In terms of monthly users, Weibo is the second largest Chinese social media platform after WeChat. However, unlike WeChat, it is still primarily PC based. Weibo is one of the most powerful marketing tools in China offering wide range of possibilities for reaching people across various demographics and psychographics.

Weibo offers to marketers a powerful Weibo Index tool to learn more about what platform users are searching for. Compared to previously covered Baidu and Qihoo tools, it is structured in sig
nificantly different way allowing generating other types of data.

It is important to note that social media platforms like Weibo could be quite similar to search engines in many ways. Platform users search for terms in a similar way as they do using Baidu or Qihoo. This allows Weibo to generate wealth of information that could be indispensable for marketers looking to customize their message for this particular audience.

Weibo Index into four main tabs: historic keyword trends, real time trends, geographical interpretation and user attributes analysis.

Let’s examine what Weibo Index shows for the same keyword we used for Baidu and Qihoo tools covered earlier.

The first graph shows search volumes for a keyword on PC and mobile. It is quite clear that there is a certain correlation with the search results we have seen with the search engines: both types of data show a sharp peak in the second half of March:

Looking at both PC based and mobile searches reveals the fact that most searches have been done from mobile Weibo app rather than PC based website:

Next tab displays search volumes in the past 24 hours. Here, peaks occur in different times compared to results from the search engines. Apparently, Weibo searches for iPhone 8 have peaked at around noon and then again at 23:00:

Such information can be particularly useful for social media marketing. It can allow marketers to figure out optimal timing for posts to receive maximum exposure on the network. In fact, the data can even be reduced down to an hour level in order to identify search volumes of every single minute within a particular hour!

The location tab shows geographic distribution of the searches:

Here the situation is also a bit different from the results we have seen with Baidu and Qihoo. It seems that people in Hebei and Zhejiang provinces were the ones most interested in iPhone 8.

Last tab, audience attributes, shows even less correlation with the search engines data for this particular term. This time, women represented the vast majority of the audience (80%) vs. only 20% of men. Also, the audience is significantly much younger on Weibo: most people searching for iPhone 8 were between ages 19-24.

This information could lead to a different approach for marketing this specific product. On Weibo, marketers could be tailoring the ad to a largely young female audience while Baidu and Qihoo ads should cater to older male crowd. Optimizing marketing approach across different platforms would be much more difficult without having such data.

Last section of the audience attributes tab relates to user persona that seems quite irrelevant for this particular keyword. Also, Weibo shows the data on zodiac signs of the users searching for a particular term:

Apparently, Libra born users were more active in their search for iPhone 8. Why was that the case? I guess we will never know.

In any case, Weibo seems to be the only network out there that enables marketers to incorporate astrology into their marketing…

Continue to WeChat Index tutorial >>>

Here are our tutorials on China keyword research tools:

Keyword research on Baidu: Baidu Index

Keyword research on Qihoo: Qihoo Index

Keyword research on Weibo: Weibo Index

Keyword research on WeChat: WeChat Index

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There are considerable challenges in achieving success in the mobile apps market. Those have to do with launching and promoting an app in the right store, figuring out monetization model that works and is sustainable, overcoming China-specific technical challenges and, finally, making sure that your product is not easily copied by a competitor.

Here is the list of 10 most important factors to consider before venturing into China’s mobile apps market:

The right mobile OS

Thanks to the low cost of entry level smartphones in China, two out of three users are on Android system which makes it the one to target first. iOS still represents about one third of the total market but Android will certainly continue to dominate China in the near future. Windows phones didn’t get much traction in China yet, while Blackberry and Nokia’s Symbian systems being even less relevant.

