腾讯将借人工智能和游戏发力广告业务

Chinese internet giant Tencent aims to increase advertising income by using artificial intelligence and branded virtual costumes in video games, but is reluctant to put more advertising on its flagship WeChat social network, according to the group’s executive in charge of digital advertising.

中国互联网巨头腾讯(Tencent)负责数字广告的高管表示，该公司力求通过利用人工智能以及视频游戏中的品牌虚拟服装来增加广告收入，而不愿在其旗舰微信(WeChat)社交网络上投放更多广告。

Ad revenues drive earnings for most of the tech world, but not in China. Tencent’s WeChat network is approaching half Facebook’s 2bn users, but digital ad revenues this year are forecast at under $7bn, compared with the US social media group’s $36bn-plus, according to eMarketer.

广告营收驱动着大多数科技公司的盈利，但中国的情况有所不同。根据eMarketer的统计，腾讯旗下的微信在用户数量上接近Facebook 20亿用户的一半，但今年其数字广告营收预计在70亿美元以下，远低于Facebook这家美国社交媒体集团的360亿美元以上。

Tencent, the world’s eighth biggest company by market capitalisation, generates most of its revenues from video games such as the smash hit Honour of Kings — the world’s top grossing title — but hopes to shift towards advertising, now less than 20 per cent of revenue.

按市值排列为全球第八大公司的腾讯，大部分营收来源于视频游戏，例如世界上收入最高的手机游戏《王者荣耀》(Honour of Kings)，但它希望增加目前在总营收中占比不到20%的广告收入。

“For internet companies, the most popular model all over the world is advertising . . . so we are working on that,” Steven Chang, a Tencent vice-president, told the Financial Times.

“对互联网公司来说，世界各地最流行的模式是广告……所以我们正在这方面发力，”腾讯副总裁郑香霖(Steven Chang)告诉英国《金融时报》。

He cited data showing China’s overall advertising market will grow about 4 per cent this year, while digital ad growth will be about 30 per cent, suggesting that — as in other parts of the world — digital platforms are drawing spending away from traditional media.

他援引的数据显示，今年中国整体广告市场将增长约4%，而数字广告增幅将达到约30%，这似乎表明，就像世界上其他地方一样，数字平台正从传统媒体夺走广告支出。

“Digital is getting bigger and we are one of the big players in digital. So obviously we will be getting more [advertising] budget, from TV budgets or whatever.”

“数字业务越来越大，而我们是数字领域的大企业之一。所以很明显，我们会获得更多的(广告)预算，无论是从电视广告预算还是从其它什么预算。”

With its top mobile games attracting tens of millions of players each day, “lots of marketers would like to work with games. We are looking at different angles of developing game-related solutions,” said Mr Chang.

鉴于腾讯的顶级手机游戏每天吸引数千万玩家，“许多营销者都想与游戏合作。我们正在研究从不同的角度开发游戏相关解决方案，”郑香霖表示。

He cited the example of a BMW-branded “skin” that is worn by virtual characters in Honour of Kings, which Tencent says was adopted by professional gamers and, as a result, seen by about 500m viewers of live-streamed tournaments.

他举了《王者荣耀》中的角色所穿戴的宝马(BMW)品牌“皮肤”的例子。据腾讯表示，这款皮肤被专业游戏玩家所采用，因此在现场直播比赛中被大约5亿观众看到。

The company’s online content services, such as a video-streaming site similar to YouTube and news feeds accessible via the WeChat platform, account for most of Tencent’s advertising revenues, said Mr Chang.

郑香霖介绍说，该公司的在线内容服务，例如与YouTube类似的一个视频流网站，以及通过微信平台可访问的新闻资讯，目前占腾讯广告营收的大部分。

The company is using AI to target advertising, for example at basketball fans. “If you are hungry for that, we keep feeding more NBA related information to you, at the same time possibly you are the one that we can provide Nike shoes for . . . we are providing this technology to clients already," said Mr Chang.

该公司正在利用人工智能来定向投放广告，例如针对篮球迷。“如果你对那方面的信息情有独钟，我们会不断向你输送更多的NBA相关信息，同时你可能属于我们可以推介耐克(Nike)鞋的人群……我们已经在向客户提供这种技术，”郑香霖表示。

But Tencent is reluctant to place more adverts on Wechat’s Moments service, which is similar to Facebook’s news feed. “WeChat is still very young so how to cultivate users and create a good user experience is number one, it’s not the advertising revenue,” he said.

但是腾讯不愿在微信的朋友圈(Moments)——类似于Facebook的新闻Feed——投放更多广告。“微信还很年轻，所以要把培养用户、创造良好的用户体验放在第一位，而不是广告营收，”他说。

Companies buying online advertising in China and overseas have complained about widespread fraud from automated programs generating fake viewer numbers.

在中国和海外购买在线广告的企业抱怨自动化程序存在普遍欺诈现象，产生虚假受众人数。

At a conference in Shanghai on Tuesday, Tencent’s chief operating officer Yuxin Ren complained of fraudsters who, “through control of many different IP addresses, can imitate a huge number of real users”, thus inflating their ad revenue.

周二在上海举行的一个会议上，腾讯首席运营官任宇昕抱怨说，“羊毛党他们通过掌控大量不同IP地址的机器，模拟成大量的真实用户，可以瞬间把商家在网上做营销的礼品领走”，这种行为会抬高他们的广告收入。