360DigitalInfluence

Where do you go to escape negative social media attention? Well, you could try one place that Twitter and Facebook will struggle to find you: China.

Some might think that is exactly what NBA “problem child” Stephon Marbury did when he moved to China a couple of weeks ago to play for Shanxi Zhongyu.

Marbury seems to have completely moved his social media presence. He posted his last Twitter entry on January 26, having already made his first entry a day earlier on the equivalent Chinese site. Marbury, the biggest NBA star ever to have played professional basketball in China, already has 26,132 fans on the Chinese Twitter-like Sina Microblog.

Of course, Marbury hopes to do more than escape twitterers; he is partly here to promote his clothing and apparel brand, Starbury. His posts frequently link to his Taobao store, where a pair of low-cost Starbury basketball shoes retail for around RMB 150-200 (USD 20-30).

I think this could become one of the best marketing uses so far of a Chinese microblog site, perfectly combining personal branding and product promotion.

Marbury is already creating a genuine dialogue with his fans. Earlier this week, for example, he engaged in a mammoth microblog Q&A, directly answering huge amounts of questions from fans.

Of course, challenges remain. He is only able to speak to his online fans in English, and his off-court brand will largely depend on his on-court success. Last week, Shanxi Zhongyu lost their first game with their new star.

This online ad for Chinese car maker Chery has been viewed 2,782,911 times on Youku and has received 843 comments since it was uploaded on January 9th. This is, therefore, a very significant viral video in China.

A reference to a recent challenge made against Chinese kungfu by Thai boxers, the car featured in the ad defeats the foreign challenger before kungfu even has a chance. 

According to Youku Buzz, which has also written about this “banal” clip, this was Youku’s most-viewed video last week. At the time of writing my post, there were twice as many thumbs up as there were thumbs down.

Despite this apparant support, the comments, which began overwhelmingly positive, end up being almost exclusively negative.

I think there are much more sophisticated ways of appealing to nationalism than this. This ad has none of the things I think make a good viral: it doesn’t make me laugh, it doesn’t evoke any emotion, and it doesn’t teach me anything.

Kudos is due, however, for getting the ad out in time to resonate with the recent martial arts showdown. This is the only legitimate reason I can think of why it has had so much positive attention.

One recent comment suggests another theory, “The people that gave this a thumbs up were employed by the company…”

“Foreigner lights up Guangzhou by dancing like a weirdo,” (老外搞怪舞功燃烧广州), appeared a couple of weeks ago on Chinese video-sharing site Youku. At the time of writing, the clip had been viewed 648,791 times.

The dancer, who is probably not called Matt, is dancing in Guangzhou, host of the upcoming Asian Games. The annoying catchy soundtrack tells viewers to put up their hands and cheer for Asia.

Look familiar?

It may remind some of another viral video phenomenon, “Where the Hell is Matt”, which also starred a white man dancing stupidly in various locations:

Although nobody appears to be claiming credit for the Guangzhou clip,  it was probably commercially produced, most likely by an official body linked to the Games or by Jianlibao (健力宝), the beverage brand that appears toward the end of the clip.

Many of the people who have left comments are similarly suspicious, while many others appear to be genuinely impressed and moved.

A couple of the clip’s viewers also point out the similarity with Matt’s video, calling it a “rip-off Where the Hell is Matt.”

Chinese microblog platforms have one major thing in common with Twitter, they limit updates to 140 characters. However, since a Chinese character generally conveys much more meaning than a single letter of the Roman alphabet, a Chinese microblog update can say a lot more than one in English.

As a very rough guide, four Chinese characters (新浪微博) are used to describe one of China’s leading microblog platforms, while fourteen characters are needed to write its English translation, Sina Microblog.

Similarly, 推特 - the Chinese for Twitter, does in two characters what English does in seven.

In addition, Chinese sentences do not need any spaces to make sense, even after punctuation marks.

Admittedly, posts on Chinese microblogs are often a mixture of English words and Chinese; and the online cultures of China and the English-language speaking world abbreviate in different ways.

However, despite these qualifying factors, by offering the same 140-character limit, microblogs are being much less stingy to Chinese writers than people updating in English.

So, a company or an individual can say a lot more. And quite often, they do just that. First, look at this fairly typical Twitter update from microblog aficionados, Dell (@DellOutlet):

Below is another update, also from Dell (@delldirect), on Chinese “twitter-like” site, Zuosa.com:

In just 114 characters, this Dell microblogger had managed to say the following:

Dell’s National Day Sale will run from Sept 11 to Oct 8. To celebrate the 60^th anniversary w. the motherland, Dell Home Computers is offering 6 cool gifts & deals on 10 computer models. These exciting offers will run non-stop for 4 weeks. Also, get a free upgrade to color casing & a 512MB independent graphics card, as well as other service upgrades. All offers are on a first-come-first-serve basis. What R U waiting 4? Act now!

It doesn’t look so “micro” now, does it? By using only part of their allowance, Dell managed to say the equivalent of 430 English-language characters.

When it comes to microblogs, I am less likely to read long updates; fat blocks of characters – English or Chinese – put me off.

Of course, not everyone is as lazy as me. However, companies should think about whether they should take advantage of these slightly less “micro” opportunities by writing longer updates. Personally, I think they shouldn’t. In this case, less is definitely more.

On November 21, the southwestern province of Yunnan launched China’s first official government microblog feed.

 
Among the first entries, which are published on the “Twitter-like” Sina microblog platform (新浪微博), was a post about a recent protest in the city of Kunming. The 130-Chinese-character response to the incident was rapid and relatively open.

Since its first post two weeks ago, the Yunnan government has updated its microblog 27 times, using the service to make various announcements, from manufacturing safety records to a drinking song competition in the province. At the time of writing, “Yunnan Microblog” (@云南微博) had 13,087 followers.

Governments use microblogging platforms to achieve various goals. A good microblog, for example, can allow governments to present a more “human” face. Yunnan Microblog, however, is currently little more than a news feed. Posts are written by “Yunnan,” rather than a person with a real name; and, with a couple of exceptions, the language used is dry and official sounding.

Governments can also use microblogs to monitor public sentiment. One of the ways Sina’s microblogging platform is different from Twitter is that it allows comments under each post. The Kunming protest entry, for example, received 41 comments. However, since Chinese social media platforms engage in self-censorship, Sina Microblog is unlikely to provide opportunities to speak out against government. As one person joked, “No comment… too afraid.”

This same feature could also have been used to create more interactive dialogue between netizens and the government. Yunnan Microblog, however, is yet use the platform to respond to any of its comments.

While conservative use of the platform, combined with China’s Internet restrictions, may limit the platform’s potential for meaningful engagement, Yunnan is certain to benefit in some way from this involvement in the online conversation. The provincial government and the public have a new direct link to one another. This, at the very least, is a step in the right direction.