Fragmentation of Android apps market

There are literally hundreds of Android mobile stores, each focusing on a specific niche, demographics or geographic region. Understanding complex Android ecosystem is crucial to launching your app in the right store. Simply applying to all or most of them is not an option because each store has its own QA and approval process as well as billing system. The best strategy is to focus on the top 5 stores and monitor the performance of each of them. The most popular Android independent stores in China include AppChina, Anzhi, Gfan, Hiapk, Liqucn,Wandoujia, eoemarket, and 91Market (note that Google Play is not even in the top 20).

In addition, many large companies, such as China Mobile (largest mobile provider), Baidu (top search engine), QQ (popular messenger), as well as Huawei, Lenovo, Xiaomi etc., have their own store.

Mobile network speed

The speed of China’s mobile networks still lags behind Western countries, Japan or Korea. If your app is graphics-heavy making it loading slow, it will most likely be abandoned. If you are considering localizing an existing app for Chinese market, you need to make sure that it works fast enough on much slower network speed.

Hopefully, the ongoing development and introduction of 5G infrastructure will help alleviate this problem.

Social media integration

Another challenge of localization is the integration of the local social media channels. Your app won’t work in China (unless used with VPN) if signup or login options use Facebook or Twitter as those are inaccessible from the Mainland. Same goes for sharing and retweeting. If social media is essential for your app, make sure to integrate the most popular local platforms such as Sina and/or Tencent Weibo, YouKu or WeChat.

Cloud storage issue

Popular cloud storage services, such as Dropbox or Box.net, are often too slow or inaccessible from China. Out of popular Western services, only Microsoft Skydrive seems to be relatively stable at the moment. If cloud storage is required for your app’s functionality, consider using one of the local solutions, although they may not be as fast and convenient. 

Payment system

Local mobile-based payment services have won the war against any other payment method. Two of the most popular services are Alipay and WeChat Pay. Remember that Chinese use of credit cards is very limited as they seem to entirely skip the credit card era straight to the digital money world. Another popular payment system with mobile in-app purchases works directly through mobile carrier, such as China Telecom, China Unicom and China Mobile. This, however, require more complex integration of your app into their payment system, something that can’t be done without an experienced local partner company.

Everyone takes a cut

Apps stores fees range wildly, something to be taken into account when choosing the most suitable one as well. QQ for instance, takes up to 70% of an app’s revenue, while China Unicom takes 30%. In addition, each store has its own guidelines and procedures as well as its own government tax and banking rates. Note, that government tax and various regulation fees can easily reach up to 30% on top of the app store cut!

Piracy concerns

If your app is successful there is no question that it will be copied. All of the world’s most popular apps have local copycats. Partnering with a local partner that is familiar with the apps store ecosystem can also help ensure that the copycat apps are pulled from the store to be replaced by the official ones. On the other hand, if you are simply coming up with a concept for an app and it is a good one, such “partner” can simply appropriate it. Therefore, due diligence is paramount in choosing your local partner.

Monetization model

Purchasing apps outright has been in decline worldwide. In China, people are even less willing to pay for an app, no matter how insignificant the price would be. This means that more creative monetization strategies should be considered. One of them would be selling ads. Recently, BBC ran a story about Chinese mother who developed flash card app for their kids which is now supplementing her income by $1,000 every month from the ads alone.

Another model is based on in-app purchases. It makes more sense to give away an app for free to get users more familiar with it. Once, hopefully, they start liking it, they would be more willing to pay for extras. This model works well for games and chat apps.

Finally, premium model is another one to consider: user downloads an app with limited functionality but has to pay for more enhanced features.

Apps for brands

Finally, there is another type of apps that aims at building brand awareness or serves as a marketing tool to supplement and support offline or web-based sales. If your app doesn’t require payment system or complex integration with other services, it can be launched much more easily. Also, such app would not be in any danger of  being copied as it has no value of itself without the brand behind it.

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The biggest problem with email marketing in general and China email marketing in particular is, of course, spam. Most countries around the world have introduced laws and regulations designed to limit amount of spam by specifying requirements to emails and imposing various degrees of penalties for violators. For example, federal anti-spam legislation CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 requires proper opt-out link to be included in a promotional mail, valid “from” email and a clear “subject” line.

