Tencent will hold the partner conference on July 3 in Beijing. They intend to publish the game platform on WeChat.

According to the email from Tencent, they will hold the partner conference on July 3 at the Beijing National Conference Center.

Its conference will be held from 9:30 to 17:30 on July 3. And in the morning, we can attend the session of their corporate strategy or current trend. And in the afternoon, we can choose to attend the one of interesting theme from 5 categories (QQ, Marketing, Game, WeChat and Cloud).

According to the news, Tencent intends to publish the detail of game platform on WeChat. And they also said that they already contracted with Temple Run and Fruit Ninja.

Their rival LINE and KakaoTalk are leading in this area compared to Tencent, but their future action will be worth watching too.


Source => Tencent Partner Conference 2013

Many WeChat users are following official accounts for their hobby.

Last time, I introduced the report of "The behavior analysis of WeChat users" that was published by Sootoo Research, and I explained the part of the situation of utilization. And today, I would like to introduce the situation of official accounts on WeChat in that report.

1. Which type of official accounts do you follow?

Leisure and Life    36.12%

Corporate   16.74%

News and Media   26.48%

Famous person and star   42.29%

Other   12.78%



From this result, we can find that many WeChat users are following the official accounts for the purpose of their hobby. And this is proved again in the next question.


2. Why are you following the official accounts?

- For leisure and hobby   61.29%
- For getting the wisdom of living   41.49%
- For getting the current information   40.86%
- For study   29.03%
- For getting the current status of the corporate   25.81%
- Recommendation from friends   22.58%
- Other   11.83%



3. What was the opportunity that you started to follow the official accounts?

- Recommendation from friends   42.57%

- The information on Weibo   61.39%

- The information on official site   37.62%

- Other   15.35%



Actually, it's difficult to increase the followers only in WeChat itself. This result also proved that the promotion on the outside of WeChat (such as Weibo or official site) and word‐of‐mouth communication are very important for increasing their followers.


4. What timezone is convenient for your getting the information from official accounts?

We can't find the characteristic difference in this result, but it seems that the timezone of morning and after work are relatively welcomed.


Well, I think that the company who were starting marketing activity on WeChat is still more increasing. How about referring the this report in conjunction with the information of the next version of WeChat?


Source => Sootoo Research

Sootoo Research said that over 60% users use WeChat everyday .

Sootoo Research published the report of "The behavior analysis of WeChat users", and so I would like to explain the part that is written about the situation of utilization at this time.

1. Have you ever used WeChat?

92.97% of respondents said "Yes". It's very high rate, but Sootoo is the company that provides the IT field news, so there may be a little bit bias in this answer. But on the other hand, it's true that WeChat users is rapidly increasing, and their user will reach 400 million people soon.


2. What is the reason that you started to use WeChat?

- That reason is that friends or colleagues have already used WeChat --- 71.34%
- That reason is that was interested in WeChat --- 47.42%
- That reason is that can send the voice or text by WeChat --- 34.05%
- That reason is that can use video call on WeChat --- 29.31%
- That reason is that can use group voice chat on WeChat --- 21.34%
- That reason is that use every time the products provided by Tencent --- 2.59%

In the last report that was written about "whole" social media, the answer of "Friends or colleague have already used it" was also the top reason. So it can be said that the one of the most important thing is the word‐of‐mouth marketing as I thought.


3. How often do you use WeChat?

- Many times in a day  36.23%

- One time in a day   27.17%

- One time in few days  21.24%

- One time in a week  15.36%





As a result, it follows that over 60% users use WeChat every day.


4. How many hours do you use WeChat at one time?

Less than 5 minutes  29%

6 to 15 minutes  34%

16 to 30 minutes  15%

More than 31 minutes  22%








5. Which feature do you usually use on WeChat?

- Voice Chat  93.51%
- Sending pictures  77.28%
- Watching pictures on Moments  61.66%
- Sending pictures to Moments   53.55%
　　　　　　　・
　　　　　　　・
- Checking the information from official accounts  22.52%
　　　　　　　・
　　　　　　　・
- PC version of  WeChat  7.91%



I think that this result proved that WeChat is the communication tools with friends or colleague regarding almost people at this moment.


This report also explained about the use reality of official accounts on WeChat, but I would like to explain about it at the next time.


Source => Sootoo Research

WeChat started to provide the mobile payment solution. Its first user is McDonalds.

As I explained before, WeChat will provide the linkage feature with EC in the next version 5.0. In addition to this, they provide the mobile payment solution on WeChat, and actually it's already provided by McDonalds.

  


At first, WeChat user have to become a follower of McDonalds account. After that they will provide a message that includes a link. And WeChat user click the link to get a card that is called "茶点卡", and after that the screen of above picture will be appeared.

And user click the button of "立即购买 (Buy Now)" on this screen, and pay 3 RMB through TENMPAY, user can get the "茶点卡 (Tea card)".


But at this time, this card has some restriction to use.
- User can use this card only from 2:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.
- User cannot use this card to buy coffee or some services.
- There is an expiration date. (3 months)


I don't know using this card has some merits compared to cash at this time, but I think it's a very interesting trend from the point of view that is the linkage of mobile payment and social media.

Sina Weibo also already started mobile payment solution on their platform, so the linkage of mobile payment and social media may become the one of the hot topics this year in China.


Source => TechWeb

The next version of WeChat will bring the two big impact.

Tencent WeChat team is now just preparing the next version of WeChat, and the some screenshot of them was leaked. Looking them, I think that this version will bring the two big impacts to users.

1. Linkage function with EC site.

WeChat already has the function of scanning the QR code, but they will add the function of scanning the bar code. Users can directly go to the EC site to check the price of the product that they scanned via this function.

