Alipay shared a study on the spending habits of Chinese visitors on the payment app over the Labour Day holiday (1–3 May) this year. The number of Chinese visitors in Singapore over the Labour Day holiday period almost doubled from last year.

In addition, the average Chinese traveler spent SGD 325 (RMB 1,611) in Singapore during the Labour Day holiday – higher than in any of the other SEA countries, and a 13% increase from the same period last year according to Alipay.

Key Singapore-specific findings reveal:

• Grocery and fresh food supermarkets, followed by department stores and fashion brands saw the highest growth among Chinese visitors during this period
• The most popular merchants in Singapore were taxis (in-street and via taxi-hailing apps), airport merchants and resort merchants

General findings from the study reveal:

• Average overseas spending per user on Alipay increased by nearly 11% to RMB 1,790 (SGD 361)
• Spending was highest in Europe, the Middle East and North Asia
• In terms of the number of transactions, Thailand was the second-most popular destination for Chinese tourists
• Malaysia and Singapore ranked seventh and ninth in terms of the number of transactions

Demographic findings

Chinese seniors are an up-and-coming tourism trend – transactions made by those born in the 1940s and 50s more than doubled, with average spending per user in this age group jumping to RMB 1,622 (SGD 327).

About 65% who used Alipay overseas during the Labour Day holiday were female. Transactions made by those born in the 2000s increased eight-fold, on average to RMB 506 (SGD 102) during the same period.

In Southeast Asia, tens of thousands of merchants already accept Alipay as a payment platform for Chinese tourists. An earlier joint study from research firm, Nielsen and Alipay found that more than 90% of Chinese tourists would use mobile payment to pay overseas if given the opportunity.

Alipay has been working with various government bodies, financial institutions and businesses in Southeast Asian countries to further enhance guest experiences and enable seamless access to tourism attractions for Chinese visitors.

The number of Chinese tourists to Switzerland went down by 14.3% YoY in the first half of 2016 according to Swiss Federal Statistical Office.

The number of Chinese tourists stayed overnight in Swiss hotels reached 1.4 million in 2015, an increase by 33%, becoming the fourth largest tourists origin country after Germany, the U.S., and UK.

However, 476 thousand Chinese tourists stayed overnight in Swiss hotels in the first half of 2016, down by 80 thousand (14.3%). Terrorist attacks and more complex Schengen visa application process are the primary factors leading to less Chinese tourists visits.

The minimum buy of WeChat Moments advertisement is further reduced from 200,000 yuan (US$30,418) to 50,000 yuan (US$7605) in an attempt to attract more small and medium companies.

Monthly active users (“MAUs”) of WeChat, including Chinese version Weixin, reached 762 million in Q1 2016 according to the latest Tencent financial results. And, Tencent reported total revenues of RMB31,995 million (USD4,952 million) in Q1 2016, an increase of 43% over the first quarter of 2015.

Related: Unwritten rules of Weibo and WeChat Feed Stream

In addition to the reduced minimum budget requirement, WeChat also launched two different formats for advertising on its social networking stream Moments: video and coupon ads.

The latest WeChat Moments video ad allowed companies to display their ads through video. Video ad charged 180 yuan on CPM basis in core cities, 120 yuan in key cities, and 60 yuan in ordinary cities.

WeChat Moments display ads consisted of profile image and title of the advertiser, promotion message, ad image, external link, and engagement. Customers could click “View Details” to go to the set URL and the URL could be of a certain post of WeChat official account or a H5 page. Feed ads were displayed the fifth from top and would disappear to the users who were not engaged within six hours.

Related: Weibo to Offer Video Advertising in H1 2016

WeChat Video Ads

Core cities (2) in China included Beijing and Shanghai; major cities (35) included Tianjin, Chongqing, Harbin, Shenyang, Xi’an, Wuhan, Changsha, Nanjing, Chengdu, Hangzhou and other provincial capital cities and active cities in China; common cities were cities except core cities and major cities in China.

