Baidu Webmaster Platform provides tools to optimize Chinese websites. It has been in invitation-only testing for over a year and it’s just launched public beta. Baidu Webmaster Tools, compared to Google Webmaster Tools, are very basic and premature providing six tools for webmasters: 1. Sitemap Submission to Baidu Webmasters can use Sitemap tool to submit […]
3 Most Popular Social Bookmarking Services in China
The top three most popular social bookmarking services are Jiathis, bShare and Passit. Let’s take a look at each of them in more details. JiaThis JiaThis claims they’re the largest social bookmarking service provider in China (which I believe is true) and their social booking tools are implemented by over 310K websites including large sites […]
Baidu Shutting Down Its Weibo Service
Baidu yesterday announced it’s shutting down its “Weibo” service, t.baidu.com, by 22 August. Baidu’s Weibo service “Shuo Ba” (or “Talk Bar” in English) started in September last year with a real-name system requiring all registration to be verified via a mobile phone and photos. Having gained no popularity with its real-name system, Baidu made it […]
Stunning Transformers Display on Baidu Zhidao
Users who conducted a search using “transformers” on Baidu Zhidao (Baidu Answers) saw a pretty cool transformation animation as shown above; it’s not a flash but Javascript that creates this effect. Now we all know Baidu can be very creative too.
Taobao Imagine: An Image Search Engine for Shoppers
Last Tuesday, Taobao launched their image search engine Imagine for online shoppers. The idea is simple: if a Chinese netizen sees something she likes and wanted to buy, she can search for that product as long as she has the image of that product.
“Maybe Genre” Gone Viral on Renren
One status update on Renren account by the name of Yuqing Fan got over hundreds of thousands of replies, reposts and imitations. A direct translation of the original post by Miss Fan is,
Baidu Launched Audit Tool for SEO
Baidu just added a new SEO audit tool in Baidu Stats, which checks and grades websites on six factors: The length of URL. Baidu’s official recommendation is, the length of URL should be no longer than 255 bytes. The use of dynamic parameters. This is to avoid duplicate content. Meta data. The absence and generic […]
Chart: What Would Unsatisfied China Online Shopper Do?
According to a survey conducted by iResearch during last December and this January, almost half online shoppers will complain by making a phone call to the customer service and leave a complaint on online retailer’s website. Nearly 20% unsatisfied online shopper will simply never buy from that online retailer; a small percentage of online shoppers may […]
Government Responded in Weibo for Criticism
I know there are a lot of things the Chinese government should do to improve; but the incidents in Huili county of Sichuan Province surprised me; twice. Huili is a small county in southwest Sichuan Province with less than half a million residents. Its website recently published a piece of news of three government officials […]
Baidu Announced $306 Million Strategic Investment in Qunar.com
Travel search engine Qunar.com received USD 306 million strategic investment from Baidu, which makes Baidu the biggest institutional shareholder. 306 million is the biggest strategic investment in online travel market in China and also the biggest one for Baidu so far. Qunar and Baidu will work closely together in the product line and branding to promote […]
Case Study: 3 Lessons on Weibo Marketing
The heavy storm yesterday afternoon in Beijing flooded some areas and stopped the operation of several lines of subway. However, there were a few lessons marketers can learn on social media marketing on Weibo from how some Chinese companies took advantage of the storm. Lesson 1: Monitor the conversation & take advantage of trending topic […]
Baidu launched Baidu Jingyan, a Knol clone.
Baidu has been internal testing a Knol clone, called Baidu Jingyan (“Jingyan” means “experience”) for a while and it has just launched it.
Benz sold 205 smart in three and half hours on Taobao
About two weeks ago on Sep 6 2010, Benz put up its 200 “smart” cars on Taobao‘s Groupon-like website offering 23% discount. Mediaedge:cia was the agency behind this campaign and the plan was to sell 200 “smart” cars on Taobao in three weeks’ time. Surprisingly, all cars were sold out in three and half hours. […]
Tencent Launched Social Networking Site: “Friends”
Tencent last week launched a new social networking website in China called “Peng You” which means “Friends” in English. Pengyou clearly targets two groups of audience, “students” and “white collar workers”. At first login, users will be asked to select which group they belong to: The “students” SNS features come from Tencent’s previous product called […]
Google.cn stopping to redirect to HK with a deceptive landing page
As Google’s Internet Content Provider (ICP) license is up for renewal on June 30 in China, Google now has a new approach to handle Google.cn visitors.