Focus on China’s most popular app: WeChat
What is WeChat?
Developped by Pony Ma’s Tencent and launched in 2011, WeChat (or Weixin 微信) is a messaging application and is definitely the most popular app among Chinese customers.
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A swift evolution
Only one year after its launch, Weixin set to hit the international market and changed its name for WeChat for other countries than China.
In July 2014, nearly 70% of the company’s earnings already came from mobile ad sales.
That same year, it was decided only accounts with more than 100,000 followers could push advertising on WeChat.
WeChat users spent more than than 40 min on the application every day in 2015.
August 2015 mark the moment when total number of active users exceeded 600 million, of which 70 million are based in other countries, amongst WeChat’s billion accounts.
McDonald’s was the first large company to start doing e-commerce on the application. Nowadays, you can find loads of companies – big and small, of many sectors – who offer their products and services on WeChat.
Buying McDonalds products directly on WeChat
What is WeChat from NewSoulProjects on Vimeo.
Which functionalities are available on WeChat?
Instant messages
WeChat users can exchange messages (text and audio) and a live chat is also available. They can also send pictures, videos, money or even their GPS location through the app. The latter can be sent to a brand’s account, and it will automatically show the user where to find this brand’s shops in the nearest area.
A user shares his current GPS location.
Moments
Moments is a newsfeed where users post content, which can be liked or commented.
A user’s own Moments page.
Public accounts
Brands are allowed to create a public account; there are different types of accounts : enterprise, service or subscription accounts. They will then be able to push content to their followers. There were 8 million public accounts in 2014.
Subscription accounts will be visible to all followers in a dedicated folder and are able to send one message per day.
Service accounts’ posts will be visible among their follower’s main thread and they can send up to 4 messages per month.
Enterprise account’s news will not be in a specific folder either, but only visible to invited users, to which they can send unlimited messages.
Starbuck’s public account
All accounts are entitled to have a navigation menu and allowed to provide e-commerce solutions, except for subscription accounts which does not have access to this business option.
Wallet
This feature allows Wechat users to transfer money from and to their Wallet thanks to a UnionPay bank card. The possible actions linked to this Wallet are very diverse: you can pay your bills, send money to friends, book a cab or buy group discounts for example.
Send money from and to your WeChat Wallet
KOLs on WeChat
Digital marketing strategies in China heavily rely on Key Opinion Leaders because they are generally followed by a massive and devoted audience.
Angelababy, a KOL in fashion/beauty
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Wechat get 93% of penetration rate in Big city Shanghai & Beijing, huge no?
Yes Nicolas, it is Huge.
But it does not surprised me, everybody has wechat in China