WeChat Moments video ads consisted of profile image and title of the advertiser, promotion message, video, and engagement. The video ad would display in less than 6 seconds unless users click to see the complete version. WeChat Moments video ads has had no external link yet.

WeChat Moments ads could target customers by age, gender, region, smartphone operation system, networks, and interests. 14 industries have been allowed to buy Moments ads including apparel, household appliances, internet service providers, personal products, retail and entertainment, education, home decorations, foods and beverage, transportation, IT, consumer products and digital products, finance, operator, and real estate.

Related free download from Incitez: WeChat Marketing Guide

Also read: China Social Media Users Insights in 2015

WeChat officially launched a new ad format on its social networking section Moments called Coupon Ads last Friday.

Tencent’s WeChat team launched ads for Moments steam in January 2015 and video ads this April.

Coupon Ads can be displayed in Moment feed stream with demographic targeting. It supports text, images and video formats. Once users click on “Collect” text link, they will be redirected to a coupon page and get the coupon, which can be used for their own purchase or shared with friends.

Pizza Hub launched two Coupon Ads campaigns for its Durian Pizza with a 15s video and a text/image respectively.Coupon collection rate was increased by 8 to 10 times.

Also read: WeChat Payment reached over 300K retail stores

Sogou, one of the top three search engines in China after Baidu and Qihoo 360, announced their cooperation with Microsoft Bing with the launch of two new products: Sogou English Search and Sogou Scholar Search.

While conducting academic research online, a lot of Chinese are more inclined to use Google search which for the reasons we all know can not be easily accessed. The new vertical search products from Sogou specifically target this segment of users, who have higher education and income levels.

Sogou English Search users can also type in Chinese to search for English content.

Also read: Baidu Mobile Search Users Reached 663 Mn in March 2016

Tencent’s WeChat team has started offering video ads in its social networking section Moments with a minimum CPM of 180 yuan (US$27.7) for Beijing and Shanghai targeting.

WeChat Advertisements are ads in WeChat Moments, a social networking section on WeChat, based on geographic and demographic targeting. It is displayed on the fifth posts.

WeChat Moments ads can be used for branding, promoting Official Accounts and mobile apps. Targeting options include geo-targeting, demographic targeting, device targeting, and interests targeting. Real-time reporting is available in the backend system.

Depending on the targeting cities, CPM varies from 50 yuan to 150 yuan (US$23) with Shanghai and Beijing the most expensive (150 yuan/CPM), followed by 20 top cities (100 yuan/CPM) and other. Video ads are recently made available in Moments with extra 20% on top of the existing CPM pricing.

The fixed CPM pricing requires pre-booking, 5 days to 28 days in advance, and a minimum budget of 50,000 yuan. Real-time bidding is also available from 30 yuan/CPM requiring a minimum spend of 1,000 yuan per day.

Different levels of budget get different levels of support. If you just meet the minimum budget requirement, you can only publish one photo under the text and photo ad format while those with at least 5 million yuan budget can publish 9 photos.

You can get a free WeChat online marketing guide here (registration required).

BMW Video Ads on WeChat Moments

You can scan the QR code below to see details of this BMW campaign:

Also read: WeChat Marketing Insights 2015

Total revenues of all Chinese search engine companies reached 80.76 billion (US$12.48 billion) in 2015 with an increase of 34.7% according to iResearch.

China’s search engine advertising revenues totaled 68.26 billion yuan (US$10.55 billion) in 2015, an increase of 32.2% YoY.

Baidu continued to dominate China search engine market with over 80% market share by advertising revenues, followed by Google China (9.2%), Qihoo 360 (4.9%) and Sogou (4%). Qihoo 360 has been growing fast, whose revenues were still behind Sogou at the end of Q2 2015.

Qihoo 360 announced the launch in Hong Kong of Shangyi on 31 March 2016, which is a set of integrated data and marketing analytics tools designed to help local and overseas marketers and advertisers identify the unique characteristics of Chinese netizens in order to optimize their marketing strategies and enhance business growth.