The Chinese equivalent anti-spam legislation is called “Regulations On Internet Email Services” and is, by far, more complex and severe compared to its US equivalent. This law applies to emails sent to all Chinese residents and, at least in theory, covers users who happened to receive emails while in Chinese territory.

Your China email marketing checklist

Here is the brief summary of the requirements to a promotional email according to the law:

Verifiable Permission.

Chinese law requires recipient’s explicit permission to be given in order to include an email to a mass mailing list. Unsubscribe or opt-out option is not enough. The permission has to be verifiable and stored indefinitely in case of an audit;

Word “Ad” in subject line.

Either English “Ad” for English language emails or the equivalent Chinese word for “advertisement” is required in the subject line;

Content requirements.

Chinese promotional email definition is much broader than the one of CAN-SPAM Act and includes all kinds of messages containing any type of advertisement;

Downloadable content requirements.

If a message contains any links to external content, such as a piece of software or an app, the law requires a written guarantee that they do not contain any spyware or anything that can facilitate hackers. It is not clear whether this applies to downloadable graphics such as images or thumbnail icons;

Content restrictions.

Article 57 of the Regulations on Telecommunications stipulates the content of the allowable email which is purposefully left quite vague. There are thousands of words and topics that are currently banned and the list is very dynamic.  Politically sensitive topics are the obvious examples as well as everything that is deemed obscene or pornographic. It’s a good idea to refer to the list of blacklisted keywords before starting your China email marketing campaign.

According to the law, the penalty goes from 10,000 yuan  and up to 30,000 yuan per email in case the violation involves “unlawful proceeds”. The law doesn’t specify what such “unlawful proceeds” might mean.

So, considering such tight restrictions and severe penalties, why would anyone even entertain the idea of mass email marketing campaign in China? Well, here is the upside: so far, there have been no known or, at least, reasonably high profile cases of the actual application of the law or prosecuting any offenders. In fact, the law does little to help with the major spam problem that exists today in Chinese internet space.

Obviously, one has to be aware of the legal aspect of email marketing in China and continue following common practices such as including unsubscribe links, acquiring and growing email mailing lists by legitimate means and, of course, staying away from sensitive topics. Violating such rules can have your domain blacklisted risking completely blocking your company’s access to users in China. One should keep in mind that the famous China’s Great Firewall is notoriously effective and you don’t want to find yourself on the other side of it one day.

Talk to us about your next China email marketing campaign.

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On the other hand, many foreign brands, who want to jump in on WeChat, don’t realize that the platform comes with the number of limitations. While in some cases and if done right, WeChat marketing can be incredibly effective, in other cases the results can be quite disappointing.

5 Common Misconceptions about WeChat Marketing

#1 Followers will find you

Unlike other popular social networks, WeChat’s private nature makes discovery quite difficult. WeChat’s own search function only allows looking for an account containing the exact match to a specific word. Even with that, the search results are often inaccurate. There are only a few ways you can acquire a follower:

• Have them scan your QR code placed on other media (website, banner ad, print, billboard etc.);
• Have someone forward a link to your account on WeChat to their friends (essentially word of mouth);
• Having someone to post a nice comment about you in their feed (moments) with the link to your account (KOL);
• In-app advertising – more about it below;

Here is more about getting WeChat followers organically.

#2 No one else can use my brand

Many popular brands who are just getting around starting their WeChat marketing campaigns in China often find out that someone else is already using their brand name and logo. Once an account has been created by someone it can be quite hard to have WeChat remove it. However, ignoring the problem is not a good idea either.

If, following the complaint, the owner of “squatter” account is refusing to comply by changing their WeChat account’s name and logo, it is possible to file a complaint to Tencent by filing proper paperwork. To be successful, the legitimate brand owner has to prove their ownership of the trademark in China which is the whole new topic. More on registering trademarks in China can be found in one of my favorite resources online at China Law Blog.

