The battle in the lunar new year greetings of the big three social media services in China. (QQ/ WeChat/ Sina Weibo)

This year, from Jan 31 to Feb 6th is the lunar new year holiday in China. And by the old calender, Jan 31 was the new year's day, and Jan 30 was the new year's eve of this year. Recently the person who send and receive the greetings of new year on the social media is rapidly increasing in China as I explained before.

Chinese big three social media service, QQ, WeChat, Sina Weibo published the announcement that is related with the new year's greetings as follows.

1. QQ (Tencent)

According to the official announcement, there were 13.6 billion messages in Jan 30th on QQ platform. And in a peak time, there were 32.7 million messages in 1 minute, and they also said that there were 16 million video messages in 1 day.


2. WeChat (Tencent)

According to the official announcement, in a peak time, there were about 10 million messages on WeChat. They didn't publish the total message number of Jan 30th, but they said that its total sending message number were double of the last year, and its total receiving message number were three times of the last year.

And they also said the peak time of exchanging messages were 22:00 and 24:00 on Jan 30th.


3. Sina Weibo (Sina)

According to the official announcement, there were 863,408 messages on the first one minute of Jan 31. They also didn't publish the total messages number, but there were 729,751 message at the same period of the last year, so it can be said its number was increasing.


Well, by looking only this result, QQ is the king. And the next is WeChat, and Sina Weibo was far away from them. But this result was based of new year greetings.

In general, the new year greetings are exchanged between the family, friends and the acquaintance. I think that the social media services can categorize two types by the point of their characteristic view.

Those are "social media service that directed inward" and "social media service that directed outward". Users mainly exchange the personal information between the close relationship in the "social media service that directed inward", and its typical example is Facebook.

On the other hand, user would like to spread their information to unknown people such as the purpose of personal branding in the "social media service that directed outward", and its typical example is Twitter.

And I think that QQ and WeChat is the "social media service that directed inward", and Sina Weibo is the "social media service that directed outward". So I think that Sina Weibo does not have to be pessimistic about this result. If the standard is different, its result also will be different.

But Sina Weibo is recently said that their total users or active users are decreasing.  I think, in the peak period of their growth( it is in 2011) , the users who like the "social media service that directed inward" also joined Sina Weibo, because their friend or acquaintance also use Sina Weibo. And recently, mainly such user was gone or stop to use Sina Weibo, I think.

So I think that Sina Weibo have to care the users who like the "social media service that directed outward", and at the same time, they have to decide how treat the users who like the "social media service that directed inward".


Last, I would like to introduce the status of SMS messages.

SMS has been the most popular method of exchanging the new year greeting in China for a long time. But as I explained before, its number is recently decreasing year by year.

Its number is estimated 30 billion messages during this Chinese new year's holiday, but its number will be decreasing 1.17 billion messages compared with the last year. Mainly almost young people, 80's or 90's, like to use QQ or WeChat when they will sent such greetings, so I think this trend also continue in future.


Many users sometimes have the different two intention in their mind, such as "social media service that directed inward" and "social media service that directed outward". When many users get tires of the "social media service that directed inward", then they tend to move to the "social media service that directed outward". And the reverse pattern is also true.

Now WeChat is the most powerful social media service in China, and it can be said that WeChat is the "social media service that directed inward". So I think the "social media service that directed outward" may come to the fore as a next trend of WeChat.


Souece => Social Media in China blog (Japanese version)

Two things that Sina Weibo have the problem.

Sina published the performance reporting in the second quarter yesterday, and some number of Sina Weibo also became clear with this.

The total revenue of Sina Weibo was about 37.7 million USD in the second quarter, and it increased 46.1% compared to the last quarter. Among the revenue, the advertising revenue was 30 million USD, and the service revenue was 7.7 million USD.

About the advertising revenue increased more than 50% compared to the last quarter, but the service revenue was slight increase.

According to the annual reporting in 2012, 77% of Sina Weibo revenue was earned from the advertising revenue, other 23% of revenue was earned from service revenue.
But the rate of the advertising revenue in this quarter was about 85.7%, so it can be said that their dependence on the advertising revenue is more and more running high.