Read more: China’s Mobile Search Market Insights

Qihoo 360 announced the launch in Hong Kong of Shangyi on 31 March 2016, which is a set of integrated data and marketing analytics tools designed to help local and overseas marketers and advertisers identify the unique characteristics of Chinese netizens in order to optimize their marketing strategies and enhance business growth.

Through understanding the behavior of Chinese netizens, and analyzing the insights obtained, Qihoo 360 Shangyi will help brands provide over 700 million Internet users in China with more effective brand experiences, and grasp the opportunities in the China market through both mobile and desktop devices.

China is one of the fastest-growing Internet search engine markets in the world. Market size reached RMB56 billion in the third quarter of 2015, representing an increase of about 40% year-over-year, with search engine marketing accounting for more than 30%, at RMB22 billion. According to a recent iResearch market survey, the market is expected to continue to expand rapidly, reaching RMB168 billion in 2018. With this surging trend, companies from around the world are looking to connect more effectively with customers in China. And with the big data analytics services offered by Shangyi, companies can now target the right audience more effectively, and understand their behavioral patterns and habits, so as to adjust their marketing strategies whenever appropriate.

said Mr. David Ip, Global Business Advisor of Qihoo 360 Technology Co., Ltd.

Shangyi is Qihoo 360’s first marketing analytics tool backed by the big data generated from Qihoo 360’s more than 1.6 billion users, helping companies develop intelligent marketing and promotion strategies. Shangyi’s core competitive edges include:

• offers in-depth data mining technology and multi-platform data processing capability collected from Qihoo 360’s big data pool
• consolidates multiple data sources, and offers data analytical reports in terms of search and browsing behavior, demographics and geographical segmentation
• meets multiple needs of marketing analytics – targeting audiences in multiple ways, and supporting a variety of analytical approaches

There is a huge variety of consumer preferences and behavioral patterns among Chinese netizens in different regions and demographic segments, which can be a real hurdle for overseas companies entering the China market. Qihoo 360 enjoys a leading position in China’s Internet industry. Its brand effect and comprehensive big data resources provide an optimized channel for overseas companies, helping them to make the right business decisions and achieve better operational efficiency when targeting audiences within particular regions, user groups and behavioral segments,

added Mr. David Ip.

E-commerce brand Ebates and online travel website Hotels.com have both deployed Qihoo 360’s search engine marketing solutions to drive their brand exposure and awareness, and boost traffic on their websites.

Ms. Catherine Lu, Vice President, Marketing, Ebates Inc. Greater China, said, “As one of Mainland China’s Internet giants, Qihoo 360 played a crucial role in our entrance and expansion in the China market. Through Qihoo 360’s search platform,

Ebates has successfully gained brand awareness and accelerated its sales in China according to Ms. Catherine Lu, Vice President, Marketing, Ebates Inc. Greater China. They believe that Shangyi will offer global brands more in-depth and effective marketing data by analyzing users’ search behavior and geographic and demographic segmentation.

Hotels.com are also pleased that they have successfully driven their brand awareness and business expansion through Qihoo 360’s search platform. Hotels.com increased orders by 50% year-on-year.

Contact us here if you’d like to open a Qihoo 360 SEM account.

Also read: Weibo Search Users Insights 2015

Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan were the top three inbound tourism sources in January 2016 according to China National Tourism Administration.

Also read: China Travel Market Overview for Q4 2015

China had 109 million outbound tourists who spent a total amount of US$229 billion on shopping in 2015 according to GFK. China was the largest outbound country in the world.

GFK’s survey showed that more than half of Chinese travelers were between 15 and 29 years old, 37% between 30 and 44 years old, and about a tenth between 45 and 59 years old.

The top five most popular travel destinations of Chinese travelers have been South Korea, Thailand, Hong Kong, Japan and Taiwan since the beginning of 2016. Europe was also a popular outbound destination of Chinese tourists. Chinese travelers visiting Thailand, South Korea and Japan in November 2015 grew by an increase of 263%, 112% and 157% respectively.