#3 In-app mobile advertising within WeChat is effective

In fact, advertising within WeChat is notoriously ineffective while also extremely expensive. Click through rate (CTR) of such ads is usually quite low for a number of reasons. The main problem is that once clicked, the user than will be taken out of the app elsewhere, usually to a built-in WeChat browser. Since most people don’t casually browse WeChat but have some purpose while using it, they wouldn’t typically abandon their activity in the middle to be redirected elsewhere.

The ads within user’s Moments (WeChat’s version of feed), are also rarely relevant and are not displayed consistently. Here is my other post about the issues with WeChat advertising.

#4 Recycling of posts from my other social media channels will do just fine on WeChat

Although, it could be an effective strategy to reuse content from other social media channels or blogs for WeChat, the posts are often not optimized for this platform. For example, articles that are too long or those relying too much on the graphics may not render well on WeChat’s smartphone screen.

One of the keys for WeChat marketing is figuring out the posts format that is just right in both size and layout. The graphics should be clear enough while displayed as a thumbnail in multiple picture posts while not looking pixelized when extended to the full screen. That would require some tweaking and testing to get everything right.

Also, if there are external links, they should lead to properly responsive pages that are optimized for mobile.

#5 WeChat marketing allows accurate targeting

We wish that one was true. Unfortunately, it is quite difficult to segment WeChat marketing messages, which is also true for its advertising. On the most basic level, the followers can be segmented only by their location and gender. Even the location is based on whatever WeChat subscriber has set and not on the actual geolocation. Whenever a more granular approach is needed,  each individual follower can be tagged and grouped. This would allow sending more targeted messages to a specific audience.

Such segmentation can be either manual – often an extremely time and labor consuming effort, or automated with some 3rd party backend platform customization. The biggest disadvantage of the platform, as compared to other popular social media channels, is its lack of tools to target followers based on their behavior, a crucial component in many effective digital marketing strategies.

In conclusion, while WeChat can be a powerful marketing tool in China, it’s important to realize what it can and cannot do. The best use of WeChat would be to deploy it as a one of the marketing elements, closely integrated with other channels, not in isolation.

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WeChat, Chinese mobile “super app” by Asia most valuable company Tencent, is perfectly positioned to consolidate and strengthen its dominance over China’s mobile marketing landscape in 2018. Having reached one billion active users in 2017, the app is used by practically everyone in China as the primary social media channel as well as shopping and entertainment outlet. When it comes to mobile marketing, whatever direction Tencent takes will determine its development.

Based on what we have seen so far and the technological innovation already introduced, here are our top four mobile marketing predictions for China in 2018:

#1 Accurate location based triggers for serving mobile ads

One of the most underutilized mobile marketing potential capabilities is location based targeting. Thanks to WeChat’s popularity with users in China and the fact that it is only used on mobile phones, the app always “knows” the current location of its users. Therefore, it is possible serving highly targeted ads based on users’ real-time location. In such scenario, when a user is in the proximity of a point of sale of a specific product, he/she would get a special offer like a discount coupon or another incentive to visit a store.

Moreover, more shopping outlets and even individual stores can now track visitors with extremely high precision via apps or mobile floor guides. For example, many modern shopping malls in China encourage users to connect to a floor guide via WeChat allowing them to track those users throughout the mall. Serving them the most relevant ads based on the accurate location and time holds a huge potential for businesses.

So far, WeChat hasn’t taken full advantage of this possibility, although it is certainly within Tencent’s technical capabilities to implement. Location based triggers advertising adds another dimension to mobile marketing and it is likely that Tencent is working on ways to capitalize on such technology in near future.