I think that this dependence (in other words 'bias') is the first problem for Sina Weibo, and I think that they have to strengthen other revenue more, such as the collaboration with Alibaba (It means "Social Commerce").


The second problem is the low rate of active users.

They announced that their daily active users were 54 million people, but their total registered user was over than 500 million people. It means that the rate of daily active users was only about 10%.

According to the news, the recent daily active user of Facebook was 699 million people. Compared to them, it can be said that the daily active users rate of Sina Weibo is very low.

Increasing the rate of active users have been the long term problem for Sina Weibo, but it can be said that it is still midway.


According to the news, PifferJaffray recently estimated that the market value of Sina Weibo is 6 billion USD, but this number is more than the value when Alibaba acquired 18% share of Sina Weibo in 586 million USD. And according to the some resources, Sina Weibo intends to list stocks independently in the future.


We have to keep watching whether their plan will achieve or not as ever.


Source => TechWeb, Sina Tech

A report said that 13.4% of the WeChat user already canceled to follow the official accounts. Why...?

Sootoo published the report that was written about the user activities on WeChat before, but they also published another interesting report that was written about user analytics at this time.

1. How did you get to know the official account?

#1 Already know on the other platform and so forth    55.7%
#2 QR code    39.1%
#3 Recommendation from the other person  36.2%
#4 Advertisement   27.4%
#5 Search   16.4%

Other   2.9%

About QR code, it has to put on somewhere like the official site or Weibo, so it can be said that this can categorize getting from "other site".


2. What is the purpose that you have followed the official accounts?

#1  For getting the special benefit or information    34.3%

#2  For paying attention to the hot topic or news   26.3%

#3  For the hobby or killing time   22.8%

#4  For the personnel exchange   14.4%

Other   2.2%




3. What type of the official account have you followed?

#1  News    65.5%

#2  Comedy   37.3%

#3  Science and technology   30+％

#5  Analects    17.1%

#9  Travel and traffic   10.3％

Some big news site, such Tencent or Sohu, also have provided the official account on WeChat, but more than 65% users have interest to them as a result.


4. How often read the information from the official accounts?

#1  Occasionally read   42.3％

#2  Frequently read   24.7%

#3  Canceld the follow   13.4%

#4  Already known   12.5%

#5  Unknown   7.1%



13.4% of the WeChat user already canceled to follow the official accounts, but the next graph explained why they already canceled it.

The first reason of it is that the all of the posts were spam or advertising (56.2%), and the second reason is that the posts were worthless information (53.0%).

Tencent would like to avoid that the official accounts use WeChat as a marketing platform, but it follows that the user side also wouldn't like to read the such posts.


As I explained before, WeChat for iOS was updated to the newest version "5.0", but Android version was also updated the last week. And as I explained before, the display method of the official account was already changed.

   


Anyway, we have to read the changing of the official account policy among with this again, and we may have to rebuild the strategy or activity of marketing on WeChat.


Source => Sootoo research center

CNNIC Report : Social media services in China was not so much high rate growth this time.

Last time, I introduced the summary of Chinese internet users situation as of June 2013, but I would like to introduce the usage situation of each internet service this time.

At first, this graph is the usage situation of all internet users by each service.

There isn't a huge change as a whole, but "Group Buying (21.2%)", "Travel Booking (18.7%)" and "Online News (17.5%)" got the high increase rate.

Social media services (Instant Messenger, Weibo and SNS) was not so much high rate increase, but Instant Messenger will be likely to reach 500 million users soon.


Next graph is the usage situation of mobile internet users by each service.

Instant messenger still keep the top position, and its utilization rate was 85.7%. Online news also got the high rate increase by the mobile internet users, but its largest mobile client "Sohu" got 100 million times downloads as of April.

Mobile payment and mobile shopping also got the high rate increase compared to other services, but Weibo and WeChat also started their own both services, so its growth will be expected to accelerate without a break.


Anyway, as far as reading this report, the power of mobile internet looks like continue for a while in China, and it looks like still 'Blue Ocean'.

Let's keep watching the trend or new movement in this market as before.


