Shanghai (PRWEB) August 16, 2013
FansTang, an Asia-focused digital media company, announced today that it has reached its 50 millionth follower across its social media accounts on China’s leading social networks: Sina Weibo, Tencent Weibo, RenRen and WeChat (similar to Twitter, Facebook and WhatsApp), and video portals, Youku, Tencent Video and Sohu Video (similar to YouTube) and possesses valuable data attached to these users.
Social media websites such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube, which are used every day by millions of people in the US, are blocked in China. FansTang has built a new kind of direct-to-consumer social media platform, enabling Western celebrities and athletes to build their awareness in China by speaking directly to millions of Chinese fans every day. FansTang gives Chinese fans the access and ability to see their favorite celebrities through their own country’s most popular social media sites all on one platform, given that they’re unable to access the rest of the world’s most popular social media channels directly.
Traditionally, Chinese social media has been very difficult for Western celebrities to access and develop a meaningful presence with fans in China because of the obvious language barrier and various competing social media platforms which have created a fragmented landscape. FansTang simplifies access by providing a one-stop solution with complete, bilingual and customized social media content specifically designed for each of its celebrity clients. FansTang educates Western celebrities using data acquired about their Chinese fan base, helping to ensure that social media posts achieve maximum engagement in the form of likes, comments and re-posts.
FansTang’s business approach is that, in order for Western celebrities to access the market opportunities in China, Western celebrities must engage directly with Chinese fans. To that effect, FansTang has built a platform to reach the millions and millions of Chinese fans that are increasingly engaged on China’s social media platforms.
China is the fastest growing market in the world, but monetizing this burgeoning market is no small feat. FansTang is tackling this challenge and succeeding in bridging the gap between the West and East by using a data-driven approach to develop China-specific content for an elite group of targeted celebrities that Chinese fans are most interested in for its social media platform.
As FansTang uses a data driven approach to its own business, it is acquiring vast amounts of data as the number of viewers and their level of engagement increases. This data is enormously valuable to brands, agencies and studios in both China and the US. With direct access to millions of highly engaged followers, substantial demographic data is collected from the over 150 Western celebrity accounts FansTang manages and is made available through the company’s proprietary analytics platform.
"The key to monetizing China, which I have learned after years of hard lessons, is to understand local Chinese consumers and provide them with what they want while creating competitive barriers in an area that local Chinese entrepreneurs cannot easily replicate on their own," says FansTang CEO Adam Roseman. "We are seeing success in doing this because we are bridging the gap between China and Hollywood, not only for fans, but for celebrities as well."
About FansTang:
FansTang is owned by China Branding Group, a venture backed company founded in 2012. With 50 employees and offices in Shanghai, Beijing, Guangzhou and Los Angeles, FansTang has built a new kind of direct-to-consumer social media platform enabling Western celebrities and athletes to build their awareness in China by speaking directly to millions of Chinese fans every day. Harnessing the power of existing Chinese social media platforms, FansTang helps its clients build strong, engaging and authentic relationships with Chinese fans and in turn, helps to monetize the relationships that celebrities and athletes build with their Chinese fans by arranging, brokering and overseeing opportunities for Western talent to endorse Chinese brands. FansTang has brokered and arranged more than USD$20 million of endorsement deals for Western celebrities and athletes in China over the past 12 months.