Ding Lei apparently did not give up socializing.
Editor’s note: This article is from WeChat public account “AI Blue Media Exchange” (ID: lanmeih001), author Wei Xiao.
On the one hand, it sells asset business such as koala, and Netease continues to lose weight. On the other hand, Netease is still exploring the direction of testing new products to add new tracks.
A few days ago, there was news on the market that Netease released a voice social software product “sound wave”.
Alan Blue Media has been downloaded from the Android App Store and learned that “Sound Wave” was launched on November 12th. The developer is NetEase (Hangzhou) Network Co., Ltd. The product of “Sonic” is described as Find your other half with sound, brand new voice dating, enter the room, and start your journey of making friends.
According to this description, it can be seen that the product of “sound wave” is positioned as a social stranger. After the trial, the product is still in the testing stage, only a small number of test users and voice interactive chat rooms, the function has not been perfect.
AI Blue Media notes that after getting the attention of the market, In the afternoon of this afternoon, the search results of “Sound Wave” in the relevant app store have disappeared quietly.
Because of the launch of “sound wave”, Ding Lei apparently did not give up socializing.
When the development of Netease was established three years ago, Ding Lei admitted that he was most impressed by the trial and error, which was a mobile social layout. “In terms of chat software like WeChat, we entered too late, and the strategy was a bit wrong.” Ding Lei reflected.
One background is when the domestic Internet moves from the PC era to the mobile Internet. In the mobile IM field, WeChat defeated a number of strong enemies, not only relying on Ali, Ma Yun’s personal push, and Netease’s easy letter. They have all become frustrated.
In August 2013, NetEase and China Telecom established a joint venture company and released the mobile instant messaging social product “Yixin”. Internally, Ding Lei once said that “in the next three to five years, regardless of the cost, do not count the investment must be easy to do.”
But after the product was released, it only took a moment to quickly silence.
After that, it is the mobile social structure of WeChat, which is a super-app, and it is easy to believe, travel, etc.Competitors were forced to transform and avoid the main position guarded by WeChat.
Retirement to the team’s lakeside garden, made a nail, and laid out corporate social. Yixin has transformed into a content social app for “global social + big platform”. Although it still maintains operational updates and frequent actions, it is difficult to enter the mainstream vision. According to the seven wheat data, the list of easy-to-speak social apps has been around 100 per year.
The loss of Yixin also caused Ding Lei to miss the mobile social track. He almost never mentioned the letter again. At one time, the industry also believed that NetEase lost its ticket when it entered the mobile Internet era, but fortunately, Netease still seized the opportunity of mobile games in the locked game position, and derived music from Ding Lei’s personal interest. E-commerce two new mobile tracks.
Three or four years ago, Ding Lei swept the net to easily move the shadow of the social field. In Netease Cloud Music, he is a high-frequency active UFO, sharing American jazz singers, listening to the changing environment to bring changes to his music, and immersed in the electronic production of melody and lyrics. After carefully selected by NetEase, he ran to the West Lake Longjing tea production area to pick it himself, and excitedly left a happy photo of tea picking.
Netease did not go through the mobile social road, but Ding Lei at that time believed that the two roads of mobile music and e-commerce also lead to broad roads.
The data once proved this.
With the rapid growth of Netease Cloud Music, NetEase’s strict selection, and Netease’s koala, the mainstream theories such as “Internet thinking”, “wind-mouth theory” and “only fast-breaking theory” have been considered by the outside world as “almost perfect miss”. Netease, which is popular in social, O2O, live broadcast, and sharing economy, has developed steadily over the past few years and is at ease.
Ding Lei also left a happy Ding Lei legend in the rivers and lakes. But by 2019, everything is different.
Netease cloud music is deeply affected by copyright, and the ceiling is unobstructed. The rapid growth of NetEase’s e-commerce is no longer the same. From the third quarter of 2018 to the second quarter of 2019, Netease’s e-commerce growth rate was 67.2%, 44%, 28%, and 20%, respectively.
Ding Lei also changed his attitude towards e-commerce, and then Netease koala sold Ali, while Ali invested in the capital operation of Netease Music. This also finally shows that the network is easy to move the music, e-commerce two tracks, but also failed to achieve the desired break.
After the launch of the current “sound wave”, Netease seems to have the idea of returning to the mobile social field.
One time, NetEase needs a new story in addition to the game. Secondly, it may not be too good for Netease.
Furthermore, the current mobile social is subject to variables.
Different from 2013, Yixin positiveAt the time of the mobile IM war against WeChat, the situation has changed now, whether it is the user side, the market, or even WeChat itself,
Users have iterated.
Social, essentially serving the user. The user’s needs directly determine the social form. With the new generation of young users touching the net, they have different needs in socializing, and pursuing more personalization, interest, etc., this is the solid foundation for the new social entertainer to break.
WeChat has become a behemoth, and every move has implicated 1 billion+ users. This is the basic disk of Zhang Xiaolong’s restraint, and it makes it difficult for WeChat to meet some user groups in certain specific needs.
The market also encourages social challengers, which also reflects the social room left to the market cake.
Currently, social entrepreneurship is still a hot land. Even if there are many deaths, there are also many people who can kill them. For example, exploration, soul, and small red books are all unicorns that are highly sought after by capital.
Users are still very enthusiastic. When a new social challenger enters, the user will be willing to try, willing to download and share, of course, whether or not they can finally stay, and see if the socialist is hard enough.
In this context, it is not difficult to understand that Netease will enter the mobile social field again. The positioning of the voice social product selected by “Sound Wave” is also a hot entry point. The voice social products represented by oops, souls and sounds meet the diversified social needs of young users and quickly become a newcomer in the social field.
The 2019 Social Network Industry Research Report shows that from the end of 2018, the voice social app that provides strangers to know, match, and communicate has set off a wave of climax. As of March this year, the total number of such apps in major app stores has exceeded 100. At the same time, Ai Media Consulting’s data shows that voice social users are expected to exceed 200 million in 2020, and users are mostly after 90s.
However, voice socialization is welcomed by users, but it also encounters strong supervision. Many mainstream voice social products have suffered different levels of penalties for stepping on the policy red line.
Netease returns to mobile social networking and still uses voice social as a cut-in. It can finally realize Netease’s mobile social dream and avoid the pits that the industry has stepped through. These need further market verification.