author: Director Liu, from FIG title: Oriental IC
On December 12th, the good material circle that had been tested for more than half a year ushered in the 2.0 version. This revision is a bit big. The name has changed from the “good material circle” to the “WeChat circle”. The positioning has also changed from sharing good things to short content communities. In product design, interest-oriented search for circles, while presenting homepage content is still dominated by friends. It is more like a combination of public domain and private domain traffic. Community products.
This is the third major revision since Good Things Circle officially changed its name from “My Shopping List” to “Good Things Circle” in March this year. A special entry was added to the “Search One Search” section; the second time was the end of July. From the LOGO icon to the product module and name, they were significantly modified to form the prototype of the grass-growing content community. Based on the content, it is broadened into a short content community of interest, more like a combination of Douban Group, Baidu Post Bar, Xiaohongshu, and Weibo.
“Tugging” for so long, three revisions and two name changes, where will the WeChat circles go?
One Arrow and More Carving 2.0: Is it a hodgepodge or a grand slam?
In the WeChat circle of version 2.0, the homepage is divided into three sections, [Circle Look], [Discover Circle], and [Updated Circles Joined]. Compared with the old version, it has strengthened the circle to take a look. This is a function that was also called “My Shopping List” last year. Only the content that friends like will appear here. At the same time, the discovery circle is weakened, leaving only a small position in the middle, and clicking into it can find the large category, while the circle that has been added has the same position.
In terms of UI and presentation, it has been improved by an order of magnitude.The method is like the vibrato, you can swipe up and down to see the content, swipe left and right to see the details, the difference is that the vibrato is only video, which includes pictures, text and videos. But adopting this model is itself biased towards video, so the circle is likely to assume the task of WeChat to make short videos in the future.
It is worth noting that the new version strengthens the user ’s creative incentives. The more you create, the larger the score, and the greater the weight. If it was only a circle system before, now the creator system has been added. The two systems are independent of each other but have affiliation. Creators can contribute to any circle, and circle owners and administrators can also Inviting outstanding creators to come in, everyone is a symbiotic relationship.
The emergence of the creator system is expected to activate circle users. Prior to this, many circle owners participating in the internal test said that circles are like a pool of standing water.
In addition, the function of the shopping guide can add the products of WeChat cooperation platform when maintaining the original content, and a dedicated store can be set up in a single circle to facilitate creators to publish content, it is recommended that the circle owner exclusive applet store Goods.
This means that in a circle, the future may become a shop, and the e-commerce imagination will be very large.
After experiencing this version 2.0, from the perspective of interest, it is like a Douban group. From the perspective of function, it is like a little red book. From the perspective of configuration, it is like Baidu Post Bar. From the perspective of content presentation, it is like a vibrato. From the perspective of content richness, it is also like Weibo, which gives people the impression that they want to use more than one arrow.
It can be seen that its positioning has changed from a special shopping guide community to a short content community with shopping guide attributes .
This means that this is a hodgepodge, with everything, whether it is video or text, pictures or merchandise, or even music and games.
But it’s orderly, dominated by two thoughts, the first is the content that the circle of friends is optimistic, similar to the open circle of friends; the second is to search by category and find your favorite Content, based on these two leading, WeChat still maintained the original restraint, adhering to the insistence of running out, allowing users to have greater dominance.
This is WeChat!
What does the circle mean for WeChat and Tencent?
Regarding the status of WeChat circles, rumors are that Ma Huateng and Zhang Xiaolong personally supervised the product line, which belongs to the strategic level. Whether Ma Huateng and Zhang Xiaolong have personally grasped it has not been confirmed so far, but it can be determined now that the project was run overtime by a team of nearly 60 people under WeChat search. There are many WeChat startups. Core employees can see the importance they attach to this product.
In terms of WeChat and Tencent’s own strategy, this product shows necessity from multiple angles.
After the launch of the mini program, WeChat, with 1.1 billion monthly active users, has become a veritable “browser”. In addition to adhering to the original social functions, the demand for search will increase. The internal and external environment is also catalyzing the improvement of WeChat search.
In the big environment, the PC is declining further, mobile search is accelerating, and Tencent’s new rival is headline search today. Internal,Although WeChat renewed the contract with Sogou, a brother company, it did not announce whether to renew it for another five years. Sogou ’s financial report only mentioned that “cooperation with WeChat was officially included in the renewal agreement for the first time, that is, within the next year, When providing third-party search services for external Internet content, Sogou search will be given priority. “Note that it is” the next year “and no” five years “are mentioned.
Inside, WeChat search, which has been muted for so many years, is also in full bloom. On December 11, WeChat search was officially upgraded to “WeChat search and search” and announced to the public that WeChat on January 9, 2020 In the open class, Souyisou will make a full debut for the first time, interpreting the full product capabilities, new trends and values, which is considered by the industry as the biggest highlight of this WeChat open class.
From the perspective of WeChat heavy warehouse layout search, the existence of WeChat circles is very necessary, and it can be posted on Baidu.
Baidu Post Bar receives tens of millions of daily traffic from searches and WeChat with 1.1 billion monthly active users. Its search should not be underestimated. In turn, the emergence of WeChat circles complemented the shortcomings of WeChat’s search. Even if WeChat Souyisou continues to cooperate with Sogou, Sogou itself does not have Baidu Tieba products, so the emergence of WeChat circles complements the shortcomings of search content.
