500 million RMB were given away yesterday during “Chunwan”, the most popular TV program on earth which was viewed by about 800 millions people. Chunwan is the show broadcasted on Chinese New Year by the official Chinese TV Channel CCTV, and watching it is a tradition for most families across China.
Which requirements?
3 key requirements were set for users to get a chance to win:
– Enable “Shake” function, the feature of WeChat enabling users to locate nearby WeChat users or promotions
– Use WeChat in Chinese – the English and Chinese versions of WeChat are still widely different, and the Chinese version includes a vast range of additional features
– Use the very latest version of WeChat
After the update, the “shake” function of users would get a special “Chinese New Year” design:
How to win?
“Red enveloppes” were given at 3 points in the evening:
– Beginning of Chunwan (8pm)
– Middle of Chunwan (10:30pm)
– End of Chunwan (midnight)
At each of these moments, users were being notified by the host, shake your phone and get a chance to win!
7 billion shakes
At 10:30pm, Tencent recording more than 7 billion shakes, peaking at 800 million shakes per second from their users. This tremendous success is a reminder of how popular WeChat is among Chinese users, and not only so among the younger users. WeChat has indeed succeeded beyond the achievements of its Western counterparts in reaching users of all age groups and professional backgrounds, thus leading to the tremendous numbers described above.
Other interactive features during Chunwan
During “Chunwan”, other features were provided like:
– Uploading pictures of you and your family to be displayed on the big screen
– Special wishes from celebrities
– Checking the schedule of Chunwan
The Hongbao war
WeChat is not the only service enabling to get Hongbao: QQ (the other messaging system from Tencent) and Alipay are also giving red enveloppes to their users during Chinese New Year, sometimes on a daily basis.
Red enveloppes are given either under the form of cash or coupon to be used on the Chinese online e-commerce platforms (in the case of Alipay)