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In April 2012, WeChat updated version 4.0, adding a circle of friends; “swipe circle of friends” has become one of the purposes of everyone playing mobile phones. After a few years, the circle of friends that used to be “Daily N Brush” gradually made everyone feel tired, and no longer updated their own circle of friends. This article comes from the WeChat public account: Everyone is a product manager (ID: woshipm) author: Fan Yao Rui, head Figure from: vision China

The frequency of my circle of friends is basically maintained once a month for several years, but I will watch it every day. The circle of friends is a very important way for me to get the status of my friends. Simple likes and comments seem to be back I used to sit in the sea and sky and chat together.

Until there was a meeting with a few friends, Xiao A asked me if my trip was fun some time ago. Is there any strategy? Xiao B suddenly said in surprise, how could he not know that I went out to play.

Lastly learned: it was Xiao B who closed his circle of friends and did not see my activity, and he has been closed for a long time.

I was suddenly curious: Why would n’t I want to send a circle of friends or even close the circle of friends? What made them do it? Is the original demand disappeared or only the original demand is satisfied by other methods or platforms. If so, what is the difference between these methods or platforms and WeChat Moments?

Before discussing these, let ’s talk about why we sent a circle of friends:

First, why would you like to send a circle of friends

1. Product structure of WeChat

Friend circle is one of the important functions of WeChat. Let ’s take a look at the product structure of WeChat:

As shown above, WeChat mainly has functions such as address book, message, and circle of friends. On the one hand, the address book provides users with objects that can be communicated by message (single contact, Group) , on the other hand, the user communicates with the people in the address book in the form of a quasi-broadcast through a circle of friends.

The address book is a magical and ancient function. It existed in the form of phone book and electronic address book as early as the telephone period. It is not a front-end product form, but the underlying basic capability support, and it also provides more imagination And possibly.

• Provide user message communication objects (single contact, group ); < / p>

  
  

• Provides users to broadcast and shape their own audience, and also provides users with content producers who consume content (Get Friends Recent) (Friend Circle) ;

  
  

• provides a way to distribute content (or items) Relationship basics (video number, take a look, search a search, applet) .
  

  
  

  PS: It is feasible to use relationship chains to socially distribute items. The former has a lot of spelling, and the latter has intersections, that is, Shiduo, although they are not WeChat.

  At the same time, other functions continue to supplement the address book:

  • Add before message communication: WeChat search, local address book import, scan QR code, business card recommendation, etc.;

    
    

  • Communicate before adding: people nearby (geographical relationship) 、 Shake before, drift bottle (Stranger) , group chat and add people (Same scene) .
    

    Think of when you used Xiaolingtong to call and send text messages before, adding it to the address book is a thing without any pressure. In many cases, whether it is useful or useless, it will be added to the phone book first, in case of time Need.

    From the address book function itself, in fact, the more contacts, the better.

    However, when the address book function is migrated to WeChat, the usage habits have not changed.

    2. Functional positioning of the circle of friends

    “The circle of friends is more like a square, a square of people you know, every interaction here is like a loud talk on the square.”-Zhang Xiaolong

    The circle of friends is a function that can display the dynamics of friends based on the social settings of acquaintances. When users enter, they can browse the dynamics of their friends and their feedback on the other ’s dynamics, and they can also feedback on the dynamics of friends text-remarks”label =” Remarks “> (Like and comment) .

    My understanding of the circle of friends is to provide yourself with a place to exchange information with people in the address book, through the content carrier (text, pictures, videos Etc.) Complete information synchronization between each other, with a view to creating a certain character image for each other.

    3. Demand analysis of making friends circle

    In “Self Presentation in Everyday Life”, Goffman divides the daily life environment into two areas: “foreground” and “backstage”.

    “Sometimes, the individual will act in a completely planned way and express himself in a specific way, just to give others an impression, and he may arouse his intentions from them Specific response received. “

    In daily interactions, people more or less play the roles of actors and spectators.

    In social interaction, others are like a mirror, and “I” is also more inclined to project the image of “I” in front of others in the mirror, and get the evaluation that “I” imagines.

    Now that the Internet is so developed, more and more social communication needs to happen online, and the circle of friends is undoubtedly a great place to “express yourself”.

    However, due to the unlimited expansion of the features and usage habits of the address book, the usage scene space of WeChat has expanded infinitely, and friend circles have also begun to generalize, and sending friend circles is not just for “expressing oneself”.

    Second, why do n’t you want to send a circle of friends

    Several typical friends are reluctant to send a circle of friends, or even close the reasons for the circle of friends:

    • Xiaohong: I like taking photos and photography, and have strong content production capabilities. At first I wanted to post some of my own videos, but my circle of friends did notThe easy-to-use template, BGM, slowly began to share some of its own dynamics on Douyin. Although later WeChat also supports templates, but the fans on Douyin are still waiting to watch my video every day, and they are used to being dynamic in Douyin.

      
      

    • Xiaoming: Big family, especially seven aunts and eight aunts. There are a lot of relatives and friends at home. They especially like to send out some activities like “cut me a knife” or “collect awards and awards”, and also pull me to give them praise. No, my parents are nagging again, saying that they are all relatives. Helping them order will not lose a piece of meat. I’m so annoyed that I feel “kidnapped by human feelings”. I simply shut down my circle of friends, and I was completely clean.

