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What is the final form of station B?

In the medium term, the secondary culture and secondary users are the core competitiveness of the B station. In the long run, what does station B need so many secondary users?

This has to go back to the proposition that Station B will eventually become XX Company. As we all know, Chen Rui, the chairman of the B station known as “Ruidi” once gave an answer to the proposition of “what B station is to become”, and the result is judged by the public (BecomeChinese YouTube), Chen Rui’s answer was partially Man is treated as a station BA layered picture of Wall Street investors showing to Wall Street investors.

What Chen Rui said at the time:

“Station B will eventually be a cultural brand company, just like Disney was originally a comic or film company, but in the end it is a cultural brand company (Source: LatePost).

Regardless of station B, let’s see if Chen Rui’s judgment on Disney is correct. Disney was founded by the brothers of Walt Disney and Roy O. Disney, and in the fifth year of its founding, it produced the first sound cartoon “Steamboat Willie” in film history. Mickey Mouse is the protagonist of this cartoon. .

It can be said that Disney was really just an animation company (or studio) at the beginning. But today, if you are an investor who understands the field of media and entertainment, you should know that this giant with a market value of up to 200 billion US dollars is essentially an entertainment company. There are several top movie/animation distribution brands under Disney, and Disney playgrounds all over the world.

What is the difference between an entertainment company and an animation/film company is that the entertainment company not only owns the IP and content owned by the animation/film company, but also has consumers who are willing to pay for the IP and content. In 2018, Disney accounted for more than 26% of US box office revenues. Behind all the high box office movies you can think of, Disney is basically standing. People will use “Disney Produced” as a measure of a certain work, so Chen Rui’s understanding of Disney as a cultural brand company is reliable.

Can station B become a cultural brand company? Note, doesn’t it mean that Station B can become Disney, is it possible for Station B to evolve in the direction of Disney-like entertainment companies?

At least in our previous analysis of the business model of station B, station B is consciously cultivating the consumer population needed as an entertainment company. Perhaps Chen Rui really wants to make money like this: owning IPs that are popular in the market, and then packing these IPs into different content or products, and finally selling them to consumers.

Of course on this chain, Station B currently only has the consumers in the last link (the number is not enough). Even in this part of the group, few people go out through station B themselves.The content or IP of the product is attracted.

Assuming that B’s share in the domestic video field has further increased, is there the possibility that B’s station will have the advantage of holding the number of users, march to the source and evolve into a cultural brand company? There is in theory.

Here is a reference to Niconico, the originator of the barrage animation website that was born in Japan (translated as “hehe”, hereinafter referred to as the N station). This website was very successful as soon as it was launched in 2006, and its network data transmission volume rose to 8.3% in Japan the following year.

From 2010 to 2014, the N station holding a large number of animation audience resources is not unremarkable. All kinds of works and program copyright giants have come here to fight for stuffing banknotes in the former pocket in exchange for cooperation, including the famous Japanese Game company Nintendo. This scene can’t help but recall the investment of station B by another Japanese electronics giant Sony.

However, it is a pity that the N station has not become a perfect case for a video website to counterattack and become a cultural brand. Instead, it was owned by more than 50 subsidiaries in 2015. It has a large number of game animation IP rights and almost monopolized it. Kadokawa (Phenomenon-level animated film “Your Name” was produced by Kadokawa), N Station Since then, it has become a link in Kakukawa ecology.

In the latest financial report released by Kadokawa (Q2 2018~Q1 2020), N station contributed 34% of the group’s overall profit Amazingly, all of this is based on a rather poor user experience and Kakukawa’s long-term lack of attention to the N station. Even so, N stands still in the Japanese web application market and still has its place (as shown below).

(left picture: market penetration rate; right picture: live broadcast penetration rate)

Acquiring N Station is an attempt of Kakukawa Group’s digital transformation, but this traditional entertainment giant with publishing business as its core lacks the determination to carry out digital transformation to the end. Kakukawa’s investment in station N is not only much smaller than that of streaming giants such as tubing and Netflix, but it is also inferior to station B, which has a market value of 10 billion dollars.