For Tencent, the parent company of WeChat, to strike headlines while chasing e-commerce dreams is its foreign policy for a long time. WeChat is a machine gun in Tencent’s hands. People who buy things in Ali and watch short videos in Douyin basically use WeChat.
WeChat has such a large user body and has a huge amount of long tail traffic. It must have a place to carry it.
The exclusive entrance “shopping” consumes a part, the Pinduo in the WeChat group consumes a part, and the WeChat in the circle of friends consumes a part, but this is far from enough. Over the past few years, “shopping guides” have been the biggest outlet. Advertisements without goods are hooligans. So in the beginning, the positioning of WeChat circles was a good shopping guide. Now it has been updated to circles, and the function of taking goods has continued to strengthen.
Strategic layer, Tencent has participated in supporting public comment, Youzan, Vipshop, JD.com and Pinduoduo, as well as a number of offline supermarket brands in the past few years. The development of payment, made WeChat payment use Alipay in just a few years, and disguised to fight Ali. A series of vertical and horizontal deals have achieved good results, but Tencent and the invested companies have not yet formed a closer e-commerce connection.
On the other hand, the rise of headlinesAs a result, the traffic that originally belonged to Tencent was diverted on a large scale, especially the appearance of Douyin, which can be said to be a product that has great lethality to Tencent. Tencent must make short videos, just like it did social media. But now Tencent’s own short video product, Weishi, has not been frustrated, and while investing in fast-track investment, pin its hopes on WeChat.
Many people think that if Tencent wants to make a difference in the short video, they have to watch Zhang Xiaolong. Zhang Xiaolong is also trying. The previous video small functions were limited to the circle of friends and group chats. They are closed content and it is difficult to form large-scale communication values. Only open communities can form large-scale exposure values and promote the BC end. Come to build a community.
Circles open up public and private domains through the form of interest communities, use text, pictures, and video content to precipitate long-tail traffic, try to drag back the original traffic to Ali, Weibo, and Douyin, and then redistribute it to the ecology The cooperative e-commerce platform in the end is expected to become its own unique new e-commerce ecosystem, which may be its ambition.
Slow thermal logic of new WeChat products
For the WeChat circle, the most people talk about it, or its “tangled and embarrassing”.
What’s tangled is, what does this product do in the end? From the initial shopping list, to the later good circle, to the current WeChat circle, it has been changing frequently. After the 2.0 version came out, it can be said that the dust has settled down and locked into an interest-based short content community.
Next, everyone is most concerned about whether there is a first-level entrance, because there is no first-level entrance, it will be very bad.
At present, the entrance to the WeChat circle is [WeChat—Discovery—Search], and the other entrance is the WeChat circle applet. These two entrances are very deep. Although the volume of WeChat may bring a lot of traffic after the full launch, for the circle owners and creators, if there is no first-level entrance, the value is not great. A new product, many people do n’t know the place, and the entrance is deep, and it is not very convenient to enter and exit, and it is difficult for users to form usage habits.
The development of applets over the past few years has shown that applets are not suitable for content, but only for tools. If the WeChat circle follows the operating logic of the small program and is attached to the search, it will be difficult to push it. After all, content is not like tools, tools are just needed, content is everywhere, and its competing products Weibo, Xiaohongshu, Douban itself are already some content communities with great brand influence, occupying users Cognitive mind.
There is no first-level entrance, which means that WeChat Souyi must get enough traffic, and benchmark Baidu. The traffic that it brings to Post Bar every day is at least 10 million. In addition, Baidu can catch fire, relying not only on the traffic brought by search, but also the relatively obvious entrance and convenient usage habits. After detonating several entertainment events, it finally caught fire.
So, if the traffic of WeChat search cannot support, and there is no first-level entrance, then this product is a failed product, which is considered an internal discard or a chicken rib. Conversely, if WeChat is determined to make this product well, then there must be a first-level entrance.
From the current patience of Tencent and WeChat, we have mobilized such a large amount of resources, repeatedly revised it, and persisted for so long. We must definitely make this product well. The entrance should be a matter of time.
The operation logic of this team is slow-heating.
Since this year, a number of similar content grass-growing communities have appeared in the industry. The most famous one is Weibo’s oasis, but now it seems to be half dead, due to its extensive operation, which attracts a large group of micro-businesses through the thunder As a result, many people have talked, and the oasis has become a stage for self-employed micro-businessmen.
The operating logic of WeChat circles is reversed. Unlike other demons and ghosts, WeChat is already a mature product, covering almost all forms of Chinese netizens, making a new product, opening a mouth, it looks simple, but it is careful to cross the river with its testicles.
So it now uses a very restrained way, using an invitation system, starting from the literary circle, slowly covering mothers and babies, food, fashion beauty, etc., step by step, so that once on the black market, a circle card Was fired to 3,000 yuan. Even now, the application for building a circle has not been released, and a cumbersome review mechanism is required to obtain the qualification for building a circle.
The slow-heating operation logic not only reflects Zhang Xiaolong’s philosophy, but also effectively guarantees the quality of the first batch of circle owners.Guaranteed content looks attractive.
This sounds great, but it is also very gambling. After all, some people have been with us for more than half a year. If the entrance or traffic is not late, there will be a large number of circle owners who can’t persist, and they need to see hope.
This is a dark game.
The good thing circle team needs to polish the product as soon as possible and apply for more traffic to stimulate the circle owners and creators to have greater enthusiasm to produce works, better quality works and activity, and in turn promote Tencent senior management First level entrance.
author: Director Liu