot from one of the groups showed a girl sharing her experience of a date. In the end she found out that the boy only drove a BMW and she dumped him. Because she was looking for someone who drove a Ferrari at least. Crazy!
What does this mean for brands?
Is it really important to show people that they are living well? Not exactly. The core reason people do this is the Internet traffic. The main way for these “socialites” to monetize is to get sponsorships from brands or to do ecommerce livestreams. To do this, traffic is what they need. So instead of purchasing fake followers, which brands are becoming more savvy at catching, they want to gain real followers by pretending to have a life that their followers aspire to.
Since these images can help them gain traffic, it shows that Chinese Internet users love seeing something sophisticated and they have great curiosity to see behind the scenes in the lives of a socialites.
In this scandal, brands are not exactly the victims. They get more exposure, for example, the Shanghai Bulgari hotel and many high-end afternoon tea places. But at the same time, if I see someone post about staying at the hotel on Xiaohongshu or I see someone carrying a Dior bag taking photos when having afternoon tea, I can’t help questioning the reality of it.
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