#2 AI based big data processing

Tracking users online generates enormous amounts of data for marketers. In case of mobile, adding a location dimension creates even more information that can be extremely useful. The challenge lies primarily in analyzing huge amounts of data and automating the whole process. AI holds a lot of promise in meeting those challenges. Big industry players have been heavily investing in AI, driving the field’s rapid development in the last couple of years. Once again, Chinese companies like Baidu and Tencent, with the government support, have been on the forefront of innovation in AI.

Being able to efficiently process vast amounts of data generated by mobile devices will further advance targeting capabilities of mobile marketing and this is what AI is very likely to be able to accomplish for those companies in the next year going forward.

#3 Individual user targeting

Marketing efficiency is, essentially, all about targeting accuracy and market segmentation is the way to make such targeting more precise. Creating a persona representing each segment allows marketers to design a specific approach that would be most suited for the members of each group. The smaller the segment – the better it can be defined.

Unfortunately, it also makes marketing much more complex, and, in many cases, unmanageable. This is all about to change with the introduction of AI based data processing and analysis when segmentation can potentially become even more granular, all the way down to individual level. This would potentially allow marketers to tailor the message targeting each individual rather than a segment. When this become possible, mobile devices will be a natural channel to reach users on that level.

Our next mobile marketing prediction: we are going to see more of such highly personalized marketing in 2018.

#4 Facial recognition

Facial recognition is another maturing technology that is likely to get widely adopted by marketers in 2018. Although not without a controversy, facial recognition adds new level to personalized marketing that can be delivered via mobile. The advantage of facial recognition vs. other tracking and identification methods lies in its non-intrusive nature because it can be done without close physical contact with users. For better or worse, facial tracking doesn’t require users’ consent (at least not now), so people can be tracked remotely and even matched with their public social media profiles.

For example, when a visitor to a physical store expresses interest in a product but, ultimately, decides to pass on a purchase, facial recognition would allow finding out who that person is, and then retarget them via other channels by offering a similar product or a discount on the original one.

It is very likely that regulators and consumers groups will start campaigning against such methods, citing privacy concerns, however, it is reasonable to assume that the technology is here to stay regardless. When it develops further, perhaps it will even become possible to identify and record shopper’s facial expressions to figure out the overall sentiment towards a brand or a product. This would represent the next frontier in mobile marketing.

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It has achieved 2.5 percent penetration rate which is no small feat in the crowded app market in China, although it still dwarfs in comparison with WeChat with over 80 percent penetration.

While WeChat and QQ are for connecting with friends, Momo is an app for connecting with strangers based on interests and location.  Its closest equivalent in the Western market would be Tinder or Grindr. The app has been gaining in popularity in the recent years, transforming itself from a hook-up app into broader social network Designed to connect people based both location and interests, by the end of 2014 it claimed to have 180.3 million registered accounts, 60.2 million monthly active users, 25.5 million daily active users.

The company started monetizing also in 2014 but hasn’t been profitable. After IPO, things have began to change and in Q1 2015, Momo achieved total net revenues of US$26.3, up 383 percent on the same period last year. US$6.1 million of that was from social gaming, US$13.0 million from paid memberships, and US$1.1 million from paid emoticons and the gifting feature.

The app managed to make a net income of US$6.7 million in Q1 2015, compared to a net loss of nearly US$3 million at the end of 2014.

Unlike WeChat, Momo doesn’t have an English version – it was shut down earlier with the promise to come back one day. At the moment, Momo has decided to stay focused on domestic market and Chinese communities overseas.

The app is free and its revenue comes primarily from gaming, premium membership fees (it has 2.3 million paying membership subscribers), emoticon sales and advertising. In fact, advertising seems to be one of the most promising routes to generate revenue – Momo has also launched a new advertising platform for offline retailers.

One of the potential advertising possibilities are around targeting customers through location based service. For example, while users are scanning for people to connect with, an interest-based ad of a store or a club can be inserted with the results. It could be offering a discount or a free drink, inviting people in the area to pay a visit.