Source => CNNIC

The rule of WeChat official account will be changed. Tencent emphasized that WeChat is not a marketing tool again.

As I explained last time, Tencent held a partner conference on July 3. And I explained that oversea users of WeChat already exceeded 70 million people. And today, I would like to explain another important thing related WeChat.

At that conference, there was a session related to official accounts of WeChat, they announced that changing the rule of WeChat official accounts.

I explained before that the display method of official accounts will be changed in the next version of WeChat. And in addition to this, they announced that official accounts will be categorized two types as follows.

1. 订阅号 (Subscription accounts)
2. 服务号 (Service accounts)

According to their explanation, "Subscription accounts" can post one message in a day, but its message is not displayed in the top page of WeChat as I explained before. And "Service accounts" can post only one message in a month, but its message is still displayed in the top page of WeChat as same as the current version.

Now it's not clear that the existing official accounts will be categorized which type. But some resource said that the official accounts of media (News and so forth) will be categorized as a "Subscription accounts", and other official accounts will be categorized as a "Service accounts"...

It's not clear that this definition of categorization is true or not at this time, but anyhow, the effect of marketing on WeChat will become much less than now.


VP of WeChat said "WeChat is not a marketing tool, it's like a Social CRM tool" before, but it can be said that this message is gradually embodied. So we have to prepare the action for this trend, and we have to reconsider social marketing method in China.


Source => Tech QQ, Ifeng Net

WeChat and Weibo both are mainly accessed from mobile devices.

A data research company "DRATIO" published a research report of social media in China.

This report is written about the comparison of Sina Weibo and WeChat user, and there are some interesting trend. So I will explain the summary of this report.


1. Do you use Weibo or WeChat or both?

Weibo only     20.6%

WeChat only  22.4%

Both   57.0%







The over half of users use both services, but there is an interesting trend by the below picture that was categorized by age.

Only using Weibo users has turned out that the older ages have the higher rate, but I think that old users maybe use QQ as a communication tool instead of WeChat.


2. In the recent one month, how often did you use each service?

The highest utilization rate of WeChat is over 4 times in a day, and the highest utilization rate of Weibo is 3 to 4 times in a week.


3. How many hours do you averagely use each service in a day?

Less than 30 minutes is the highest rate of Weibo user's using hours, and 30 to 60 minutes is the highest rate of WeChat user's using hours.

The users who are using WeChat more than 4 hours exist 13.4%, so it seems that the using time of WeChat is relatively longer than using Weibo.


4. Which devices do you usually use for each service?

Mobile access is the most popular method of usage of both services, but this is a natural thing. Because as I explained before, mobile device already became the top of all method connecting to the internet in China. Furthermore, Tencent defines WeChat as a mobile communication tool, and Sina said that their more than 60% users have used mobile devices to access Sina Weibo.


5. Where do you usually use each service?

#1   at home
#2   at office
#3   at transportation facilities
#4   at public place
#5   at outside
#6   at lodgings
#7   at classroom
#8   other




As a result, more than 80% users have used each service at home. And it is a characteristic thing that using each service 'at office' is more than 'at transportation facilities'.


6. Which feature do you usually use on each service?

Though it's a natural thing, 82.5% of WeChat users usually use chat feature on it. And the characteristic thing is that very few users use the social feature of WeChat compared to Weibo. I think this is one of the most important fact when we would like to utilize each service for our business.


For capturing Chinese social media market, it is a very important thing that compares Weibo and WeChat, and understanding deeply each property. So I would like to continue introducing that point of view in future too.


Source => DRATIO

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

WeChat formally entered into the Indian market. They already started the TV commercial.

As I reported before, there is a certain number of WeChat users in India, but WeChat formally entered into the Indian market to expand its users a few days ago.

Tencent held an opening event in Mumbai, and they announced that a lot of Indian companies already made the official accounts on WeChat for their marketing activity.


And Tencent already started the TV commercial in India as follows:

Tencent nominated Mr. Varun Dhawan and Ms. Parineeti Chopra as the image character of WeChat in India, and they appeared on the above commercial, and also attended the opening event.

