China experts believe that it will take more than a 30-minute Q&A session spoken in Mandarin for Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg to convince the Chinese government to open its doors to the most popular social media site in the world.

Liyan Chen, a Forbes staff member, wrote that other steps which Zuckerberg must take include creating links with Chinese businessmen and captains of the tech industry. However, the billionaire mentioned in his talk that he had met with Lei Jun, the founder and CEO of Xiaomi, the fast-growing smartphone manufacturer whose sales in China have outdone even Apple.

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The two talked for a few hours about Xiaomi's expansion in the global market and how the Chinese phone maker could tap into Facebook, which counts more than 1 billion members, as a platform to boost its international sales further, reports Forbes.

Another step is to hire more Chinese workers, which Zuckerberg just did by employing 20 Chinese students. Chen added that Facebook plans to take in more Chinese recruits in 2015.

She also stated that Zuckerberg's being part of the advisory board of Tsinghua University School of Economics and Management, where he spoke on Wednesday in Mandarin, likewise helps, since the academy is China's equivalent of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the U.S.

Based on media reports, Zuckerberg's speaking in the most popular Chinese language created an impression not only in China, but also in other parts of the world.

Reportedly, Zuckerberg started studying Mandarin in 2010 in order to garner the attention of Priscilla Chan, a Chinese-American woman whom he dated for years. Although Chan was raised in Massachusetts, her family speaks Chinese at home and her grandmother was shocked when Zuckerberg told them in Mandarin that he and Priscilla were getting married.

The couple were wed in 2012, and since then - while running Facebook - Zuckerberg learned more Mandarin words than his wife by speaking to Chinese employees. He also learned another Chinese language, Cantonese.

Although the Washington Post initially described Zuckerberg's Mandarin skills as "terrible," they later upgraded it to "mediocre," while other Chinese teachers whom the newspaper spoke to gave different opinions.

Chen Gao, a lecturer in East Asian studies at New York University, said that despite Zuckerberg's heavy accent, he nevertheless charmed the students with his humor and appropriate language use.

Jing Tsu, a professor of Chinese and comparative literature at Yale University, said the CEO's pronunciation would require effort to comprehend, but it could be understood.

William Wan, a Beijing correspondent, admitted that Zuckerberg's Mandarin was not great, but given that he runs a $200-billion company while learning the language on the side is impressive enough.

Even Weibo users had two thumbs up for Zuckerberg's Mandarin, which one user described as "much better than my English." Weibo is the equivalent of Twitter in China.

One Twitter member placed learning Mandarin on his bucket list after hearing Zuckerberg speak. The Facebook CEO probably has a bucket list of his own which includes the hope that Beijing officials will also loosen up and open their iron doors to Facebook.  

TagsMark Zuckerberg, Mandarin