Thailand, South Korea and Hong Kong were the most favored destinations among the post-85s and post-90s in China in 2015. Since 2014, a large number of Chinese tourists began to pay more attention to the cultural landscape and historical heritage of tourism destinations instead of convenient transportation and low travel cost. Travel for shopping was a new trend among Chinese outbound travelers.

Two-thirds of China post-85s and post-90s were high-income groups according to GFK and they will be expected to spend more on travel in the future. Understanding likes and dislikes of China’s travelers especially the post-85s and post-90s were essential for attracting these travelers.

Also read: China Travel Insights for Chinese New Year 2016

As of 31 December 2015, the number of travel agencies in China reached 27,621 according to China National Tourism Administration.

The top ten inbound traveler regions by the total number of person trips are Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, Macau, the U.S., Malaysia, Singapore, Japan, Thailand and Russia.

China travel agencies organized a total number of 42.18 million person trips and received 45.29 million person trips in Q4 2015, an increase of 14.68% and 14.59% YoY.

Jiangsu (17%), Shanghai (9%), and Zhejiang (9%) are the top 3 travel destinations in China in Q4 2015.

Southeast Asia countries are among China’s most popular outbound tourism destinations, accounting for 27% of total person-trips in Q4 2015.

Also read: China Travel Insights for Chinese New Year 2016

WeChat is launching a separate app for enterprises according to Weixin Team. It’s currently under internal testing with selected enterprises.

WeChat Enterprise will be available in one to two months supporting iOS, Android, Mac and Windows.

Tencent developed communications software for enterprises back in 2003 called RTX, and WeChat Enterprise is being developed based on RTX and mainly for companies’ internal communications.

Tencent launched WeChat Enterprise Account in 2014 which might be confusing to some users now with the launch of WeChat Enterprise version. The two are different; Enterprise Account, similar to Official Account, is based on the current WeChat app while the enterprise version is a separate app. But, Enterprise Account users can migrate to WeChat Enterprise version easily.

Read more: The Value of WeChat Official Accounts

China social media users maintained a rapid growth across all age groups in 2015 according to Kantar. The most popular social media was WeChat, Qzone and Weibo.

50.9% Chinese internet users used social media in 2015 with an increase of 16.9 percentage points compared with 2014. Users aged between 16 to 25 years old were the driving force and the penetration rate reached 71.5% in 2015.

China social media users increased largely in 2015. Social media between 35 to 45 years old grew with an increase of more than 20% in 2015 and users above 55 years old doubled in penetration rate.

WeChat (75.9%) was still the most popular social media in 2015, followed by Qzone (50.5%) and Weibo (35.0%). Monthly active users of Weibo in December 2015 grew by 34% year over year to 236 million and 83% of which were mobile users according to Weibo.

481.5 million people who accounted for 35.4% of the total Chinese population were estimated to visit social media at least once a month according to eMarterter.

Also read: China Social Media Users Insights in 2015

Transaction values of all Chinese travel agencies reached about 365.29 billion yuan (US$55.88 billion) and the online reached about 73.55 billion yuan (US$11.25 billion) in 2015 according to ctcnn.com.

Transaction values of Chinese travel agencies reached about 365.29 billion yuan in 2015 with an increase of 11.2% compared with 328.51 billion yuan (US$50.25 billion) in 2014. The online travel agency market reached 73.55 billion yuan with an increase of 71.4% in 2015 compared with 42.9 billion yuan in 2014.

The online penetration rate reached 20.1% with an increase of about 7 percentage points over 2014 (13.1%). Online penetration will continue to grow in 2016.

Ctrip, Tuniu, and CY were the top three largest OTAs by transaction values in 2015. The three accounted for 50% of total OTA market share. CY increased its market share in 2015 with 3.7 percentage points higher than 2014 and Tuniu increased by 3.3 percentage points compared with 2014.

