What WeChat can Learn from WhatsApp? Customer Value Proposition Development for Mobile Social Networking (MSN) Apps : A Case Study Approach

As a result of digital technology revolution and massive growth of smart phone usage, over 66% of world’s population (4.92 billion) is using mobile phones and over half of them are using social media. Mobile social networking (MSN) becomes one of the key communication tool, new trend, necessity and lifestyle. With information transparency, consumer value changes quickly, whilst rapid adaptation of similar offerings in the market place, it is essential for suppliers to keep pace with consumer value changes those directly affect the consumer satisfaction and loyalty. The research applies academic models and frameworks to the real life situation to develop a value proposition in the practical world by considering WeChat (1 billion active users) as the company under study and comparing it with WhatsApp (1.5 billion active users) as the leading competitor in the market. The objectives include identification of customers’ perception of a value for mobile social networking (MSN) services, followed by critical evaluation of existing value proposition of WeChat with Whatsapp to identify gap and finally to propose a new value proposition for WeChat. This paper first identifies customer perceived value (CPV) of mobile social networking (MSN) apps using Overby and Lee (2004) model followed by critical review of existing value proposition of WeChat and then comparing and contrasting with the leading player WhatsApp. Frameworks developed by Piercy (2009), Anderson J. et al. (2006) are employed for the same. Finally, the case develops new value proposition for WeChat by using Osterwalder et al 2014 and other frameworks. By the end of this research, a new consumer value proposition (CVP) proposal for WeChat is proposed for consideration in matching with the globally evaluated consumers’ value criteria