Alibaba integrates payment features into Weibo

Chinese Ecommerce giant Alibaba has partnered with social micro-blogging platform Weibo, owned by tech firm Sina, to offer in-app 3^rd party payment integration with a new service dubbed the Weibo Payment Service.

A result of the partnership will allow verified Weibo users the option to pay for items from directly within Weibo listings, similar to Twitter and Facebook’s new Buy Buttons. Also the new service will merge Weibo accounts with accounts from Alibaba’s TaoBao marketplace. This will mark the first big step towards integration since Alibaba bought out 18% of Weibo for $586 million in April 2014.

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Plans for Sina’s micrto-blogging service consist of Weibo transforming its self from a social Twitteresk social network to a full-fledged Ecommerce platform. After the transition, verified Weibo account users can list items and accept payments through the service.

“The new payment service is expected to affect the mobile payment service business of Tencent’s WeChat. The fund management platform Yu’ebao has slowed down during the second quarter of this year,” stated a post on Want China Times.

Alibaba has been in an unofficial feud with primary rival WeChat, a similar social network and messaging platform offering user-to-user payments, Ecommerce transactions, mPOS capabilities and purchasing of items directly from within posts. While Alibaba may reign supreme with AliPay, the firm is missing out on a new growing audience of mobile centric payment options littered with features and capabilities.

The Alibaba-Sina integration could see Weibo stand on par with WeChat in one of the fastest growing Ecommerce markets on the planet.