Also read: China Outbound Cruise Travel Market Insight 2015

WeChat enterprise account is a mobile service for enterprises to establish connections among enterprises and staff, upstream and downstream supply chains, and enterprise IT systems. Enterprise account is designated for companies, government agencies, schools, hospitals, non-government organizations and other institutions.

WeChat enterprise account can help enterprises realize the effective mobile office with low-cost and fast efficiency compared with app promotion, and transform enterprise production, management, cooperation and operation processes to mobile. WeChat enterprise accounts as a tool for transforming IT systems to mobile can help enterprises:

1) Efficient mobile office. After the setting up of the enterprise accounts, enterprises can utilize its basic tools to strengthen the communication and coordination of staff, enhance the corporate culture, bulletin notification and knowledge management, and realize the mobility of enterprise applications quickly;

2) Low development cost. Companies won’t spend much on enterprise accounts compared with apps.

3) Zero threshold. Company members can scan the code to follow and users are able to use smoothly without special learning.

WeChat enterprise account could accelerate the integration of social relationships and work relationships. Most users communicated with workmates through WeChat during working hours according to the research of Tencent based on enterprises who have operated WeChat enterprise accounts.

WeChat could support an easy communication channel for business. The enterprise account can facilitate the communication between supervisors and subordinates, and reduce work pressure to some extent. Besides, it can make unfamiliar workmates or customers communicate more freely.

Monthly active users of WeChat reached 650 million ending November 2015. The number of WeChat enterprise account reached 600,000 as of November 2015 and overall users totaled over 10 million. Daily active users were 2 million and daily messages in November 2015 exceeded 12 million.

By establishing enterprise account, enterprises could realize a compact business circle, functional ecology system, and multiple social circles. Enterprise accounts can reconstruct the business pattern and bring in more opportunities for companies.

Also read: The Value of WeChat Official Accounts

China internet advertising market has entered a mature stage in 2015. Marketing on Weibo and WeChat has been one of the most effective methods to promote brands and companies in China in 2015.

Schwarzkopf

Schwarzkopf sold out nearly three million bottles of shampoo on Double 11 2015; sales value reached 9.7 million yuan (US$1.48 million) with an increase by 78% compared with the previous year. It became the best seller on Tmall in its category..

Schwarzkopf had prepared for Double 11 as early as June 2015. They implemented two marketing activities for the shopping festival. First, Schwarzkopf invited Mark Bustos, a famous hairstylist in Wall Street, to cut hair for Shanghai citizens and Alibaba staff; second, Schwarzkopf made a short film Begin from the Head which had a positive influence on the public.

In addition, Schwarzkopf invited SNH48 to endorse a series of FRESHLIGHT products which targeted the young female. The number of consumer visits to Schwarzkopf Tmall flagship were 2.5 times higher than any other periods when SNH48 performed on Double 11 Evening Party.

UCAR BEAT U

UCAR released a series posts “Beat U” on June 25th, 2015 insinuating users should boycott Uber. With celebrities and famous personages holding BEAT U warning signs this marketing activity generated public attention.

These posts were directly against Uber’s drivers with no legal operating license, privacy disclosure and safety problems. Although many internet users were objectionable towards this set of ads and some pointed out a mistake in a post, it was a successful advertisement that generated awareness and influence.

UCAR had left a clear position as safety and high privacy for prospective customers during the activity. In addition, UCAR had provided vouchers three days later which drove downloads of its mobile app dramatically.

The Most Passionate Resignation Letter

A teacher in Zhengzhou China submitted her resignation letter with only ten Chinese characters which meant “the world is big; I want to go see it”. The resignation letter was considered as the most passionate letter and caused a marketing fever in China.

