BEIJING, March 29 (TMTPOST) – The commercialization of WeChat Channels, a short video-sharing platform launched in January 2020, has been thrust into the spotlight since an offline WeChat Open Class Pro held by Chinese tech giant Tencent’s WeChat in Guangzhou on Tuesday.

The meeting also unveiled updates on several functions, including WeChat Channels, WeChat Mini Program, WeChat Pay, WeChat Work, and WeChat Search. The focus is on accelerating the commercialization of WeChat Channels.

2022 witnessed significant growth in the commercialization of WeChat Channels. According to data released by the open class, total hours spent on the platform increased threefold year-on-year, its live streaming sales revenue increased eightfold year-on-year, and the total income of anchors increased by 447% year-on-year. Ma Huateng, known as Pony Ma, the chairman of the board and CEO of Tencent, stated in an internal staff meeting in December 2022 that WeChat Channels was the best-performing business of the WeChat Business Group and the hope of the whole company. Last Thursday, Tencent President Liu Chiping revealed at a financial report meeting that WeChat Channels’ revenue had exceeded 1 billion yuan in the fourth quarter of 2022, with plenty of room for future growth.

During the open class, WeChat employees hosted a special session on WeChat Channels livestreaming sales, sharing start-up strategies, successful cases and playbooks with merchants and service providers in industries such as apparel, cosmetics, food, and jewelry. WeChat encourages merchants to bring private traffic into the live streaming sessions, extend the length of live streaming, and purchase paid traffic to expand the audience size. The company aims to attract more influencers and MCN companies to the platform to drive overall sales. Furthermore, localized life services will become one of the platform’s core directions. WeChat Channels is currently testing a local component to better support local businesses, which can allow merchants to sell group purchase vouchers at WeChat Channels. The component is being tested internally and is expected to be officially launched in May this year.

During the development of the closed loop for livestream e-commerce, WeChat Channels is also focusing on expanding its content ecosystem. Zhang Xiaochao, a Vice President of Tencent and the head of the platform, said that the platform would help creators increase their income through a new creator revenue sharing plan and a paid subscription feature for quality content creators. This new feature will allow creators to set up a paid content area where users become members by paying a monthly fee. The quality content with original declaration will enjoy a series of rights and benefits, including advertising sharing in the comment section, original content protection, and priority recommendation in platform distribution.

The video-sharing platform is also being aligned with other sections of WeChat. According to Zhang, the company has spent the past year linking WeChat Channels with existing WeChat platforms, making it an essential content component within the app. The open class also announced new features of other platforms. For example, WeChat Pay is attempting to launch a “palm-swiping service”, allowing users to verify their identity by swiping their palms. This feature will support membership cards, campus cards, transportation cards, electronic ticket codes, and gate passes.