Kuaishou once again launched an attack on the overseas short video market. Recently, it launched a new short-video app called Snack Video on Google Play targeting overseas users. Unlike its other overseas short video product, Kwai, Snack Video has a recommendation algorithm that can more accurately push the video content that users like, and the functional interface is very similar to TikTok's.
The development of overseas markets has always been an important strategy for Kuaishou, but this road has not gone smoothly. First of all, it was defeated by ByteDance and lost the opportunity to acquire the popular video app Musical.ly. Then the overseas main product Kwai was frustrated in competition, whose team changed coaches, the staff size shrank, and the Southeast Asian and Indian businesses were forced to press the pause button. It wasn't until September 2019 that Kuaishou recruited again and restarted overseas markets.
Nowadays, Kuaishou and ByteDance are two of the biggest players in the lucrative short video market, so a hard fight between them is inevitable. Although Kuaishou once again challenged TikTok, it still couldn't keep up. According to Sensor Tower data, in January 2020, TikTok's global downloads reached 104 million, ranking first; Kuaishou ranked eighth, and Kwai did not even enter the top ten list.
However, Kuaishou's competitor is not only ByteDance, but also the world's giants including JOYY Inc., Alibaba and Facebook. The competition in the short video market is intensifying, and who can win the top spot is not yet known. With the launch of Snack Video, can Kuaishou beat TikTok to dominate the short video market?
The battle between Kuaishou and Douyin in overseas markets
According to PEdaily.cn (ID: pedaily2012), Kuaishou recently launched a new short video product Snack Video in the overseas Google Play app store. The related icons have also been applied for registration and the status was pending review.
According to Tech Planet (ID: tech618), Snack Video is very similar to Douyin / TikTok, and has a recommendation algorithm to watch all types of popular videos more accurately. From a functional point, it is divided into 5 functional areas including "Home", "Discovery", "Shooting", "Message" and "Personal Center". Users can see the short video content when they enter the Snack Video homepage. When the user likes the short video, the algorithm will automatically recommend related short video content. The homepage contains the same city, you can view short videos taken by nearby users.
Strictly speaking, Snack Video is Kuaishou's second international offering after Kwai. And it is given a recommendation algorithm that is obviously different from Kwai, which focuses on inclusiveness and gives opportunities to ordinary people.
Since Kuaishou restarted its layout of overseas market in mid-2019, it has carried out some new actions continuously. First of all, it entered the Brazil market and launched two main products in Brazil, namely Kwai and VStatus. According to the data released in the second half of 2019, Kwai has been welcomed by users in Brazil. It has repeatedly topped the Brazilian application list, and another product, VStatus, ranked second in Brazil.
In November of the same year, Kuaishou announced a "Creator Recruitment Plan" in Brazil. It plans to build a team with no less than 1,000 creators in the future to bring better content and product experiences to users and traffic support for talented people in Brazil. At the same time, Kuaishou announced that the number of Kwai's daily active users reached 7 million in Brazil.
In order to stand firmly in Brazil, Kuaishou's overseas layout dare not slack. In March this year, Kuaishou posted a job search for video content operations and social media operations personnel in Mexico and Argentina, aiming to enter the Mexican and Argentina markets.
The period of Kuaishou entering overseas markets is precisely the gold time for short videos to enter the overseas markets. From the beginning, Kuaishou was based on the neighboring country, South Korea, and then entered Russia, India, and Southeast Asian countries. It has been on the top of the list and also fallen off the list. Behind repeated tossing is Kuaishou's ambition of globalization.
Kuaishou eventually lost to ByteDance
From home to abroad, ByteDance is the biggest competitor of Kuaishou. Earlier, the data company App Annie announced the top 52 global publishers in 2019. Comparing with its 2018 list, it can be found that Kuaishou who ranked 47 in the previous year had been squeezed out of the list. At the same time, there are no Kuaishou in China's top 30 overseas revenue earners. In the ranking of the top 30 downloaders, Kuaishou ranked 17th, and there was a big gap between ByteDance, which topped the list.
In fact, the gap between Kuaishou and ByteDance has already appeared in Musical.ly's acquisition, which is the first confrontation between the two in overseas markets. In November 2017, both Kuaishou and ByteDance were bidding for Musical.ly, hoping to quick their overseas layout.
A person familiar with the matter disclosed the details of the negotiation: Kuaishou was the first to negotiate with Musical.ly. But Fu Sheng, an angel investor in Musical.ly, asked the buyer to acquire its two other overseas products (News Republic and Live. me), which was strongly opposed by Kuaishou.