Sprite, Qihoo 360, Tencent News, Yongche, Alipay, 58.com, Subaru, Meituan, Ctrip, Renren, Suning, Hunantv, Infiniti, iCarsclub, Youku, Alimama, Baidu Post Bar, QQ Music, 360 Mobile Guard, Didi, Sinopec Group, China Mobile, etc. seized the opportunity to publicize their brands. Some brand even gained millions of views.

Colors of the Dress

A dress was fiercely talked about among China internet users in Feb 2015. Whether the dress was black and blue or white and gold was discussed among millions of internet users both in China and foreign social media.

Roman, the brand of this dress, was the biggest winner of this “debate”. Its women clothing sales increased by 347% and brand became worldwide known.

WE

Li Chen and Fan Bingbing, two famous celebrities in China, announced their romantic relationship with a photo on Weibo with a simple text “We” on May 29th, 2015. And then companies and brands began marketing with “WE”. L’Oreal Paris, Pechoin, Hanhoo, ZMC, OSM, SIBU, CIVIER, Kotex, Durex, etc. who used similar pictures and creative words with “we” to advertise for their brands or companies.

ALS Ice Bucket Challenge

ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis) ice bucket challenge was launched by Pete Frates, a famous baseball player in Boston College who was suffering from the disease. Persons who were named should either challenge the ice bucket within 24 hours or donate US$100 to fight against ALS.

ALS ice bucket challenge was spread from overseas social media. The challenge was first initiated by Lei Jun (president of Xiaomi), Robin Li (president of Baidu), and other famous figures in China on the internet and technology industry. Then, celebrities joined, and many citizens spontaneously participated in the activity.

ALS ice bucket challenge was a very effective combination of marketing and public welfare. It got donations of 257 million yuan (US37.57 million) in a month far more than the expectation of Pete Frates. Many brands also took advantage of this campaign for marketing among which the most famous one was Samsung naming Apple for the ice bucket challenge.

Also read: China Social Media Marketing Trends in 2015

China’s online retail market reached 945.1 billion yuan (US$143.5 billion) with a growth rate of 45% in Q3 2015 according to Analysys. The growth rate was lower compared with the previous quarters in 2015.

The growth rate of China’s online retail market slowed down in 2015. The market tended to mature. However, total online retail sales only accounted for 12.3% of total retail sales. The online market still faced enormous development opportunities.

More shoppers were active on the mobile end than PC in Q3 2015. Mobile online sales reached 524.3 billion yuan (US$79.6 billion) which surpassed PC as the major online shopping channel as of Q3 2015.

The business pattern of China’s B2C market remains the same in Q3 2015. Tmall and Jingdong dominated the market both in market and business innovative capacity. E-commerce suppliers were trying to win subdivision market to seek a breakthrough.

China’s online retail market has been stabilized since 2014. Three business formats have shaped, online fair, online department store, and online discount retailer. Tmall, Jingdong, and Vipshop were representative companies of each format.

Tmall was the earliest online fair platform in China which has built a relatively perfect system for followers. Tmall has been devoted to building a high-quality shopping platform by strict selection of merchants and to provide consumers a safe and efficient platform. Total online transaction values on Tmall reached 91.2 billion yuan (US$14.25 million) on Double 11 in 2015.

Jingdong started as an online magneto-optical store, but soon diversified, selling electronics, mobile phones, computers, etc. Self-built delivery stations and pick-up stations were the core of Jingdong’s diversified services.

Vipshop was a leading online discount retailer for brands in China. The Company offered high-quality and popular branded products to consumers throughout China at a significant discount from retail prices targeting at women buyers. Vipshop reported net revenues up by 63% to 8.67 billion yuan (US$1.36 billion) in Q3 2015.

Also read: China Retail V.S. Online Shopping 2015

China’s travel market reached a total number of of 4.12 billion person-trips in 2015 according to China National Tourism Administration. China’s domestic travel market exceeded 40 million person-trips contributing over 4 trillion yuan (US$0.61 trillion) for China.

120 million travelers traveled abroad in 2015. China ranked first globally in the number of travelers and total travel spend. Data of National Tourism Data Center showed that the travel market has created 10.2% of the total jobs in China.

