2. Social Networks in China
1. China already is the biggest “social network nation”
2. Huge opportunities for further growth
3. Demographics: Social networks are growing up
4. Social network use increasingly mobile
5. SNS in China dominated by local brands
6. Short messaging in China is huge
7. Integration and evolution
3. 1. China has the most social network users
307.5 million
2012
174.2 million
2012
159.7 million
2012
Source: emarketer
4. 1. Over half of the Top 15 social media sites are Chinese
0 10 20 30 40 50 60
51.com
Pinterest
Kaixin
Linkedin
Tudou
Renren
Youku
Tencent Weibo
Tencent
Qzone
Sina Weibo
Twitter
YouTube
Google+
Facebook
Penetration of Active Users Q1:13
Penetration of Active Users Q1:13
Source: Chinainternetwatch
51%
26%
25%
22%
21%
21%
20%
19%
12%
10%
9%
8%
6%
4%
4%
5. 2. Huge opportunities for further growth
49% 66% 60%
Social network user penetration 12/12, % of Internet users
More potential
users in China
than the other
nations
Source:
eMarketer
6. 2. China already has the most social network users…
Source: emarketer
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
North America
Western Europe
China
7. …and unlike the other markets, it will continue to grow!
Source: emarketer
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
North America
Western Europe
China
8. 2. Engagement of Chinese netizens in social media is also very
high
46 MIN
Time spent on
social media per
day
88%
of social media users
are active
8 BRANDS
followed by each
user, on average
43%
of netizens interested
in products shared
from friends on sites
38%
of netizens take shopping
decisions from the
recommended products
on sites
Source: Go-globe
9. 3. Growth comes from people currently not using SNS:
Older user groups and rural users! (see Report #2)
10. 3. Today‘s social network users are very young
Age Distribution of Chinese
social network users
<10
10-19
20-29
30-39
40-49
50>
Source: CNNIC
29%
34%
23%
11%
4%
11. 3. Examples: Targeting of young users
WeChat platforms for students
„Qing Cong Da Xue
Sheng“: Facebook-
style social network
for college students
„Wu Da Zhu Shou“: Services for
college life (check course
credits, curriculums, calculate GPA
etc.)
„Hua Nong Bao“:
College maps
Source: Technode source: iFanr source: Hometown
12. 3. Today‘s social network users are very young
But that means: Lots of growth in older user groups!
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
65+
15-64
0-14
Source: Qian Zhan
Age Distribution of Chinese Population (% of the total population)
13. Inevitible appearance in China: less young people, but
more elder people
Since one Child Policy, carried out in 1980, the Chinese
population indeed slows, but the age distribution changes
rapidly. Although
China has loosened
the policy in many ways
like ‚4:2:1 families‘,
the number of older
poeple did not stop
growing fast.
14. daily • 66%
weekly • 23%
monthly • 4%
Less
than
monthly
never
460 million
Chinese mobile netizens,
which accounts for
78.5%
of total netizens.
66%
of Chinese smart phone owners
are using mobile social media
every day
Smart phone
users
• 4%
Source: CNNIC, newmediatrendwatch • 3%
4. Social network use increasingly mobile
15. Source: 12MAG
China has a huge smartphone market. It already has 32.8% market
share in 2013.
4. Social network use increasingly mobile
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
400
450
500
China USA UK Japan Brazil India
2013 unit
shipments
2017 unit
shipment (in
Million)
Top 5 countries smartphone shipments 2013 and 2017
16. China mobile Internet access surpassed desktop PC
% of Chinese netizens accessing the web via Desktop PC vs via Mobile
phone 07/07-12/12
Source: KPCB
4. Social network use increasingly mobile
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
June 2007 December 2012
via Desktop PC
via Mobile Phone96%
28%
71%
75%
17. The usage of tablets grows continuously like smartphones in
China to help Chinese mobile social network boom.
The sales volume of tablets in China reached close to 9 million units in 2012; the
revenue of 2012 hit almost 5 billion US dollars.
Source: Kinstone; Xinhua; Tabtimes; Flurry
According to Displaysearch, China will become the second largest tablets market in
the world; In 2013 the sales volume of tablets in China will reach 65 million units;
the Chinese market share will be up to 27%.