Returning to the N station itself, due to the lack of attention to user experience and the strategic planning of Xiaofu Ji’an, its user growth has always been limited to the two-dimensional crowd. The most popular content of station N so far is still animation.

In the more than 10 years of operation of the N station, this animation website has been profitable for more than half of the time. But the profit of N station cannot be used as a proof to judge the success of its transformation. Rather, it is even more embarrassing to get a relatively decent market share in Japan with such a “shang Er Lang Dang” development stance. If N station is like B station or even a pipeline More ambitious, more attention gained from Kakukawa Group (such as going out and developing independently), is the story of station N another direction? Not known.

In general, the first half of the N station story still proves the feasibility of the transformation of the B station, that is, the animation website holding the audience resources is willing and capable of developing upstream content. In the second half of the story, Kakukawa’s treatment of Station N can bring to Station B at least the following points:

1. Always pay attention to user experience and technological development. In fact, this is the first reaction of almost all people who use N station service-that is, the experience of using N station is too bad (For example, non-members should accept Total loss of image quality), N station’s weak technical ability is obviously not to blame;

2. Let the three parties of IP, content and audience be fully linked. This is one of the Kakukawa Group’s most serious mistakes, and that is that its core publishing business is seriously lacking collaboration with N Station, which has caused N Station to gradually become an entertainment content player under the Kakukawa Group. If station B wants to become a cultural brand company, it must understand the truth of customizing content from the user’s end;

3. Don’t be satisfied with being rich. For the N station, whether before or after being acquired, the performance of the status quo is consistent. For many years, the main profit-making means of the N station was advertising (also including patch ads), of course, this has not Pay attention to user experience. But the most important thing is that the parent company behind the N station has a lack of determination to develop powerful IP through game development. The management seems to prefer to use offline activities such as “niconico super conference” and “niconico town conference” as Users provide value-added services. This kind of strategy is feasible as a supplementary means to increase user stickiness, but it is obviously a little petty as the company’s strategic direction.

4. Don’t worry about making money, be brave to step out of the comfort zone. Similar to the third point, it is said that the management of the N station publicly expressed its satisfaction with differentiated competition and the industry criticism caused after having no interest in becoming bigger and stronger.

I don’t know if Station B has seen the lessons from Station N, but the current series of practices of the former are obviously avoiding repeating the mistakes of Station N. For example, the maintenance of user experience is like thin ice, fear of advertising, and the funnel model we mentioned above to accelerate the B station to attract new users.

At the same time, Station B is also actively preparing for the transformation of cultural brand companies. In March 2017, the B station launched the Guochuang District section, which covered domestic animation, domestic comics, related information and casual comments. However, due to the general investment in this field by B station and the domestic top animation IP basically occupied by Tencent, relying on domestic production The breakthrough of animation content is not realistic in the short to medium term.

Therefore, the task of building IP falls to the game. From the perspective of historical experience, there are not many cases where comics, animations, and movies are adapted from phenomenon-level games, indicating that the conversion of games to several other content forms is feasible. At the same time, compared to other domestic two-dimensional game development platforms, B’s advantage is that it has a deeper understanding of the users of the second yuan. After all, the number of users of the B station is there, plus the rich second-hand mobile games Agent experience will inevitably provide some confidence for the self-developed game of station B.

Not only that, at ChinaJoy 2019 last year, Station B also announced five independent games at a stretch, two of which were developed in cooperation with Sony Playstation. In the future, the possibility of logging into the Playstation console will not be ruled out. However, like Guochuang Animation, don’t expect too much of the self-developed games of Station B to rise rapidly in the short term. At this stage, the main advantage of B standing in the game is still concentrated on the channel and the ability to promulgate (marketing expenses in the corresponding cost structure< /span>).

In the foreseeable future, Station B will never become a cultural brand company in Chen Ruikou’s mouth, but through a glimpse of the revenue/cost structure of Station B, combined with the operation strategy of Station B, it is not difficult to find The real course of this company. Before Chen Rui’s dream comes true, if the revenue/cost structure of Station B does not change dramatically, there is no need to say whether Station B has deteriorated.