As they referred in that commercial, it seems that Tencent will mainly promote the voice chat feature "Hold-to-Talk" in India.


According to the presentation by WeAreSocial, social media users in India were 60,545,120 people as of November 2011.

Its penetration was only 5% now, but its growth rate is 52% in a year.
And according to the other source, the number of mobile users in India is now 862.62 million people, but the rate of 3G user is only 10%.


But in a sense, it can be said that a low penetration is a big chance for frontiers. WeChat already totally have almost 400 million users and 50 million overseas users now.

India may become the key place for them.


Source => PCONLINE,  thinkdigit, indiatimes

Two-thirds people login to a social media everyday in China, but there are only 3% people who are truly in difficulties that if they can't use any social media.

Chinese portal site "Sootoo" provided a interesting report as follows.

Q1. How often do you login to a social media service?

Several times a day     : 51.95%
        Once a day             : 15.06%
Several times a week  : 20.26%
       Once a week           : 3.90%
Less than once a week: 8.83%





This report said that about two-thirds people in China login to an any social media everyday. According to the latest report by CNNIC, many people use a any social media in China. So it can be said that this report followed up the credibility.


Q2. How long times use a social media in a day?

Less than one hour : 39.74%

1 to 2 hours: 40.00%

2 to 4 hours: 17.92%

More than 4 hours : 2.34%





This report said that almost 80% people use a social media less than 2 hours in a day.


Q3. Which social media services do you usually use?

Qzone  : 80.86%
Sina Weibo :  78.72%
Renren : 71.43%
Tencent Weibo :  60.45%
WeChat :  51.83%
Pengyou : 11.45%
Douban :  10.04%
Facebook :  5.45%
Kaixin :  4.96%
Other :  4.05%



This result is very interesting. I thought that the ranking of WeChat is higher than Tencent Weibo, but the result was different at this time.
And other unexpected thing is that the utilization rate of Renren was higher than my expect. Actually, Renren is the biggest SNS provider in China, but the interests of Chinese people is moving from SNS to Weibo or WeChat in few years. So its result is unexpected, and the big difference of RenRen and Kaixin's utilization rate was also unexpected.


4. Which purpose do you use a social media?

To contact with friends : 74.03%
To watch the video or post : 72.99%
To kill time :  63.12%
For hobby :  59.22%
To watch the hot topic :  54.55%
To post own mind :  45.06%
To expand personal connections :  38.70%
To enjoy games :  22.75%
To enjoy apps : 21.56%
To send a gift :  20.38%
For business :  15.58%
To join a event :  10.90%
Other :  0.95%

The answer of enjoying games or apps was lower than my expect. Sina Weibo have provided many games on their platform for a long time, and WeChat also have a plan to provide games on their platform as same as LINE...


Q5. Which devices do you usually use when you login a social media?

Mobile phone :  81.18%

PC :  69.35%

Tablet :  25.81%

Other :  11.83%





As I reported before, mobile devices is already the most popular method to access the internet in China. As a result, it follows that this fact also apply to in case of social media.


Q6. Why did you start using a social media?

Own thoughts :  23.65%
By the recommendation of friends : 26.35%
Many friend already use it :  45.95%
Can contact easily with friends :  43.92%
To expand personal connections :  8.11%
To get the information :  18.24%

Other :  4%


This result said that the almost half people started a social media by the reason related with friends.


Q7. If you weren't able to use a social media, how will you feel?

It's very inconvenient and unacceptable :  3%
Feeling not good, but acceptable : 51%
Feeling nothing at first, but feeling inconvenient not good later :  23%
Already not using it for a long time, so feeling nothing :  18%
Other :  5%

As mentioned in the introduction, two-thirds people use a social media everyday in China. But there are only 3% people who will be truly in trouble with not to use a social media. It's also an unexpected result.


Well, I'm very interested in this result, and furthermore I also would like to look the result in other countries :)


Source : Sootoo

Tencent updated the login page of WeChat public platform and the case studies.

As I explained before, WeChat have a management platform(PPoW) for the official accounts, but recently its login page was updated as follows.

Last time, I explained that the oversea users of WeChat already exceeded 40 million people, but the image of this login page looks like to suggest that Tencent will accelerate overseas advance.

