Will QQ red envelopes be able to stop Alipay’s counterattack?

In just over 30 days, it will be the Chinese New Year's Eve that people all over the country are looking forward to. During the Spring Festival in 2014, WeChat made grabbing red envelopes a trend, and its influence has continued to this day. The most active moments in WeChat groups are usually when someone is sending red envelopes. WeChat red envelopes have obviously become Tencent's biggest killer in the mobile payment market.

Spring Festival red envelopes affect the mobile payment landscape

The popularity of WeChat red envelopes during the Spring Festival of the Year of the Horse also impacted Alipay's leading position in the mobile payment field. Jack Ma even compared the sudden entry of WeChat red envelopes to the "Pearl Harbor attack." Although Tencent Tenpay denied the rumor that red envelopes caused the number of WeChat card-linked users to surge to 100 million, the gameplay of sending and grabbing red envelopes, which conforms to the traditional Chinese habits, is slowly changing the mobile payment landscape.

Alipay, striving to maintain its leading position, certainly did not want to miss the peak marketing season of the Spring Festival. In fact, Alipay’s red envelopes were launched one day earlier than WeChat’s red envelopes during the Year of the Horse Spring Festival, but unfortunately, the social attribute was too weak to interact, and it could only watch WeChat’s red envelopes take the lead. Facing the upcoming Year of the Goat Spring Festival, Alipay certainly did not dare to be careless and started to build momentum 40 days in advance. Its investment promotion plan has been disclosed on Weibo.

Mobile QQ joins the Spring Festival red envelope competition

But unlike the Spring Festival in the Year of the Horse, Alipay red envelopes will face another competitor, QQ red envelopes, in addition to WeChat red envelopes. Well-known media outlet Ebrun recently broke the news that mobile QQ is calling on brands to place advertisements and use Spring Festival red envelopes for social marketing. It is reported that mobile QQ's Spring Festival red envelopes mainly include two ways of playing: receiving red envelopes through group commands and receiving red envelopes through Spring Festival Gala voting. The main tool used is QQ Wallet. The WeChat red envelopes' Spring Festival investment promotion plan was disclosed as early as the end of last month. This means that the two Tencent giants will join forces to block Alipay during the Spring Festival in the Year of the Sheep. (The picture below shows a manufacturer's mobile QQ Spring Festival red envelope mobilization meeting)

According to the financial report data released by Tencent, as of the third quarter of 2014, the number of monthly active accounts of mobile QQ was 542 million, more than 70 million more than the 468 million monthly active accounts of WeChat, and the number of paid registered accounts for QQ value-added services was 89 million.

During the Spring Festival of the Year of the Horse, WeChat became famous for its red envelopes in mobile payments, but the scale was not large enough. This time, Alipay Wallet entered the Spring Festival red envelope market with three major Alibaba platforms, Weibo, Taobao Mobile , and Youku. WeChat red envelopes must feel the pressure. Tencent's largest mobile social platform, QQ Mobile, joined the Spring Festival red envelope battle and joined hands with WeChat to block Alipay. The Spring Festival red envelope battle of the Year of the Sheep will definitely be full of highlights.

The mobile payment market is only a matter of time before it explodes

After the release of the new version in early 2014, mobile QQ began to support QQ Wallet for iOS, completing the dual-system layout of QQ Wallet for Android and iOS. Ma Huateng has always emphasized that "WeChat and mobile QQ are two legs to walk on", and unlike WeChat, QQ had a large number of paying users in the PC era, and now the number has reached 89 million. These users have been successfully migrated to mobile QQ, becoming a strong pillar that can compete with Alipay. (Note: The number of active users of Alipay Wallet is 190 million.)

The core reason why Alipay's red envelopes started early and arrived late during the Spring Festival of the Year of the Horse is that the social attributes are too poor. Users basically only make one-time operations on Alipay wallets and do not stay. Social networking is the area where mobile QQ and WeChat are best at. The lively interactions in various groups are also a major reason why users stay on mobile QQ and WeChat for a long time. Mobile QQ has more than 500 million monthly active accounts, and the maximum number of simultaneous online accounts on the entire QQ platform has reached 217 million. In contrast, Weibo, the largest social platform of Alibaba, has 167 million monthly active users, less than one-third of mobile QQ. Mobile QQ, which has the largest user base, is still short of a detonation point to enter the mobile payment market, and the Spring Festival red envelopes may be this detonation point.

Alipay and Weibo are trying to catch up with WeChat red envelopes in the social field, but they didn't expect that mobile QQ would also join the battle. Facing the attack from the two social giants of mobile QQ and WeChat, does Alipay red envelope still have a chance to break through? The ending is likely to be similar to the Spring Festival of the Year of the Horse, when Alipay's carefully prepared red envelope plan was overshadowed by mobile QQ and WeChat.

Behind the battle for the Spring Festival red envelopes is the competition between Tencent and Alibaba for the mobile payment market. From the battle for the red envelopes during the Spring Festival of the Year of the Horse to the subsidy war between Tencent's Didi Dache and Alibaba's Kuaidi Dache throughout 2014, they are all competing for mobile payment users. As mobile payment becomes more and more popular offline, this mobile payment war will intensify.

It is foreseeable that after the Spring Festival red envelope war in the Year of the Goat, mobile payment will form a "WAQ Three Kingdoms" situation, and the Tencent mobile payment alliance composed of mobile QQ and WeChat will threaten Alipay's market share. Since mobile QQ and WeChat have many overlapping users, if the payment systems of the two platforms can be connected and form a synergy, it may drive a new round of growth in card-binding users and may also add more variables to the mobile payment market.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.