The price of smartphones and tabelts gets cheaper; and there is a unquestionably
massive and rapidly growing market for low-cost tablets in China. More and more
Chinese can afford it.
China has the most potential room to grow. According to Flurry China and the U.S.
have currently a similarly sized connected device installed base, but China has
more than four times as many people.
18. 5. SNS in China dominated by local brands
Source: techinasia; Go-globe
RENREN 172 million
TECENT WEIBO 540 millionQZONE 712 million SINA WEIBO 500 million
PENGYOU 259 million
WECHAT 400 million
51.COM 200 million
DOUBAN 172 million
KAIXIN 113 million
19. 5. Chinese SNS brands: „Clones“ are closing in on the originals
Source: Internetradierer
26%
10%
35%
74%
90%
65%
% of global users on Chinese copycats of the original social networking sites
% of global users on the original social networking sites
20. 5. Chinese SNS brands: From copycats to innovative new features
WeChat has new voice features, like chatting with
friends via voice messages in the real time; The voice
message can made with different funny voice and be
sent.
Source: Pandodaily; Techinasia
21. 397 million
mobile Internet users are
texting messages, which
accounts for
85.7%
of Chinese Internet mobile
users. Source: CNNIC
6. Short messaging in China is huge
320
340
360
380
400
420
Dec. 2012 Jun. 2013
Numbers of Chinese netizens texting messages
(Million)
Numbers of Chinese
netizens texting
messages (Million)
352
397
22. Traditional SMS vs Modern SMS
462
463
464
465
466
467
468
469
470
2010 2011
Revenue of traditional SMS Service
has peaked
Annual revenue of China Mobile‘s
traditional SMS Service 2010 – 2011
Annual
revenue
(billion
Yuan)
464.62
Source: Xinhuanet; Tencent; Prnewswire
468.89
6. Short messaging in China is huge
0.00
1,000.00
2,000.00
3,000.00
4,000.00
5,000.00
Q2:12 Q2:13
Revenue of Tencent
Tencent
($million)
4,520.7
3,189.8
Modern SMS continues to grow. Tencent
Y/Y 38.4%
23. Evolution of Ways to transmit messages for Chinese New Year
80s 90s 2000s
… 2010s
6. Short messaging in China is huge
24. Source: iiMedia
Ways to greet each other during Chinese New Year
of 2013
SMS
Fetion
WeChat
Weibo
Other
65.9%
4.5%
12%
4.1%
13.5%
6. Short messaging in China is huge
26. Sina Weibo and Alibaba fuse social network
and E commerce. They created a version of
Weibo for merchants on Alibaba‘s Tao Bao
store.
RenRen launched mobile games via iOS
platform, and plans to move into Android
gaming this year.
7. Evolution of Chinese social networks: Integration
Source: Techinasia
27. 7. Evolution of Chinese social networks: Integration
Chinese telco Unicom and WeChat
together launches a social networking
SIM cards not only for chatting, but
also for playing games, sending stickers
and making payment online etc.
WeChat‘s updated version v5.0
is combined with social
games, online mobile
payment, sticker shop etc.
Source: Techinasia
Source: Yahoo
28. Xiaomi und Tencent patternered to sell and promote a ‚Q Zone xiaomi‘
version of smart phone
7. Evolution of Chinese social networks: Integration
29. Local mobile app from WeChat lauched in January 2011. This two year old `Baby` grew
up really fast. WeChat is already the 5th most used smartphone app in the world in
2013, according to the statistics of Globalwebindex.
400 MM + users 5× Y/Y
7. Evolution of Chinese social networks: Expansion
Source: KPCB; Weixin; Techinasia
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
Oct.
2010
May
2011
Dec.
2011
Mar.
2012
Sep.
2012
Jan.
2013
User accounts of WeiXin/WeChat (million)
User accounts of
WeiXin/WeChat
(million)Source: Wikipedia
30. More and more new local mobile social network apps from local IT
companies, mobile companies and telecoms. They have their own advantages
and disadvantages.
7. Evolution of Chinese social networks: Expansion
31. It would be great to hear from you!
https://www.xing.com/profiles/Li_Zhang159
Contact me:
Li Zhang (trend researcher)
Email: renen521@gmail.com
