Delighted Stupid Wind | Empire Illusion » social network

Chinese Social Networking Is Different From Facebook and Twitter

Kent — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 04:45:41 +0000

There has been a lot of recent buzz around social networking sites (SNS) in China, and for good reasons. With the world’s largest netizen population at 320 million and growing, the potential for volume is huge. Although China is currently dominated by large domestic players such as QQ and Xiaonei, foreign players have been eying the market with less success. The primary reason is simple: instead of properly localizing their websites, foreign SNS have essentially been translating their domestic sites into Chinese without making the fundamental changes they need to compete in a new market.

The fact is that Chinese users approach online social networking differently than Western users. In order to stand a chance against local competitors, foreign social networking companies should take the time to understand these differences and adapt their sites appropriately. Here at BloggerInsight, we tapped the knowledge of our expert network and identified four key characteristics that distinguish Chinese SNS users.

(1) It’s all about entertainment – Chinese users rely on online social networking sites as their primary source of cheap, quick, and accessible entertainment throughout the week. As a result, online social networks are used less for practical communication and more for killing time and amusement—whether it’s playing a quick game at work or chatting with other users after school. Take ‘Parking Wars‘ for example – one of today’s hottest games on Chinese social networking sites, especially among white-collar workers. Users earn virtual cash for parking on their friend’s lots and for ticketing their friends when they park “illegally”. After earning enough money, users can buy more expensive cars. Millions of white collar professionals are hooked; many check their Xiaonei or 51.com profiles several times each day to update their parking status. And why? For fun, of course. After all, that is the primary motivation of Chinese netizens when logging onto a SNS.

(2) Higher tolerance for intrusiveness – While Western users are often sensitive to “clutter” around their social networking profiles (remember the initial backlash against Facebook’s flurry of new applications?), Chinese users dig the extras that come with social networking platforms. Viral games, contests, forum discussions, and other add-ons drive traffic because young Chinese netizens don’t hesitate to send message after message to friends, inviting them to get involved on social networking platforms. For instance, on a site called QQ Show, developed by China’s SNS giant Tencent, users dress up their avatars and compete in virtual fashion shows. Teens will IM their friends fervently, asking for votes on QQ Show. And while some of us are tempted to label this as “spam,” it’s just another way for Chinese SNS users to engage and interact with each other. As you can imagine, these SNS applications are huge in creating user stickiness and encouraging users to repeatedly visit the site.

(3) SNS as a public space – Many Western users see social networking sites as an extension of their real-life relationships, and their online social circles often reflect this perspective. Chinese users, on the other hand, are more likely to add strangers via the Internet and generally accept most friend invitations. And instead of keeping online conversations within their own networks, Chinese netizens gravitate toward bulletin board systems (BBS) to express themselves and participate in completely public discussions. As one of our bloggers notes, “privacy is not as important as interesting conversation.”

(4) Building an online identity – Young Chinese netizens view their SNS profiles as representations of themselves to the world, establishments of self territory outside of their parents’ and schools’ oversight. For them, social networking is about standing out and building a reputation in an online world. Local social networking sites do a great job of catering to this need for self-expression. For instance, on QQ – China’s largest social networking portal in terms of user base – users make micro-payments of 1-5 rmb to customize their profiles by purchasing virtual goods, such as accessories, clothing, and new hairstyles. In fact, this handy feature generated a large portion of QQ’s revenue last year.

So despite foreign efforts to “figure out” the much-discussed Chinese market, local social networking sites are simply cooler and more entertaining to the country’s netizens. Companies need to realize that the cut, translate, and paste strategy will never work for a unique market with its own preferences and idiosyncrasies. New features need to be added, and entire websites need to be tailored and adapted to suit Chinese netizens.

Some additional questions to consider (and we would love to hear your thoughts):

Are there any foreign social networking sites that are on the right track to tapping the Chinese market?
What will it take for foreign SNS to snag and keep users from QQ, Xiaonei, and other domestic giants?

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renren users key characteristics

Alibaba Group Launched New SNS for B2B and B2C businessman

Kent — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 05:26:00 +0000

More and more Social Network website are launched these days.

Last month the Bai community is launched by Sohu.com

and also the Taobao(Alibaba Group) SNS called Tao Jianghu.(Jianghu is a name to descripe a industry in china. )

the top 3 big site Sina.com is preparing its own social network, integrate with its wonderful blog system, But sina was making a kind of invitation marketing: only release the news of the product, but never open the registration, caused many people excited to try.

and Yesterday Chinese B2B e-commerce group Alibaba announced plans to launch a newly-developed product “Ren Mai Tong” today, integrating e-commerce and the social networking service functions to provide an online community for business people.

It will not only provide online gaming interactive functions, but also focus on the business networking activities to promote better business relations.

one of the chief engineer for the “Ren Mai Tong” product, told local media that the new service includes functions such as business card production, friends’ business cards holder, latest news, and customer news aggregation. In addition, if two parties reach an agreement on the website, they can realize online trading with Alibaba’s online payment platform Alipay.

I list some big SNS in china here

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China SNS Community List for the company

Kent — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 05:23:10 +0000

I’m trying to figure the all SOCIAL NETWORK in china to make a social network marketing for the company

www.xiaonei.com people find classmate in junior middle school and senior middle school and university as well

www.kaixin001.com most of them are office people. a make friends social website.

www.kaixin.com copy from kaixin001.com, by the xiaonei group. hot as well

www.hainei.com made by the founder of xiaonei.com, but he sold xiaonei.com to a group, and make a new one.

www.5gme.com as the IT community, the founder is the famous chinese internet guy named KESO.

http://xiaoyou.qq.com made by QQ, copy from the concept of xiaonei.com. and based on the large amount of QQ user, now it is chasing the xiaonei.com

www.ajj.cc made by the famous webmaster in chengdu, Mike saw that guy with moustache in the 4th Internet summit.

bai.sohu.com. made by the top 3 big site named SOHU.com, now you can register from this links. http://bai.sohu.com/user/reg/invite.do?u=113432&type=0&t=1245035278212&s=08fa195d1d83c7e06fc73b51dd37d31d

the other top 3 big site Sina.com is preparing its own SNS as well, it’ll be ok with 1 month.

www.tonglou.com.cn facus on the people who are in the same building. it said there are 98,000 buildings, 87,000 life community , 3,000 university and 21060 compines

www.tonlo.com/ similar with the tonglou.com.cn, but they are competitor. and most of them are shenzhen buildings

www.51.com look at this domain, you can understand how important it is, but I think half of the user are teenager.

www.bajie.cn one of the biggest shenzhen community.

above list is what I konw and what I think big enough to push the marketing campaign for saleslion

and there are also hundreds of SNS community in china focus on the vertical industry.

so If you konw some communities, you can tell us. thank you.