Korea has been a popular outbound destination for China’s travelers. The total number of 6.11 million tourists traveled to Korea in 2015 which accounted for over 40% of Korea’s inbound travelers according to CCTV financial reports.

Over 70% China’s tourists traveled to Korea for shopping in 2015, 20% for experiencing Korean culture, and the other for plastic surgery and sightseeing according to Korea Tourism Organization. Chinese travelers spent an average of US$2,200 per person in Korea, much higher than foreign travelers’ average spend in 2015.

China’s consumers spent much time in duty-free shops. Each China’s traveler spent about 2,800 yuan (US$424.57) in Lotte according to the manager of Lotte duty-free shop in Korea. The consumption was predicted to increase by at least 10% at the end of 2015. China’s tourists brought in US$22 billion for Korea accounting for 1.6% of Korea’s GDP in terms of spend on accommodation, transport, shopping, and others.

To maintain China’s outbound travelers to Korea, the Korean government was considering to provide visa-free and a package of policies according to the president of Korea.

Also read: China Outbound Travelers Shopping Overview 2015

Chinese research company Analysis listed Baidu, Tencent, Sogou, Youku, Alibaba, Liebao, 360, Sohu, Google China, Weibo, Autohome, Letv, Netease, Sina, and Soufun as the most innovative companies in China’s online advertising market. Innovation capacity was mainly determined by manufacturers’ media operation capabilities, technical strength, and future monetization ability.

Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, Google China, 360, Youku, iQIYI, Sogou, Sohu, Soufun, Letv, Liebao, Weibo, Autohome, Netease, and Sina had top operational capacities in China’s online advertising market according to Analysys. The execution and operational capabilities were mainly indicated by market share according to Analysys.

Baidu, Alibaba, and Tencent lead China’s internet market whose innovation capacity and operational capacity was relatively high. Baidu launched Duer (Secretary of Baidu) in the 2015 Baidu World Conference targeting intelligent interaction field. But, Tencent was ranked the most innovative Chinese company by BCG, 12th globally.

Basing on a wide range of services and information basing on Baidu’s powerful search technology and intelligent interaction, Duer could provide users with more subdivisions of services through continuous learning and alternating people’s behavior as a full-time secretary. Currently, Baidu has reached a plurality of vertical O2O fields and it would further open up the capital flow and logistics of O2O market to promote more service-linked products.

Alibaba tended to integrate branding resources after the acquisition of AdChina. Alimama released “Dharma Sword”, the big data marketing platform based on Alibaba’s large number of user accounts, and developed targeted marketing services based on the big data of its e-commerce market in 2015. After the acquisition of Youku Tudou, Alibaba has built video e-commerce industry chain by the further integration of user data.

Tencent built its huge social marketing services around the Wide Click-through service. Wide Click-through DMP service was formally launched in 2015 through which advertisers could reach potential consumers by precise analysis of user data. Tencent cooperated with Jingdong to build “Pinshang”, a special marketing platform for brands.

Revenues from the mobile end increased dramatically in Qihoo 360 by deepening search commercialization process. Qihoo launched its own smartphone, which could open new opportunities in future.

Youku Tudou is a guru in the video advertising market and has been more powerful after joining Alibaba league. Youku Tudou began the intelligent search service targeting video e-commerce market in 2015. By enhancing technology and innovation capacity, Youku Tudou is expected to make further development in e-commerce.

iQiyi has maintained a leading position in self-made content of the online video market and invested a large amount of money in copyright. Targeting the post-90s, self-made content of iQiyi is much distinctive to attract consumers and improve their marketing value. Advertising forms are more diversified on iQiyi.

Sogou search traffic is relatively small compared with Baidu and Haosou. With its collaboration with WeChat and Zhihu (China’s Quora), it has direct access to the quality content on the two platforms. It will likely to keep its traffic growth.

