My Eastwei MSL colleagues Johan Bjorksten, Stephy Liu and Charlotta Lagerdahl have written an insightful whitepaper on microblogging in China (PDF). Stephy also wrote an article for Campaign Asia explaining how Sina Weibo in China is different from Twitter:

  1. Sina Weibo is integrated with the very popular Sina portal and blogging platform, so brands can run integrated campaigns more easily.
  2. Photos and videos are displayed inline under the posts on Sina Weibo, so brands can share multimedia content more easily. In addition 140 characters in Chinese say more than 140 characters in English, so brands can run their Sina Weibo accounts like Tumblr.
  3. Verified accounts on Sina Weibo get additional customization options, so most brands get their accounts verified.
  4. Comments are threaded under the posts on Sina Weibo, so brands can easily track the conversations they have started.
  5. Finally, the search and discovery functions on Sina Weibo are more advanced than Twitter, so brands can easily find influencers in their doman.

Most people outside China think that Sina Weibo is a Twitter clone, but, in many ways, it’s a more sophisticated web service than Twitter.

Also, while Sina Weibo is the most popular microblogging service in China, Sohu, 163, QQ, 139 and ifeng also have popular weibo services. In fact, microblogging is so popular in China that even vertical portals like finance portal Hexun are launching their own vertical focused weibos. So, while most people still associate the term ‘weibo’ with Sina Weibo, ‘weibo’ is quickly becoming a generic term for microblogging in China.

If you have played with weibos in China, do share your insights on microblogging in China in the comments section.