Bytedance tries again to break WeChat’s hold on Chinese social media

Bytedance Technologies may have carved out a swathe of China’s online traffic with its popular short-video and news aggregation apps, but the Beijing-based company has yet to break Tencent Holdings’ grip on social networking. It’s not for want of trying.

In at least the third attempt in the past year, Bytedance will try to crack the market for social networking among China’s 829 million internet users with a group chat within its popular Douyin short-video app. Friends who follow each other’s accounts can start a chat group to share text, photos, audio, and videos on the app.

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The in-app functions allow users to share Douyin videos instantly into a group chat instead of downloading them and going outside the app to share it on other platforms.

“Douyin private messaging has been equipped with relevant basic function after it upgraded to Duoshan,” according to a company spokeswoman. Duoshan, which translates to “many flashes,” is Bytedance’s standalone social messaging app launched in January 2019.

The app, which requires a Douyin account and mainland phone number to log in, focuses one’s video messaging with close friends.

The latest offering from Bytedance steps up advances made by China’s major internet companies to build ecosystems and various platforms that can host multiple services, delivering greater convenience to consumers in the world’s largest smartphone market.

Douyin, for example, has already integrated external online shopping links from Alibaba Group Holding’s Taobao Marketplace and Tmall platforms.

It is also another attempt by Bytedance to break the grip of Tencent’s WeChat on China’s social networking. Currently, Douyin video links cannot be opened on WeChat, depriving the former of a big source of potential referral traffic as the latter has 1.1 billion daily active users.

Duoshan has slid down the rankings from first to 15th place for the Chinese app store in the social networking category after its launch in January, according to data provider Qimai.

The app lets users send text messages and stickers, as well as share images and videos accessible for up to 72 hours – features that invite comparison to those of US multimedia messaging app Snapchat and social network Instagram.

FeiLiao, or Flipchat in English, is the other social app that Bytedance recently launched. It comes with an instant messaging system and interest-based forums. It was removed from Apple’s app store two months after its first launch and before returning in July.

Some Douyin users are still unaware of the new messaging function. “I only use Douyin to watch videos for fun. I didn’t use it to social and don’t have many friends on the app,” said Sherry Zhang, 23, who uses Douyin daily.

Besides Douyin, Bytedance also operates the Huoshan and Xigua short-video apps, which compete with Kuaishou, Baidu’s Haokan and Quanmin, as well as Tencent’s Weishi and Yoo, according to China Internet Report.