Liebao promoted its advertising platform “Liehu” to integrate data, marketing, and other resources targeting native advertising services based on its overseas resources. Liebao has cooperated with Facebook, Tencent, Google and others to increase its market share.

Google China has deepened users’ innovative search service under diversified and contextualization usage. It entered the voice search market and managed to access to the mobile internet through mobile phones in 2015. Google DoubleClick achieved a breakthrough in native advertising technology, cross-screen delivery, and Programmatic Guaranteed delivery. From recent dozens of job position opening in China, Google may likely find its presence again in China.

Sohu slowed down in advertising growth rate. Sohu News spared efforts to build vertical polymerization channels and local stations. Sohu Video tried to reduce copyright competition stress with the self-made content in 2015. Sohu hoped to strengthen long tail traffic construction to attract younger users and improve content production structure.

SouFun’s e-commerce revenues rose while online advertising revenues fall in 2015 which indicated that advertisers’ marketing structure changed. With real estate market turning better, SouFun could gradually transform to a real estate commerce platform. Advertising revenues would continue to shrink in the future.

Letv created “platform + content + application + terminal” ecosystem and integrated the internet advertising resources by further accelerating the structuring the field of intelligent hardware in 2015. Letv strengthened the investment in high-quality content copyright and combined content and services to enhance the user experience and media marketing value to drive advertising revenues.

Weibo managed to build interest-based social circles to lay the foundation for the e-business in 2015. By the increase of the number of Weibo users and digital marketing services, monetization capability of Weibo would continue to maintain high in the future. Meanwhile, how to improve its ecological system, how to change the image as an information and marketing platform, and how to build a strong relationship with the e-commerce suppliers have become major challenges for Weibo’s future development.

Many automotive internet media expanded their business on automobile transaction in 2015. Automotive finance and e-commerce revenues increased which was mainly due to advertisers’ larger input in 2015. Autohome had a tough road to creating new advertising methods, increasing advertising revenues, and keeping a high market share in the future.

Netease News cooperated with Dianping, 58.com, and other internet service companies to improve localization services to meet the needs of users as well as strengthening its commercial value. Netease improved its content by we media and launched we media platform to strengthen content production capacity.

Sina accelerated multi-dimensional development on the mobile terminal in 2015. It expects to improve its mobile information content to enhance user stickiness and monetization in the future, localize information and connect with O2O e-business and other value-added services, promote diversified profit models, and promote the commercialization of mobile terminals.

Also read: China Social Media Marketing Trends in 2015

China’s online accommodation booking market reached 24.983 billion yuan (US$3.89 billion) representing a QoQ growth of 27.98% and YoY growth of 82.16% in the third quarter of 2015 according to Analysys.

China’s online travel market reached 122.23 billion yuan (US$19.07 billion) with an increase of 18.0% QoQ and 45.9% YoY in the third quarter of 2015 according to iResearch. The OTA market in China reached 5.96 billion yuan (US$0.93 billion) in Q3 2015 with an increase of 48.8% compared to the same period last year, led by Ctrip and eLong.

The online accommodation market maintained a rapid growth in the third quarter of 2015 under the constant promotions of China’s online accommodation and online travel agencies. Overall transactions of online travel market totaled US$19.07 billion in the third quarter and the OTA market in China gained US$0.93 billion.

Ctrip reached revenues of 10.762 billion yuan (US$1.68 billion) with 43.08% market share. Transaction values of Qunar were 5.63 billion yuan (US$0.88 billion) accounting for 22.54% online accommodation booking market. Ctrip, Qunar, eLong and Alitrip combined account for almost 85% total market share, 4.14 percentage points higher compared to the previous quarter.

Continue reading on China online travel booking users in Q3 2015 here.

China’s online accommodation booking companies have attempted in exploring more effective cooperation modes and integration methods between the online and offline. By an increasing number of China’s tourists and promotion of industrial chains, the online accommodation booking market in China will continue to grow in the future.

Also read: China Short-term Accommodation Market Overview 2015