(Chinese Version)

Yesterday, many Chinese WeChat users might suddenly find their friends circles spammed with short videos. What happened?

Finally, WeChat allowed IOS users to choose videos in their albums and upload to their friends circles. The video can be either horizontal or vertical, but should be within ten seconds. Otherwise, users will have to cut it. Previously, WeChat users had to use WeChat’s“Little Video” function, shoot a short video (less than six seconds) and then share it in their friends circles.

The new function not only adds great fun for users when they want to share videos with WeChat friends circle, but also creates a massive marketing opportunity for many companies. Some companies attempted to grab this marketing opportunity and make lots of 10-second viral videos within a couple of hours after the new function was launched.

This is also a great opportunity for many video editing apps to repeat the phenomenal success of fotoplace and MYOTee, which both went viral in the Chinese mobile internet world for a while.

Among them, VUE is a potent competitor. Launched this June, VUE has already become the top priority for many users to edit videos on smartphones due to its carefully-designed filters and user-friendly interface. Coincidentally, VUE was also ranked as one of App Store’s 10 Best Apps of the Year in various regions, including mainland China, Taiwan, South Korea, etc.

Coincidentally, video editing app VUE was also ranked as one of App Store’s 10 Best Apps of the Year in various regions, including mainland China, Taiwan, South Korea, etc.

“We noticed WeChat’s update this morning and immediately introduced our update to users,” VUE’s CEO Kuang Fei told TMTpost in a well-thought-out manner when we approached him six hours after the new function was released. As a matter of fact, his team came to know that WeChat was going to release such function a month ago, and has already been busy preparing its update accordingly.

In this update, VUE allows users to shoot, edit and share vertical videos, adds new cover stickers and makes several filters available for free for a limited time. All these updates are aimed at encouraging users to upload videos edited by VUE to their WeChat friends circle and get more people to know VUE.

To make it easier for WeChat IOS users to shoot, edit and share vertical videos, VUE also released several stickers specially designed to match vertical videos.

Previously, since there’s no mature platform in mainland China where users could directly share edited videos with friends, VUE mainly target foreign markets where users could easily share videos edited by VUE on platforms such as Facebook and Instagram. After WeChat IOS’s update, however, it’s time VUE attaches similar importance to both mainland China and overseas market.

Statistics also prove that WeChat’s update is a boon for VUE. While VUE’s normal DAU is around 30,000 to 40,000, its DAU yesterday skyrocketed to over 120,000.

For short video editing apps similar to VUE, users’ willingness to share edited videos is highly important. This rule also applies to MiaoPai and Xiaokaxiu, two short video editing and sharing apps closely related to Sina Weibo. Generally, these apps first attracted users through its interesting functions and then keep users through nurturing high-quality video content providers.

For example, Chinese popular celebrity couple Jia Nailiang and Li Xiaolu often interact on Xiaokaxiu, which could amuse lots of their fans. Other actors and actresses would also upload funny videos and mock shows to their Xiaokaxiu accounts, encourage users to participate and comment, thus creating an active social community.

Compared to MiaoPai, Xiaokaxiu, or professional video editing apps such as Prisma and Philm, VUE focuses much attention on basic-level video editing. In other words, Chinese females are known to use MeituXiuiu to beautify their selfies (such as whitening their faces and removing acnes) before sharing them with friends. Although such photos are edited, they are still basically real and natural. VUE aims to do the same thing in video editing and become a top priority when people are looking for basic-level video editing apps.

“Video editing apps can generally be divided into two groups: professional tools such as iMoive, and fool-style ones such as Quik. VUE’s goal, however, is to allow users to edit videos professionally through easy approaches,”Kuang told TMTpost.

Yet, it’s no easy an attempt. While professionals could go through various procedures, including adjusting the color, rendering and cropping, etc. to edit a video, ordinary users couldn’t do so. Therefore, VUE only focuses its attention on color adjusting and cropping., two of the most important procedures in editing a video.

To achieve better color effect and integrate film-level color effect to its filters, VUE turned to Lao Xiangyuan, color effect advisor of films including Monkey King: Hero Is Back and I Am Not Madame Bovary. To make ordinary video contents stand out, VUE allows users to crop and switch video clips as they like.

To make ordinary video contents stand out, VUE focuses its attention on color adjusting and cropping, two of the most important procedures in editing a video

At the same time, VUE’s positioning also meets users’ expectation. Typical VUE’s users would edit videos about their daily life, traveling and playing with pets, while Xiaokaxiu and MeiPai’s users would prefer to make funny videos and Prisma’s users prefer to make their photos look more abstract.

Most VUE users would edit videos about their daily life

We learn from Kuang that VUE accumulated over 1.5 million users globally in a very short time thanks to official recommendation by App Store in various regions. As to the reason why VUE is recognized by Apple, Kuang believed that on the one hand, VUE’s interaction design met Apple’s standard; on the other hand, while Apple had been promoting dual camera lately, VUE also kept up with the trend and introduced relevant functions.

Next, VUE plans to gradually shift its focus from “tool” to “content” and conduct necessary content management among both global and domestic users. When asked if he feared that VUE would follow the path of fotoplace and MYOTee and gradually pale into insignificance, Kuang told TMTpost that there was fundamental difference between them.

“To survive for a long time, an app has to be able to satisfy users’ basic needs. I don't think fotoplace satisfy people’s basic needs. At most, fotoplace is like a game, whose life cycle is naturally very short. However, it’s a natural need for most people to edit videos and record their lives,”Kuang explained.

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[The article is published and edited with authorization from the author @Su Jianxun, please note source and hyperlink when reproduce.]

Translated by Levin Feng (Senior Translator at PAGE TO PAGE), working for TMTpost.