Advertisers would simply specify the geographic area and the time period of ad placement and Momo would display it based on those settings. Currently, it charges 10 RMB each time user interacts with an ad. It is very likely that Momo will continue adding services that allow business to advertise and target users based on their profiles.

In August 2014, Momo Inc. launched Dao Dian Tong, a marketing tool for local merchants. Through Dao Dian Tong, local businesses and merchants can construct profile pages that allow Momo users to find them with the Momo’s LBS. Members can see the businesses just as they would see other Momo users. Momo Inc. plans to further monetize user traffic by referring users from the Momo platform to e-commerce companies.

There is little doubt that Momo’s user base, just like WeChat’s, will continue growing in China, especially considering the fact that Chinese government started to gradually shut down foreign based messaging apps. This year, Line and Kakao Talk got blocked and Viber has been experiencing periodic disruptions on the Mainland. Whatsapp is still working in China but  its users may be quickly moving to a more stable and features-rich WeChat, and, possibly Momo as well.

2015 was all about live streaming in China and Momo has also added live-streaming function which helped it gaining more users and revenue around it.

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First interesting fact is that approximately 9 out of 10 China’s online users have a social media account.

Qzone remains the largest social media platform and QQ the most popular messenger. No platform, however, can challenge WeChat‘s dominance in mobile. 

Although, Weibo has some luster, it is still a very effective advertising platform as it has the ability to target users much more accurately than other services.

Chinese social media marketing is even more important when is comes to ecommerce. As the infographic shows, Chinese are very active online shoppers, spending a lot of time researching products online and commenting on the experience. 75% of online shoppers would provide feedback at least once a month as opposed to only 25% of US users.

Finally, 77% of Chinese expect a brand to have a social media presence – a clear sign to marketers that it is one of channels in the marketing strategy mix that can’t be ignored.

Here is the full infographic:

Chinese Social Media Marketing for Business

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Also, WeChat has become one of the marketing channels for virtually every type of company or a brand in China. Having an official account and actively marketing on WeChat are becoming important elements for every business that realizes the importance of keeping their customers close and engaged.

On the other hand, WeChat has often been a disappointing experience for marketers. Obviously, the huge potential of WeChat in marketing is in its ability to reach users directly through their most beloved and personal item, a cellphone. In addition, there is a possibility to know user’s current location that would allow reaching them with more relevant content. Finally, there is plenty to be learned about those users – from the way they use their phones, to what they are sharing in their moments.

Unfortunately, WeChat, so far, didn’t deliver on that potential. Here are the main deficiencies of their platform from the marketing standpoint:

1. Few targeting options with marketing on WeChat

   Currently, followers can only be targeted by gender, age, account type and location. Even location can be highly inaccurate as it is determined by account registration and not the physical location of the user;
   

2. High cost

   WeChat marketing by advertising can also be quite expensive. WeChat charges about 10 RMB per click/follower for ads that are displayed at the bottom of subscription messages. This is quite high compared to other online options, so only big brands would usually go for it. Ads in “Moments”, the relatively recent addition, could potentially deliver higher click through rate but they cost at least 5 times more.
   

3. Low click through rate

   Ads at the bottom of popular accounts are often ignored for a number of reasons. The main problem is that once clicked, the user than will be taken out of the app elsewhere, such to a built in WeChat browser. Since most people don’t casually browse WeChat but have some purpose while using it, they wouldn’t typically abandon their activity in the middle to be redirected elsewhere.
   On the other hand, ads in Moments would have had better chance to be clicked if they were relevant to user’s interests or current location. Unfortunately, this is not the case.
   

Considering that marketing on WeChat via advertising delivers relatively low ROI, there are basically 2 other options left to make it work:

• Engaging WeChat’s KOLs to spread your message and attract followers.
• Grow WeChat follower’s base organically through promotions in other media.

We will turn to those options in upcoming posts, stay tuned!