When Kuaishou was hesitant, ByteDance immediately took off, and finally bought Musical.ly at a valuation of 1 billion US dollars, which contributed to the most important acquisition in the history of short video. With the support of Musical.ly's popularity and the large user base, TikTok quickly established a foothold in the North American market.
After missing the opportunity, Kuaishou was in a mess. There is neither a well-established operation and a model that can be directly applied into the overseas markets, nor a clear strategy. Although it has also rushed to the top of the list in many markets, this situation has not lasted long, and the ranking has slowly dropped out of the queue.
In terms of data performance, according to App Annie's data in December 2018, the Google play sub list of Kwai's most advanced Korean market, which attacked and maintained its advantages, was hovering at more than 30, with poor results. Another data shows that TikTok appeared in the top 20 free App Store lists in many countries and regions around the world, but no Kwai appears in these lists.
The data has not improved for a long time, and Kuaishou's overseas team began to make adjustment. First of all, at the beginning of 2018, two overseas products were integrated, and the size of the team was reduced to achieve two-in-one; then the strategy was adjusted in mid-July. Kwai expanded the staff size, and then adjusted and optimized again. However, the biggest action was the departure of the person in charge at the end of the year.
At the end of 2018, the overseas team led by Liu Xinhua made a large-scale personnel adjustment. Some of the original team of the overseas team followed Liu Xinhua and left Kuaishou, and many of them returned to Kuaishou's domestic product department. What followed was that Kuaishou stopped being launched in the Indian and Southeast Asian markets.
Overseas business has been combined and adjusted many times. The leader left before the war, and two popular markets India and Southeast Asia was delayed. All the signs indicate that Kuaishou is frustrated in overseas wars.
Chinese players dominate the global short video market
Half a year later, Kuaishou returned to the market and fired the first shot in Brazil.
At the time, Tik Tok had not yet targeted the South American market on a large scale, and with the support of Tencent, Kwai seized the opportunity in Brazil. App Annie data shows that from June to August 2019, Kwai ranked fifth in the Brazilian app download list, while Tik Tok ranked 117.
However, there are no opponents that ByteDance can't catch up. In mid-December, Brazil's Tik Tok had already caught up with Kwai on Google Play's popular app rankings, both of which ranked in Top 5. The Brazilian market is considered to be a relatively successful overseas layout for Kuaishou. But in Brazil, Kuaishou's threats are not just ByteDance.
According to rough statistics, there are no fewer than 6 Chinese short video apps that enter the Brazilian market. In addition to TikTok, VStatus, the video editing application produced by Kwai and Kuaishou, there is also the short video application Likee and the short video production tool Noizz, the video tool community Lomotif, the WhatsApp status video capture tool Zapee and so on.
Among them, Likee and Noizz were also ranked by App Annie as the top 2 of the world's top 10 breakthrough apps in 2019. According to data updated by SimilarWeb on February 26, in the Google Play App Ranking in Brazil, Kwai ranked 32nd, Noizz ranked 44th, and TikTok ranked 50th.
Looking at the huge global market, you can also see some familiar figures, such as Internet giant Alibaba. In May 2019, UC-incubated Indian short video product VMate entered the market with a financing of over USD 100 million from Alibaba. In less than half a year, the number of VMate's monthly active users has increased from 30 million to 50 million, making it the third-largest short video platform after TikTok and Likeee in the Indian market.
The pressure comes from all directions, and TikTok has become the "eye-catcher" of everyone. Before that, ByteDance had made new personnel changes, and global CEO Zhang Yiming said he would devote more time and energy to overseas markets. This also means that the battle for the overseas short video market is about to usher in a new round of climax.
However, the Chinese short video apps also face siege and market squeeze from the world's giants represented by Facebook. Meanwhile, regulations and restrictions on short video by national regulatory authorities are big pressures for all players.
Last month, two US senators introduced a new bill requiring all employees of the federal government to prohibit the use of TikTok on government-issued equipment. Prior to this, TikTok received injunctions issued by the US Department of State, Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security and the US Transportation Security Administration due to issues such as violation of user privacy, misuse of data, and threats to network security.
The Chinese short video to enter the overseas markets is not easy. Nowadays, the short video competition is still fierce in the overseas markets, and all players have their own ambitions. Who can be the winner is unknown.
When talking about success and failure, Su Hua once said: If it fails, change the posture and try again. This time, what kind of mark will SnackVideo leave on the overseas Chinese short video history?
This is an article from WeChat official accounts PEdaily (ID: pedaily2012), written by Zhou Jiali, translated by Chris Yuan.