Brussels Airport has been active on the leading social media channels such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Instagram for years in an effort to keep its passengers as well and as promptly informed as possible about the ins and outs at the airport. It has recently added a channel to this list: WeChat! This app is used mainly in China. Brussels Airport created an account to be able to communicate easier with its Chinese travellers and to help them find their way through the airport.
Unlike in the West, Facebook, Twitter or Instagram are not among the most used apps in China. WeChat (微信,Weixin) is the biggest player there, an app published by the Chinese firm Tencent in 2011. The app is difficult to compare with an app we know here. It comprises various apps such as Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and payment applications in one. With WeChat, you can thus manage accounts and purchase or pay for goods and services, such as an air ticket or a taxi. QR codes also constitute an important feature on the app. These codes are used primarily to add contacts and to pay for your favourite purchases in a shop.
Our Chinese travellers cannot always use our biggest social media channels in their country because of network security. To facilitate our communication with these travellers, Brussels Airport created a WeChat account.
In 2018, WeChat had 1.08 billion daily users. More than 50% of these users spent more than an hour and a half per day on the app. Last year, some 45 billion messages were sent and 410 million calls were made daily. It is high time therefore to jump on the bandwagon of this popular app!
Those of us with a smattering of Chinese should definitely take a look and scan our personal Brussels Airport QR code!
