2 minute read
Media: Heartcore Consumer Technology Trends 2021
2020 Global state of Social Networks
Facebook entities still highly dominant.
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Rank | Social Network | MAUs in Millions | HQ
#1 | Facebook | 2603 | US
#2 | WhatsApp | 2000 | US
#3 | YouTube | 2000 | US
#4 | Messenger | 1300 | US
#5 | WeChat | 1203 | China
#6 | Instagram | 1082 | US
#7 | TikTok | 789 | China
#8 | QQ | 694 | China
#9 | Weibo | 550 | China
#10 | Qzone | 517 | China
#11 | Reddit | 430 | US
TikTok experienced massive growth in 2020...
According to parent company Bytedance, the current number of people on TikTok / Douyin is over 1.29 billion monthly active users, up from 500 million mid-2018.
The international version TikTok has over 689 million monthly active users (MAU's). China's version, named Douyin, has over 600 million daily active users.
... and is closing the gap with Western peers.
Instagram performed relatively poorly (growth and engagement-wise) during the Pandemic.
Legacy players are copying competitors fast to stay relevant.
Social landscape looking increasingly homogeneous.
Yet, TikT0k was intrinsically different.
TikTok has built its entire model around deeply personalized and automated interest graphs (vs legacy social graphs for Facebook/lnstagram/Twitter) which do not require explicit search intent or dependence on one's social circle interests.
"People looking for Content" to "Content looking for People"
Facebook/Instagram/Twitter/YouTube: People - Intent - Content
TikTok: People - AI Engine - Content
Vertical social networks are rising.
Social giants can't cater to everyone. The same way Craigslist got unbundled into vertical transactional websites offering tailored funnels, several verticalized social networks offer tailored full-stack experiences increasingly more compelling than horizontal incumbents. From Gaming to Fintech to Beauty & Sports and more.
Some vertical networks are experiencing massive growth.
Who would have predicted that one of the fastest-growing network in 2020 would be a verticalized adult-content platform?
Vertical networks tend to monetize better.
New monetization layers are usually natively incorporated into these networks.
Social & direct commerce are converging.
Direct commerce is slowly but surely emerging as a compelling monetization layer for these networks.
The combination of unique social graphs, deep end-user engagement & native video embedding capabilities seems like a fantastic recipe for the emergence of several 21st century QVC players.
