Sina’s is releasing new products faster than Lady Gaga changes costumes. The contrast with Twitter’s conservative, minimalist approach is stunning . By contrast, Sina Weibo’s experimenting with a shifting multitude of products on top of Weibo.
新浪发布新产品比Lady Gaga换服装还快。与Twitter‘s 保守简化风格不同，新浪正实验在微博领域的多项改变。
Sina Weibo launched the latest two:新浪发布亮相
1. game.weibo.com – The long awaited Sina Weibo Game Center is finally online, but sharing is only to your ‘friends’ as Weibo continues to push for shared social relations.
2. credits.weibo.com – Sina’s rumored virtual currency Weibi (微币) is now live. Virtual currency seeks virtual goods.
With launch of Game Center and Weibi, Sina Weibo is now testing 4 monetization models out of the 6 that Sina CEO Charles Chao announced earlier this year at the China International Mobile Conference. We’ve previously reported on e-commerce, data services, and virtual goods.
1) Game Center – Social Games for Your Weibo ‘Friends’
Game Center is designed to be fully integrated within Sina Weibo. Each game has achievements that prompt the user to invite or ‘challenge’ his followers to play. It’s trying to trigger the same viral spread that social games have on other social networks.
Intriguingly, only ‘friends’ receive these invites. As we’ve covered before, Weibo defines friends as those who are mutual followers. In Game Center, you see all recent activities on a timeline called “Game Stories.” Friends can comment and “Like” your achievements in playing games.
Sina is once again pushing for deeper social interactions, turning the
previous weak social bonds that was established under the microblog context into stronger ones that we expect to have in SNS. For most users, people you follow in Twitter are not necessarily your friends, but Sina is attempting to turn around with Weibo. Sina Weibo aspires to also not only a microblog, but a full SNS with shared social relations.
At present there are only 10 games, ranging from single player fast-paced arcade games to multi-player ones like Texas Hold’em. On 31st May, Sina Vice President Peng ShaoBin announced that Sina would not take any revenue share from 3rd party developers for the first 12 months. Let’s see if Sina can entice developers to join the platform.
2) Sina Weibi (微币) – Virtual Currency Seeks Virtual Goods
One Weibi (or micro coin) is equivalent to 1 RMB and allows users to pay for value added services in applications or games.
Sina Weibo is far from the first social networks to launch a virtual currency that allows users to pay for virtual goods or gifts. It’s a common source of revenue for most of the social networks in China to sell VIP memberships (unlocks cooler and ‘high status’ features), sell virtual gifts or decorations, purposes and to gain higher levels in social games.
While Weibi is currently only for use in the game center, it should be available for all third party applications in the future. The outcome of Sina Weibo’s attempt to host an App Store for developers will depend upon its ability to create a healthy ecosystem for third parties.
Weibi in itself illustrates dangers of ecosystem management. The name Weibi was originally conceived by a third-party startup team in Beijing, who registered the Weibo account of same name, but were forced to close earlier this year by Sina. Sina must clearly delineate where–and where not–third-party developers can tread.
Weibi’s Tailwinds
1. Viral Spread – Content on Sina Weibo flys. It accounted for 8.15% of social shares in June and had an amazing 40.33% rate of return clicks. Users click contents shared on Sina Weibo more than any other social network in China. If games or e-commerce can tap into this viral spread, Weibi could also reach rapid turnover.
2. Mobile Payment – With annual smartphone sales to reach 18 million in 2012, China is becoming one of the largest smartphone markets in the world. Mobile commerce is an inevitable trend that has captured Sina’s attention. At the last Sina
