A micro-channel under the impregnable fortress “authentic”
Editor’s note: This article is from the micro-channel public number “letter list” (ID: wujicaijing), Author: Long Teng.
An elephant appeared in Clubhouse’s Chinese imitation show-Bytedance.
According to foreign media reports, Bytedance is developing a Clubhouse-like product for the Chinese market, but this plan is still in its early stages.
Before this, dozens of voice social products imitating Clubhouse have appeared in the Chinese market. Although news of delisting has been reported repeatedly, voice socialization has become a new trend for capital, even Michao took the opportunity Resurrection. According to Tech Planet report, the fast-hand version of Clubhouse “Spaceship” has entered the testing phase of small-scale invitations.
Bytedance’s social ambitions are well known to passers-by. Although it was unexpectedly late to follow suit this time, it hasn’t missed anything so far because the opponents are not strong.
“Unlike Elon Musk and Bill Gates at every turn, several domestic products invite at most a few investment circle bosses to the platform.” AI Finance and Economics has pointed out the common problems of such products. According to the “Beijing News” Shell Finance quoted the views of industry insiders, “The main reason for the fire is marketing methods. Musk is resident in chat. If Lei Jun stays in Michat to accompany the chat, I think it can be a hit.”
If Zhang Yiming endorses his own products, among these products, Lei Jun may be able to break his wrist with him. In fact, getting off the court in person is becoming a trend, and Zhang Xiaolong often appears in the live broadcast room of the video account.
For Byte, what is more strategic is that the development of products similar to Clubhouse can further explore the gold mine of Douyin’s 600 million daily activities.
The Half-Buddha fairy once pointed out that the voice social software platform faces two major pain points in terms of content supervision and loss of control and the inability to settle social relationships. The review experience in content operations and the online acquisition needs of users for interpersonal relationships in the same circle are the advantages of the byte entry business.
From a product perspective, this voice social product may become a byte beating bypassWeChat is an “underground” of the copper and iron walls.
It is difficult to get new friends on WeChat, leaving other social software with room for scene-based social interaction. However, due to the extremely high transfer cost of social relationships on WeChat, social products have long been in The embarrassing situation of WeChat.
Voice social products cut into the gap between the two.
Whether online or offline, joining the community and finding like-minded friends in the community are real needs in people’s social life. Product forms such as Hupu, Zhihu, and WeChat Group satisfy this demand. It is a pity that the demand for information and dialogue with acquaintances has been upgraded from graphics to voice and short video, but the communication between communities and communities still stays in the era of text communication.
The popularity of the Clubhouse is not unrelated to the long-term difficulty in meeting this demand. It can not only meet the needs of making friends online and expand the circle, but also complete the upgrade of the dialogue form.
Voice group chats on different topics in the product and a large number of like-minded friends may be able to generate continuous appeal to users and complete the precipitation of social relationships. Encounters in the product with bigwigs in various fields, communicate with them on an equal footing, and even get to know big bosses and other opportunities that are not available in reality, so that ordinary users are more eager.
Starting from the circle-based group chat, gradually forming a community culture, and then cutting into single-person social interaction to complete the precipitation of social relationships. In theory, it is possible to break into the hinterland of WeChat and realize the transfer of social relationships.
This is exactly the treasure Zhang Yiming has been coveting.
The user scale and operational capabilities of Douyin mean that the byte version of Clubhouse has a large number of KOL resources in operation, which can help byte gain popularity in the early stage of the product and play a role in diversion.
Internet celebrity anchors and celebrities attract fans’ attention on Douyin, and complete fan interaction in the voice live broadcast of the byte version of Clubhouse to cultivate private domain traffic.
The two products can also realize the private domain operation of efficient information distribution and semi-closed community communication without harming the product background.
Although Weibo also has a large number of artist resources, the number of active users and usage time of Weibo is not in the same order as Douyin.
According to Byte’s consistent style of “making miracles vigorously”, the initial launch of Byte Edition Clubhouse may bring a large wave of users to download and register.
Combined with the characteristics of the Clubhouse invitation system, the byte was unable to scatter 2 billion during the Spring Festival.The social relationships with acquaintances opened up are expected to have a breakthrough this time.
The characteristics of the invitation system are based on relatively familiar social relationships, which limits the channels for sharing.
Under the premise that social fission and secondary dissemination are inseparable from WeChat, Douyin has 600 million daily active users, so that they don’t have to worry about WeChat’s blocking of sharing channels.
This is also an advantage that other platforms do not have.
Although Xinmichao can also complete the invitations between users through the terminal’s Xiaomi mobile phone users and open up social relationships, it is limited to the invitations between Xiaomi users, and the pattern is not big. Previously, Michao failed to block WeChat through Xiaomi users under the premise that WeChat went online; now that WeChat has grown into a giant, the probability of breaking through defense has become even lower.
On the other hand, WeChat, because of its decentralized characteristics, wants to do the same product defensive byte offense, which is relatively inferior in content review and operation promotion.
The voice upgrade of the WeChat group may be a direct way, but without the bonus of the big brother’s halo, the intensity of the demand for this kind of social networking is bound to be greatly reduced. And the half-baked voice dating is also inconsistent with the underlying logic of WeChat communication tools.
According to a research report by Founder Securities, post-90s and post-00s are more eager for a sense of belonging from their peers in social behavior, and the proportion of active social interaction with acquaintances is gradually decreasing.
Post-95’s social purposes such as “entertainment and pastime, discussing topics of interest, expanding social circles, and understanding strangers” have been significantly improved compared to pre-95.
