2013 patterns of social media in China

China's social media are now growing rapidly, and in the year 2012, the rapid rise of social media platforms such as corporate socializing, social e-commerce, picture socializing, and the emergence of mobile social networks have transformed the pattern of traditional social networking, making it a powerful force. Summing up the development of social media in China in the past year, "CIC China social media Pattern 2013" has been launched.

The pattern of the 2013, in the big class division, and the 2012 pattern of thinking is the same, the Chinese social media platform divided into four major categories, "core network", "value-added derivative network", "Basic Functional Network" and "emerging/subdivision network." This classification is mainly based on the maturity of the social media platform and the functional dependencies between the platforms.

Among the specific platform categories, the most significant change is the move to the "core network" category of mobile socializing that originally belonged to the "Emerging/Subdivision Network", as well as new categories of social search, picture sharing and social television.

Basic Functional Network

"Basic function Network" mainly refers to the platform that provides basic function support for other platforms or netizens ' life. In the 2013 map, in addition to the existing types of platforms (online questions and answers, online encyclopedia, blog and blog aggregation, document sharing), the Check-in location Service (LBS) from the "Value-added derivative network" reclassified to this category. Through the rapid evolution of the past few years, check-in services have been widely used in the mobile end of social media such as microblogs, social networking sites and consumer reviews, becoming an "infrastructure".

Core network

"Core network" mainly refers to the relatively independent, mature, occupy a large number of users of the platform, such as micro-blog, social networking sites, video sites, mobile social and so on. "Core network" is the main battlefield that brand marketers pay attention to.

CIC in the study of several types of popular core network platform, the similarities and differences found that the characteristics of different sites are obvious. Video sites have an advantage over Weibo and social networking sites in terms of user access and user coverage, and the advantage of microblogging platforms over other platforms is higher frequency of access. From the user's point of view, Tencent Weibo's user age level is closer to Renren, and Sina Weibo's user age is relatively high.

Enterprises and brands in the understanding of social media patterns, but also need to understand and learn more about the characteristics of the popular platform and the difference, and find suitable for their own enterprises and brands platform for marketing.

It is worth noting that the original "emerging/Subdivision network" of mobile social move to the "core network" category. In the 2012, mobile social applications ushered in a big outbreak, with the number of users in the case of micro-letters reaching 300 million in January 2013. The aggregation of users brings new marketing opportunities. Many companies are also trying to use mobile social platforms and consumers to interact, new cases are emerging, such as the Southern Airlines passengers can be through the micro-mail machine, the user can use micro-mail to check credit card information. It is believed that in the 2013, mobile social marketing will occupy a more important position in the brand's marketing mix.

Value-added derivative network

"Value-added derivative network" refers to the functions of the core network and other networks, relatively emerging platforms. In 2012 years, the development of social electronic commerce is amazing. Beautiful said and Mushroom Street as a representative of social E-commerce, already has a considerable user base, they also through the open mobile app, and with other mobile social cooperation, improve the user experience, such as Beauty said and micro-letter cooperation, users can directly link to the beauty through the micro-trust platform to say, or directly through the beautiful said to share the Web page to micro-trust friends/micro-trust friends/Tencent Weibo.

Part of the traditional E-commerce site also began to introduce SNS elements, such as Taobao launched its SNS platform-the stubborn rabbit community. In the category of "value-added derivative network", in addition to the original social E-commerce, social content aggregation, social games, but also added a new kind of platform, that is, social search. Social search based on social media platform, through social relations, the traditional search into social elements, through keyword search and complex social relationships, the search behavior developed into a rich social means.

Emerging/Subdivision Networks

"Emerging/Subdivision network" refers to the relatively independent functions, targeted at specific groups or more emerging platforms. In this category, two types of platforms are added. The other is social television, which is based on the video sharing of the mobile end. The rise of social image is undoubtedly the Instagram of foreign countries. Important domestic platforms include Pushpin (transformed from LBS applications) and more novel "Visual + Auditory social" snapping.

Social television has also become a new kind of vertical social platform. In China, social television is divided into two types, one is based on the derivatives of other social media platforms, such as social TV based on the Sina Weibo platform, and a discussion circle based on the content of the television, such as the social TV app-, launched by Phoenix New media, but the essence of these two categories is " TV content + instant communication. In addition, we note that business socializing also extends a small branch of social recruitment, such as a popular street network for campus recruitment.

Due to the differences of national conditions and user characteristics, social media in China are different from those of foreign social media. In the 2013, Chinese social media continued to develop rapidly, the media platform gradually showed the trend of mobility, commercialization, platform, innovation, vision/hearing, privacy and service. The pattern of social media in China will show more and more rich posture with the joint efforts of many developers and researchers.

The change history of "social media pattern in China"

CIC has been producing the first social media pattern in China since 2008, with a history of more than 5 years. The first idea comes from the conversation Prism, produced by Brian Solis, a well-known foreign social media marketing expert, that has become the present pattern after combining China's special social media environment.

2008–2009 First Edition: Instant messaging, forums, blogs, video sites and other types of mainstream, independent microblogging still occupy a place.

• 2010 Second Edition, LBS, social networking site, portal microblogging, group buying site to enter the line of sight

• The third edition of 2011, light blogs, business networking began to emerge.

• The fourth edition of 2012, according to the maturity of the industry and the function of the platform between the relationship between the Chinese social media into the "core network", "value-added derivative network", "Basic Function Network" and "Emerging/Subdivision network" four categories. Increased mobility/resilience, intimate social networking, corporate social networking, and further subdivision of social networks, online travel, dating sites, etc.