As far as looking the above picture, this function will support Amazon China and Dangdang at this time. But Tencent also has their own EC site, so they maybe add the linkage function with it till the public version.

Social Ecommerce is a trend of this year in China, and the alliance of Sina Weibo and Alibaba also should head for realization of this, but it follows that WeChat will preempt to them.


2. Changing the display method of official accounts.

In the current version, the official accounts are independently displayed on Chat page. But from the next version, these official accounts will be displayed all in one piece as the menu of "Official account".

I think that it will be a big impact for marketer of WeChat. Because There is all the difference directly displayed in the top page and needed one more click.

As I explained before, Tencent WeChat team doesn't want users to use WeChat as a marketing tool. So this may be a one of step for it.



Other function will also be added to the new version of WeChat, but there is less impact than two things above.

I think that it may be high time to re-consider the method of using WeChat as a business tool.


Source => TechWeb, 36kr, Netease Mobile

VP of WeChat said "Official Account Admin Platform" is not a marketing platform. What is its intention?

As you know, many companies and organization have used WeChat as a marketing tool to develop or extend Chinese market. And they have already registered the official account on "WeChat Official Account Admin Platform (WOAAP) ".

According to Tencent,  there are hundreds of thousands of official accounts in WOAAP. And there are 30,000 accounts who already got the "V" mark, and 70% of them are the corporate user.


In this situation, in an event, VP of Wechat "Ceng Ming" said that WOAAP is not a marketing platform. What is this intention?

He mainly pointed out the two things.

1. Too much sales information will exhaust the WeChat user.
There is the limitation that the official accounts on WOAAP can post one information in a day, and "V" marked accounts can post two information in a day too. This limitation exists for not let WeChat users be tired of  a large amount of sales information.

As I explained before, they started cleaning up the fallacious official accounts, it also may be related to this.

2. WeChat as a social CRM tool.
Ceng Ming said that WeChat is suitable for managing users, communicating with users and providing customized services to users. He said it is like a social CRM tool.

As an example, he introduced the case study of China Southern Airlines.

As I explained before, China Southern Airline has leveraged WeChat to reply automatically the flight information, the weather in the each place and so forth to their users. Additionally, users can reserve their seat via WeChat now.


Actually, the leading actor is the user of WOAAP, so it's free to use WeChat as a marketing tool. But Tencent recognizes that WOAAP is not a marketing platform, so it may be difficult to expect the marketing feature addition in future.

But api of WOAAP is published on their site, so it may be able to expect that third party vendor develop the tool for becoming convenient for marketing on WeChat.


Source => Sina Tech, DF Daily

"Wifiin" can manage accessing each Wifi services that different careers provide. It is a very useful mobile app for travelers and sojourners in China.

In China, 3 big careers (China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom) provide each different Wifi service such as CMCC or ChinaNet. And these users has to authenticate by their mobile phone number to use these each service. Furthermore, this service is not mutual use.
Ex) China Mobile user cannot use the service that is provided by China Unicom and China Telcom.

It is a little bit inconvenient for travelers and sojourners in China.

But "Wifiin" can solve this problem.

This app can be downloaded from here, and the user basically can use it without charge. And this app supports Android smartphone/ tablet (2.3 or later), iPad, jailbroken iPhone and Windows phone.
* This app doesn't support normal iPhone and Windows 8 at this time.

The utilization of this app is very simple. When first boot this app, you can get 100 points. 100 points means that user can use each Wifi service for 100 minutes via this app.

Next you have to click the wifi button in the lower side of the screen to search the available Wifi service.

Blue colored points mean that its service is available. All that's left is to click that button.

After you will use all of this 100 points, of course you can charge additional points. There are two methods to charge this point as follows.

1. Download the recommended app.

 

You have only to download the recommended apps for charging this point. The points that you can get is different by each app (40 to 100 points).


2. Buy points

If you are a heavy mobile internet user, of course, you can buy the additional point by cash. Basically its price is 0.05 RMB per a minute, so it can be said that it is very reasonable.


I think that this business model itself is making sense. Because this app can solve the problem that travelers and sojourners in China have. Furthermore, the provider of this app can get the ad revenue from the app developers who want to increase the number of downloads. Of course, they can also get the cash revenue from the heavy mobile internet users.



The sole concern is an interruption or impediment from each careers. Because this app has the possibility to decrease the service revenue of each career.

I wish that this provider of this app will reach an understanding with each career. :)


Source => The official page of Wifiin, TechWom

Chinese monthly social media information sharing ranking: Sina Weibo gained the top position for the first time.

Jiathis who is providing the social distribution tools published the new monthly report as of May 2013.

                                        Share         Click Rate

#1  Sina Weibo           17.86%        26.84%

#2  Qzone                    16.51%        31.27%

#3  WeChat                 16.36%          0.02%

#4  Tencent Weibo       6.42%        11.31%

#5  Renren                     6.25%          1.98%

........

Sina Weibo gained the top position this month for the first time, but Qzone(It's the SNS that is provided by Tencent)  downgraded to the second place. WeChat gained the third position as same as last month, but its "click rate" is still very low.

It seems that the very low click rate of WeChat is caused to the property of themselves. Because the posts by official accounts and the posts in the "Moments" don't display the web URL as a link, and users cannot directly click it to access the web site.

 

So when we use WeChat as a marketing tool, we must not expect increasing the access on our website, we have to share the all of information only in the WeChat.

At this time, it can be said that Sina Weibo, Qzone and WeChat are the top 3 as the information sharing platform, but we have to continue watching the trend as ever.

Source => Jiathis