Social networking has taken over the media industry in the past decade or so. China is no different than any other country with interent access. They like everyone else use the most known sites such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter but they have come up with a few on their own.
Weibo is a microblogging website in China that is a hybrid of Twitter. Weibo was a China based social networking site so marketers came up with an idea to go global. In the past two years WeChat has gained 300 million users. Whats the difference you ask from WeChat and say Facebook. Well WeChat combines what everyone likes about Facebook, Twitter, Skype and other popular social networking sites into one.
China is loving this APP and when Mark Natkin a technology analyst in Beijing was asked if Twitter, Facebbok and Instagram should be worried he replied "The west can learn a thing or two from WeChat"
This App also features some new things such as Shake, Shake. This allows people to "shake" their phones and find other people that are shakeing their phone as well. Mark Natking also stated "In the earlier stages, any user you mentioned WeChat to would say, "Oh, Shake Shake! I can go out and meet people I don't know.' It was something interesting and unusual. And that got a lot of buzz going, getting people to try it."
Some big name brand companies are useing this site along with Facebook and the other social networking sites. Starbucks has recently used this site by asking the customers how they feel and when they responsed with a smiley face or emoticon, Starbucks replies with a song to match the mood. Nike, Intel and Durex jsuare just of a few big businesses that are jumping on the banwagon of WeChat.
Whats next for WeChat? Product Director Zeng Ming wants to take on Europe and the United States. WeChat can be found on any mobile phone for free, just look in your App store or Android store.