WeChat, a social media platform with mobile messaging communication service that was developed since 2011 by Tencent in China, has added new features to its platform, to boost user experience and to MAKE ONLINE chatting more interactive, with an expanded Close User Group (CUG).

Although WeChat is not as popular in Nigeria and most African countries, its rich contents and the expanded CUG system, which allows up to 300 people in a single user group, has made it most popular in Europe and Asia, especially in China, and today, it is ranked the second most used social media application in the world after Facebook.

Introducing WeChat at a recent media session in Lagos, Regional Manager, West Africa for WeChat, Mr. Idemudia Dima-Okojie, said the social media platform has been redesigned and loaded with more fun and more social activities that will also drive business among users. WeChat could be downloaded free of charge from the Apps Store on any smartphone and personal computers.

Speaking on the additional features, Dima-Okojie, said the social media platform allows members of a group to monitor their followers and readers, and have idea of the number of people that listen to their broadcast and programmes. Prominent among the additional features  is the creation of Official Account (OA) application, which is a channel that enables brand or business owners to actively communicate and engage with their audience or followers in a variety of ways on a personal level.

CUG members, he said, could use the platform to make voice calls, video calls, locate members on realtime, send SMS, vote, chat, listen to radio and television programmes and broadcast, and also send text messages to members of the group while a television programme is being broadcast.

Another additional feature, according to Dima-Okojie, is that listening to radio programmes, television broadcast on WeChat, chatting, sending SMS, voice calls and video calls are all free of charge, even though they run on data that could be managed by the user.

Other features on the OA apps, include one-on-one brand engagement, running of competition, running renewed programmes, running polls to get user data, location-based services, push notification, integrate group chats, among other special functionalities based on request.

Another aspect of WeChat is that it is a platform that allows each content provider to develop his or her own data and also manage the data themselves without interference.

Since it is a platform that accommodates radio and television broadcast, Dima-Okojie, said WeChat is making arrangement to sign on with more local radio and television stations in Nigeria, including online content providers like Konga and Jumia, to further enrich users experience on the social media platform.

Once an official account is set up, WeChat will be available across multiple platforms, without the need to build native apps for each mobile platform.
WeChat is available on mobile such as apps store, google play, windows phone, Nokia Symbian Operating System, and Blackberry. It is also available on Personal Computers (PC) such as Mac App Store and Web WeChat.


Source:

http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/wechat-adds-new-features-to-social-media/204512/

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