Having Fun with WeChat! Current features explained

This post is an additional focus to a previous post on the Chinese application WeChat.

The “Look Around” feature shows all the people or businesses that are close to you, those people are ranked according to the shortest distances from the user. This localization service is also free.

“Shake” your phone to search for people nearby is a feature offered by WeChat. This makes adding each other contacts much more easy and funny (phone on the right of the illustration).

The “Drift Bottle” consists on writing a message or talk, then put the message in a virtual bottle, and finally, throw it to the virtual sea. Soon or later a random person will take the bottle with your message: the user can decide to reply to you or add you in her/his contact list (phone on the center of the illustration).

Another WeChat application called “WeChat Fun” consists in recording short voice message and change the style of the voice for fun: toilet, rap, ET… New versions include more choice. You can add this application to WeChat.

Fun with WeChat

After the launch of a new version, we can expect more in the months to come Tencent will accelerate global expansion and monetization of the service through virtual goods, micro payments, and marketing campaigns (using among other elements the customized QR code).

Marketing WeChat in Taiwan – Global Expansion continues

Expansion of Chinese Internet outside mainland China goes on! The rate of growth of WeChat is currently higher than Facebook.

In October 2012, Tencent launched WeChat in Taiwan: Tencent hired “Show Lo” and “Rainie Yang”, two local popular stars, to produce the following ad:

@value2020 Video for official WeChat Taiwan launch – https://value2020.wordpress.com/

After India, Thailand, Vietnam, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, and now Taiwan, which country is the next one on the list?

e-Commerce: China & the USA on the ring

Alibaba from China, Amazon from the USA, Rakuten from Japan are dominant players in the world of e-Commerce.

Alibaba is growing very fast but the group with a revenue of $1 billion in 2011 is still small compared to Amazon Inc. Revenue of the American company reached $48 billion in 2001: +41% growth year on year.

However, with the current situation, we can expect Alibaba generating more sales than Amazon from year 2017.

Amazon has a few points of market share in China. The leader is Tmall, a site from Alibaba. The second player is 360buy (less than half the sales of Tmall). Suning, Dangdang and the other players are less dominant.

@value2020 American & Chinese eCommerce – October 2012 – https://value2020.wordpress.com/

In October 2012, while Amazon launched a page to sell wines, 360buy launched an English version of its website. This is part of the strategy of Chinese firms to expand outside of China.

Traditional retail companies are focusing on increasing online sales. With $4.9 billion, online sales of Walmart represented 10% of Amazon revenue.

The digital strategy is crucial to marketing strategy to reach potential buyers. A focus on main players is essential.

-Search engine: Google, Baidu

-Social media: Twitter, Facebook, Qzone, Sinaweibo, Youtube

If the marketing budget is enough large, you can target also the relevant other players for your brand. If you target China, Qihoo is getting attention from users right now.

It will be interesting to see the path of Tencent and Baidu in the world of e-commerce. They have powerful marketing tools with WeChat (Weixin) and Baidu analytics and advertising.

Sources:

Alibaba Group, URL: http://img.alibaba.com/images/cms/upload/alibaba_group/about_alibaba/b2b_releases/20120221_alibaba_announces_2011_q4_and_fy_results_eng.pdf

Amazon.com, URL: http://www.amazon.com/b?ie=UTF8&node=2983386011

Scanner Feature of WeChat: Likely a Master Piece of the Strategy for Mobile Commerce

We believe the scanner is not included just to add friends but for much more.

Today you can scan QR codes only. If Tencent decides to invest or find a partner, tomorrow, you will be able to scan 1D code as well.

Being able to scan 1D codes opens the application to products and therefore mobile commerce.

Will Alibaba or Amazon sign a deal with Tencent WeChat?

Qihoo became the second search engine in China

In only a few months after the launch, in October, Qihoo became the second search engine in China.

Baidu is still dominant with a market share of 73%. Sogou is third and Google fourth.

Bing (Microsoft) and Yahoo are really behind with a market share of 0.5% and 0.2%¨.

Social Media: Best and Mainstream American and Chinese Services & Apps!

Social Media Landscape in the USA and in China.

Please feel free to comment and to share!

Thank you

@value2020 Social Media in the USA and China

October 2012: Social Sharing

Tencent, with Qzone and TencentWeibo, is still leading social interactions in China.

Mobile and social applications are on the rise: for example, WeiXin (WeChat) from Tencent and FeiXin from China Mobile.

Compared to September, KaiXin is stronger than RenRen.

Who has read this blog?

Country of origin