Weibo regained momentum in 2016

Daily average video views on Sina Weibo, the leading social media in China, increased seven times year-over-year, surpassing 2 billion in the fourth quarter of 2016. Video advertising, launched in the second quarter of 2016, contributed over 10% of its total advertising revenue in the second half of the year, according to Sina Weibo.

Though the total user base and usage of Twitter-like services in China began to decline in 2013, Sina Weibo regained momentum in 2016 thanks to the significant consumption growth in short videos and live video streams, especially the former.

Sina Weibo monthly active users reached 313 million and total revenue was US$212.7 million in the fourth quarter of 2016. 90% of the monthly active users accessed Weibo on mobile in December 2016, up from 83% a year ago.

Mobile short video sector saw explosive growth in China in 2016.

“We’re seeing advertisers shifting their ad budget to mobile, social and video ads”, Wang Gaofei, CEO of Sina Weibo, said in November 2016. At the same time, TV ratings are going down in China, Charles Chao, Chairman of Sina Weibo, said so on today’s earnings conference call, so the company expected TV ad spending would shift increasingly to online.

The list prices for Weibo’s video ads were much higher than their previous offerings, according to CFO Herman Yu. Total advertising revenue, which represents 87% of Weibo’s total annual revenue, increased over 40% in 2016 from the previous year.