There is no update in the page of after login at this time. But there are some new features compared to my last explanation, so I would like to explain them.

As the above picture, the feature of "Advanced Settings" was added the right end of menu. And on the "Advanced Settings", users can manage auto reply feature and customize the menu of display screen of WeChat. And users can also demand to become its developer to refer the APIs of WeChat PPoW.


And at the same time, the case studies on this page was also updated.

They introduce 5 case studies on there, and China Southern Airline leverages WeChat to reply automatically the flight information, the weather in the each place and so forth to their users.

And Evernote is also leveraging WeChat, they makes WeChat user easily share the information in WeChat to each Evernote accounts.


Recently, the official account on WeChat is more and more increasing, but I would like to continue introducing the interesting case studies as ever.


Source => Public Platform of WeChat(PPoW)

Oversea users of WeChat already exceeded 40 million people. They also published the translation page to accelerate localization to each languages.

WeChat already started to make inroads into foreign markets. And as I explained before, a lot of countries started to use their WeChat.

And recently, they announced that oversea users of WeChat already exceeded 40 million people. According to the news, the whole number of WeChat users were 312 million people, so it follows that the rate of oversea users are about 13%.

According to the news, their rival, LINE, have over 60 million users in foreign country, so it can be said that WeChat lags behind to LINE at the moment.

But they also published the translation page to accelerate localization to each languages.

Actually, this is a volunteer based efforts by frenetic their fans. WeChat team said:

WeChat is looking for help from our users around the world to improve localization in the app. You can help us with your expertise in Arabic, Hebrew, Hindi, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Malaysian, Polish, Russian, Spanish, Thai, Turkish, Vietnamese, or one of many more languages we support.

Volunteers can login to this page by Facebook or Google account. And after login, we can find the English sentence that WeChat team would like us to translate.

I tried to translate from English to Japanese :)

Each services or products should have many frenetic fans, so I think this is very interesting efforts. Would you try this?

Well, I think that we have to keep watching the two things about WeChat as ever. One of them is "WeChat will be changed to the paid service?", and another one is this "overseas deployment". Let's keep watching.

Source => TechWeb

China Telecom will change the name and upgrade their chat tool. They will challenge to WeChat with Netease together.

The topic that "WeChat will be changed to the paid service?" is still ongoing.

Tencent CEO Ma recently denied this rumor again, but the general manager of MIIT Mr. Miao said in a event that it's make sense that careers will charge special fee to WeChat.

In this situation, there was a little bit related action. According to the some source, China Telecom will change the name and upgrade their chat tool "Yi Liao", and they will challenge to WeChat with Netease.

Both companies still does not formally announce about this rumor, but the picture of new chat tool "Yi Xin" is already laid bare.

At this time, it's not so important whether China Telecom can defeat WeChat or not, I think. Important things is that China Telecom will re-release their chat tool that is similar to WeChat. I think this is the evidence that China Telecom decided to confront with WeChat.

Actually, their new chat tool is not a OTT product, but is a SMS based product. And the user account is related with their mobile phone number. But it's not so big impact for users, because there is not so difference between the feature of both products.

So I think the possibility that China Telecom will charge special fee to WeChat is increasing. Well, how about China Mobile or China Unicom? They also each have their own chat tool.

We have to keep attention to what will become this answer.


Source => TechWeb, 365jia

CIC published "China Social Media Landscape 2013".

CIC published also "China Social Media Landscape 2012" last February, but its new version is available now!

This picture categorized Chinese social media service in 24 items, and in the inside circle, it is set the typical social media service in the worldwide. So this picture is much helpful to understand the summary of Chinese social media market.

This version was 4 new items were added. Those categories are "Mobile Social", "Photo Sharing", "Social TV" and "Social Search".
About "Mobile Social", WeChat and Wangxin(Taobao) are categorized in it. And about "Photo Sharing", Tuitu and Lomokr are categorized in it.



CIC also published the history from 2008 to 2012 of this picture as follows.

 

 


It's also fun to watch the change in Chinese social media market :)


Source => CIC