The product form of Clubhouse is precisely the new social appeal of “Generation Z” (a group born between 1995-2009).
Among the many social applications that the post-95 generation loves, WeChat is the only one missing. This is exactly the phenomenon that requires WeChat to be vigilant.
In Byte Family Bucket, users can obtain information on Douyin, complete friendship interaction in voice chat, and form social precipitation. If the two businesses are integrated again, Byte can break through the social blockade of WeChat at the same time. It will also establish a content ecosystem comparable to WeChat.
A content shapeStyle update, disseminate more efficient content ecology.
The problem that a competing product has already encountered and that byte must solve is how to avoid being removed from the shelves.
The product form of voice socialization has long faced regulatory difficulties. Soul, which focuses on voice dating with strangers, was once punished due to content security issues. The issue of content security is even more obvious in products such as Clubhouse.
In a public and open atmosphere, the content of this group chat discussion is not easy to control. On the other hand, voice-related pornography and other content have long plagued many voice platforms.
I have encountered the byte beating of Yini Duanzi’s suspension penalty, and have a deeper understanding of content security. This tuition fee has become the advantage of Byte in voice social networking.
If you want to solve the content security of the live voice broadcast, you can learn from the live broadcast of the TV station and use the delay method to reduce the risk.
In the product form of Clubhouse, ordinary members play more roles as audiences, and the room “host” is required to pass in order to be qualified to speak. This gives the platform operation delay room.
The background uses voice recognition technology to compare sensitive words in the chat in the room. The non-sensitive word voice can be transmitted normally. If the voice content hits a sensitive word, it needs to be manually reviewed and processed before it can be sent out.
As long as the review is completed within one minute, the damage to the user experience can be minimized and content security can be maximized.
In addition, some users’ rooms are hot, sensitive to topics, and there have been precedents for punishment among speakers. The platform can conduct manual supervision throughout the entire process.
For rooms with a small number of participants, virtual goods can also be rewarded to guide users to use the reporting mechanism. And in this process, constantly improve the sensitive vocabulary to improve operational efficiency.
Fostering incentives for moderators and strengthening supervision and penalties are also ways to reduce operational pressure. The identity of the “group owner” is also a cost transfer of responsibility and risk for the platform.
In the WeChat ecosystem with a larger user base, countless group chats can still maintain good operational development. This is also evidenced by the possibility that the platform can achieve a balance between operating costs and content security.
At present, for large Internet companies, rapid speech recognition technology is not a very high technical threshold. Input method companies have the ability to implement this technology. Even if it is difficult to achieve the technical precision of the input method company in the short termBytes that are “not bad for money” can also make this technology land by purchasing third-party technology.
On the other hand, Bytedance has long-term content review experience, a complete review system and personnel reserves, and a rich and comprehensive sensitive vocabulary, which can alleviate the pressure on the operation of Bytedance.
In addition, the user portrait data accumulated by Byte over a long period of time also has an incomparable advantage to other companies in the accurate matching of room content and user interests.
Will the Clubhouse stay on fire?
For bytes, this is an irrelevant question. Entering the hinterland of WeChat through voice group chat, from the point of view of Byte, this is a game that doesn’t matter if you win or lose.
If Clubhouse’s needs exist for a long time, byte’s resource advantage and first-mover advantage will help it stand out in this field and grow into the second social force outside of Tencent.
If the product is only a flash in the pan, Byte has also achieved the acquisition of young users and rising users in the process.
According to a later report, the overall DAU of Douyin remained at over 600 million during the Spring Festival, which is not a big breakthrough from the 600 million daily activity announced in September 2020.
For Douyin, whose growth is slowing down, there is an urgent need for a new growth point to maintain its first position in short videos. In the Clubhouse audio format, the mainly targeted young users and rising users are a good compensation for Douyin.
According to a research report by Founder Securities, the population of China’s Z era has reached 403 million, accounting for 29% of the total population, and accounting for more than 41% of all Internet users.
However, according to a report by Cinda Securities, the proportion of Douyin Z-era users is only 25%, which is far lower than the proportion of this group in all netizens.
According to a research report by Analysys, in the current traffic anxiety, Internet audio will still maintain a 43% growth rate in 2020, driving a net monthly increase of 60 million+.
Bytes may enter the fertile soil of audio traffic through Clubhouse, and further increase the penetration rate of Douyin among young people.
Be aware that TikTok was initially popular among a small group of young people. After generating a certain sticky community culture, it quickly broke the circle with the help of celebrity celebrities and other traffic, and gradually grew into a national level. application.
Whether byte can replicate the popularity miracle of Douyin still needs time to test. But for bytes, as long as ClubhouSe red is enough.
Because even if the product fails, the chain of social relationships that Byte has always been hopeful and unattainable has been supplemented.
Reference material:
“Copying Clubhouse, Yingke is wrong again? 》——Open Pineapple Finance
“From the “people and goods market” to see the development of the community ecology of station B”-Founder Securities
“Inventory of China’s Pan-Cultural and Entertainment Industry Development in 2020 and Prospects for 2021”-Analysys
“Media Internet Industry: Video Number, Tencent Short Video Battlefield New Value”-Cinda Securities
“Kaishou, Douyin Spring Festival Report”-LatePost is late
“After ten years of return, Mi Talk will be restarted, to be the Chinese version of Clubhouse? “——”Beijing News” Shell Finance
“ClubHouse is a disease following the trend”-Half-Buddha Immortal
“The domestically produced version of Clubhouse competes for beauty, but users say “I’m tired of it in less than a week””-AI Finance and Economics Agency