Weixin, is a popular Chinese messaging app with over 1.1 billion accounts, 902 active daily users, and 38 billion messages sent every day, that is what Weixin (Way-shin) does, also known as WeChat internationally. So, what is the secret to the success? What made rise of the app’s popularity? It is Weixin’s multi-functional ability! That is what makes this app appealing to fans of social media, mobile app users and businesses. With mobile marketing, because we know who their friends are, what time of day it is, where they are right now, and the ability to communicate directly with them through push notifications, you can influence them during their standard day-to-day behavior, and not just before or after (Lin, 2014). So for example, you can influence them incrementally – ‘Your friend is in the area – how about going to the beach 40 meters away with him and have a drink and chill out?’ followed by ‘Now that you have two people, why not start a party? Invite more nearby friends by Facebook!’
The start of social media apps makes it easy for consumers to use and ultimately, give them reasons to keep using it. Weixin was launched in January 2011 by Tencent Holdings Ltd., with the core function being sending messages to phone contacts similar to Whatsapp. There are two versions of WeChat, Weixin is the version for mainland users, while WeChat is designed for overseas users, and they don’t belong to the same system or servers (Coco, 2017). Though they have similar interfaces and many common functions, these two apps are different from each other in several aspects. Marketers who want to target customers in mainland China should be aware of these major differences, or they may lose potential customers.
Weixin’s basic functions:
- Send messages
- Transfer pictures, videos
- Walkie-talkie’: pass on speech
- Talk/Chat with a group of friends
- Video call
- Moments’ timeline: sharing photos, links, text
- Ability to ‘like’ or comment on other user’s updates
- Customizable group sharing settings
- ‘Look Around’: finding people in the vicinity to chat
- Sending custom-made ‘stickers’ or gifs
- Add contacts by address book matching, ID or QR code
Weixin incorporated the functions of other apps (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Line, etc.) and combined them into one. The main takeaways from Weixin is knowing the consumer is vital to the success. Designing an effective mobile app is half about knowing your customers and half about the creative thinking. Weixin was an instant hit; just over 400 days after its launch it already had 100 million users (Koetse, 2014). This mobile app has incredible potential, in only two and a half years after the launch of the app usage grew to 400 million users and by August of 2013 downloads by foreign users exceeded 100 million. The core function of Weixin is its messaging function: sending and receiving messages between other users of the app, but what made Weixin separate from the other apps is how is also incorporated the ability for users to send voice messages on top of sending written texts. Weixin integrates more than just that, by including the ‘Moments’ function that allows the users to have their own ‘timeline’ where they are able to post updates for their friends to see. ‘Moments’ is a closed social network between friends, but Weixin also has a ‘look around’ function where one can allow its location to be public; this allows one to find people in the area they are at to interact with.
References:
Coco. (2017, September 06). WeChat vs. Weixin: For China Marketing You Need an Official Weixin Account. Retrieved November 30, 2019, from https://chozan.co/2017/09/06/wechat-vs-weixin/
Koetse, M. (2019, March 06). Introduction to WeChat – Short Guide to China’s Super App. Retrieved November 30, 2019, from https://www.whatsonweibo.com/whatswechat/
Lin, P. (2014, June 27). The key to successful mobile app marketing campaigns is mobile-centric strategic thinking. Retrieved November 30, 2019, from https://www.marketingmag.com.au/hubs-c/the-key-to-successful-mobile-app-marketing-campaigns-is-mobile-centric-strategic-thinking/
Chris' spot 
Hi Christopher! I enjoyed the way your blog post started with facts that grabbed my attention. I also like how you inserted the questions “what is the secret to the success? What made rise of the app’s popularity?” This got me thinking as a reader. However, to add an academic comment on your blog, you say the answer to those questions is Weixin’s multi-functional ability. Although, I believe, while that is true, it is more so that Weixin knows who their audience is and thus they can give them multi-functionality based on their wants/needs, which you bing up as the main takeaway at the end. Once Weixin finds a new need that their audience has or something their audience is using on another app they will add it to their app. You basically begin to discuss this with the next sentence of knowing where they are, their behavior, etc and throughout the blog.
I also enjoyed your examples that better helped me understand your point. Also, I agree that marketers should look into the differences between Weixin and WeChat in order to keep their customer. China’s app had a lot more features than WeChat and perhaps WeChat should start adding more features to keep up with Weixin and ultimately be similar in giving their audience many features that other apps have and placing them on one app.
Overall, your blog was well put together, although next time you might want to add more whitespace and maybe create small paragraphs. For example, after answering your question in the beginning, after the sentence “That is what makes this app appealing to fans of social media, mobile app users and businesses” you can go to a new paragraph when you start discussing “With mobile marketing, because we know…” I’m not a blog expert and the way you set it up is fine, but as a reader everything appeared bunched together. To each his own though.
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I like how you pointed out that WeChat is for users who are overseas and even more so, mentioning the differences between the mainland version of the app and the overseas version of the app was also notable. As you said, knowing the differences is imperative for marketers to know so they can streamline their strategies to fit their target audiences. I think this is extremely important because even though the platform has hundreds of millions of users, it is still vital to know the audience and not utilize mass marketing. Knowing the audience allows the marketers and/or app developers to fine tune and even bring further personalization to the user’s overall experience on Weixin.
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I like how you included a video in your blog. It provides a really great visual of the features in the application. I also liked how you used bullet points. I like how you also included interesting facts like many people are using the app to pay their bills. It’s also interesting that you focused on censorship. The Chinese government censors a lot of content for political reasons. I know that Winnie the Pooh is censored in China because of the memes that we made pertaining to the Leader of China looking like him.
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