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Thanks to its business friendly ecosystem, brands have been enthusiastically embracing the platform and creating new ways to interact and engage with existing and potential customers.

WeChat is already redefining ways in which businesses sell products and services, communicate marketing messages, provide support or entice customers to visit their physical outlets. Every day we see new original and creative ways used by brands that take advantage of both WeChat enormous reach and its flexible functionality.

In this post, I’m going to discuss a few marketing innovations which have been employed by brands on WeChat.

Customer service

From its early days, WeChat official accounts had built-in capability to automatically respond to users’ text input. The account can be pre-programmed with the set of responses for common inputs at the first level of interaction. Then, the system can be further expanded by incorporating smarter logic that could deliver much more complex responses.

For example, a travel business can develop a function that would allow clients to pick a vacation spot by typing in something like “What would be the best beach resort in the Philippines?”. The system then would return the query filled with useful info, pictures or even videos followed by a link to proceed to reservation or chat with an actual human.

 Gamification of marketing

Everyone loves games, even those who say they don’t. This behavior is hardwired in our brains whether we realize it or not. WeChat provides new ways games can be woven into marketing by creating a phenomenon that is often called “gamification”. A chance to win a prize by participating in a contest is a sort of strategy widely employed by brands on WeChat.

By playing an actual game, a user can accumulate points or virtual cash that could be used towards a purchase of a products or ticket for an event.

 Interactive product catalogs

Instead of featuring a standard online product catalog, WeChat can enable integration of more complex and interactive ways for product searches.

For example, Tesla incorporated such interactive functionality in their WeChat account. It allows getting information on models all the way to the directions to the nearest dealership.

Power of geolocation

Knowing customer’s location for delivering the most relevant marketing message to a potential customer is one of the most powerful features of mobile marketing. WeChat has capability of detecting your location fairly accurately and trigger messages based on it.

For example, when you find yourself near a restaurant around lunch time, getting a discount coupon featuring one of the dishes similar to the one you ordered there last time could be just enough to steer you right back.

 Learn about your customer

Every time a customer interacts with a brand account, it is an opportunity to learn something about him or her. Apart from the obvious demographics, brands can get insights on individual preferences, most searched product types or price ranges, underlying reasons for choosing one product over another etc.

There is practically no limit to what can be learned but company’s ability to process the tsunamis of data. WeChat is one of the channels that brands can use to developer such insights and, at the end of the day, come up with better offers.

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The recent data compiled by WeAreSocial, reveals that WeChat has been also gaining ground in a number of other international markets.

First of all, for the sake of completeness, here is the data on China where WeChat is currently the most popular social network:

The slides below show some international markets where WeChat has been in top 10 social platforms.

 Hong Kong

One of those markets, not surprisingly, is Hong Kong. Although, WhatsApp and Facebook with its Messenger remain at the top, WeChat rose to #4 taking 23% of the market:

 Malaysia

Thanks to Malaysia’s large Chinese speaking population (at about 40%), WeChat is quickly gaining popularity in this country. As the data shows, it reached close to 20% of the market, just slightly behind Google+:

 Singapore

Next door to Malaysia, Singapore with its majority Chinese speaking population, has also been adopting WeChat at the increasing rate. Although, it is still behind other networks, there are reasons to believe that it’s catching up:

 India

Apparently, WeChat’s appeal could also work for a country with no Chinese speakers. Indians have been shown to start adopting the platform as well. It currently holds 5% of the local social networking market:

 South Africa

South Africa currently represents the only African country where WeChat has reached top ten status with reported 7% market share.

Although, WeChat has been gaining in popularity worldwide, Taiwanese have not been too keen on widely adopting it. This may be partly explained by a certain anti-Mainland sentiment as well as the dominant position of Facebook and Line.

I do believe that eventually Taiwan will embrace WeChat, especially considering the fact that it is the platform of choice for tens of thousands of Taiwanese who are currently staying on the Mainland.

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