      
      

    • Xiaogang: Mild OCD, like efficiency. Too many friends are added, all kinds of dynamics in the circle of friends. Look, a lot of useless information is a waste of time; if you do n’t read it, I ’m the kind of “little red dot will die,” and I ca n’t help but read it. It is better to close the circle of friends directly.

      
      

    • Xiao Li: Socialist, all brothers in the world. A lot of people at work are added to the reason for work, as well as the classmates and fellows who have been added before. Do people recognize people who ca n’t see them? Will they tell them … The more they think, the more complicated they are, so now it ’s basically “pretend to die in a circle of friends and jump on Weibo”
      

      Three, analysis of reasons and current measures

      1. Slow performance of more advanced content carriers, resulting in changes in user habits

      The reason Zhang Xiaolong said in the WeChat open class is indeed a mistake, and it has now caught up. “Video dynamics” and “video number” are measures taken.

      Although short video platforms such as Douyin and Kuaishou have taken away some of the value of social media from the circle of friends, the existence of the relationship chain represented by the address book and the value of the circle of friends as a place for establishing shallow emotional links on a large scale It will still exist for a long time.

      2. “Human abduction” caused by commercial marketing, etc.

      The usage habits of the address book will inevitablyA variety of related people are added in, like comments as an important way to maintain interpersonal relationships in the circle of friends, obviously also provides a fast, efficient and low-cost way to reach first-line users for commercial marketing.

      Some friends (get a discount, help others) send some updates, human or other reasons need to “force” You come to hold the personal field, compulsiveness and passiveness cause pressure.

      In addition to closing the circle of friends or deleting friends, I have not thought of a good way to solve it from the source, but this is not conducive to the development of WeChat products.

      3. Massive information increases the cost of obtaining effective information, and ultimately leads to incompetence in receiving information

      The contacts in the address book not only provide a lot of interesting and fun content, but also provide more valuable (for yourself) information.

      For example, the dynamics of the baby, grandpa, grandpa, uncle and aunt will urge her to send more every day, but for her mother, her work partners are more useless information.

      Because of the continuous expansion of contacts in the address book, the usage scene of the circle of friends is becoming more and more generalized, filled with a lot of useless information. These useless information not only increases the cost of obtaining effective information, but also may make people disgusted and lose access. Information of interest.

      Turning off the “Friends Circle Update Reminder” can alleviate the anxiety of receiving large amounts of information to a certain extent, but the information is still there and must be opened.

      “Do n’t watch him (her) ” is also OK, but there are three shortcomings:

      • After having received his useless information for a period of time, he can only determine “Do n’t look at him (her) “;

      • OneIndividuals will not send useless information all the time, especially for users who are “fearing to miss key information”;

      • There are many contacts in the address book, “Do not look at him ( Her) “Although it can be operated in batches, this decision is often made for a single contact, and the operation cost is relatively high.
        

        
        

        4. Performance fatigue caused by multiple “self-expressions”

        By borrowing Curry’s concept of “I in the Mirror”, the circle of friends became a virtual “reception”, and “actors” performed their own idealized performances on the reception.

        However, due to the continuous expansion of the address book, it is often necessary to maintain multiple “me in the mirror”, and once the image is established, as long as the audience exists, it needs to be maintained all the time.

        Long-term operation, we will definitely perform fatigue, and escape to a more anonymous platform (Weibo, Douban etc. .

        “Friends can be seen in three days” has further reduced the time for users to maintain “I in the Mirror” to a certain extent, and there is no need to have psychological pressure on the previous “I in the Mirror”; The value of “front office” exists, and the address book continues to expand, and “actors” need to play different roles based on different audiences.

        “Some friends are visible / invisible” is based on tags for group management of address book contacts, which meets the needs of users to show different selves to different audiences, but grouping is a technical task, and grouping standards must be strictly divided to ensure The “invisible” group will not see your activity through the “visible” group.

        And with the expansion of the address book, grouping will not only be a technical job or an individual job, there will be more and more tags, and the grouping will be more and more complicated. Most people ’s address book contacts are placed in the “default group”, and refined group management will cost a lot.

        >

        Four, two methods
        

        From the point of view, except for the first one due to the slowness of the function, the other three are because the address book adds too many “different” contacts.

        As an ancient and magical function, the usage habit of adding contacts “in case of unexpected needs” in the address book will not change, then the problem actually becomes: how to provide different contacts with different familiarity levels Social way?

        Facebook and WeChat provide two solutions with different implementations but the same strategy, that is, to divide contacts in the address book into message friends and social friends.

        • Facebook: Disassemble Facebook Messenger as a separate product;

          
          

        • WeChat: When adding friends, set the friend permissions “chat, circle of friends, WeChat campaign, etc.” or “chat only”.
          

          Message friends, just complete the message communication. At this time, the relationship chain should be infinitely expanded, and there is no need to hinder this relationship expansion.

          Social friends, establish shallow emotional links, express themselves, and gain a sense of identity and presence. At this time, the relationship chain should be limited and restrained, which is easy to maintain and express yourself without pressure.

          In summary, we can communicate with many people, but we do n’t need to be friends with everyone and share my life.

          In addition to the difference in domestic and foreign product habits between the two implementations (domestic habits are used to make large and complete products, foreign countries are used to make small and specific products) / span>, whichever is better, depends on the user’s habits.

          But both still require a lot of investment in the management of the previous contacts: WeChat needs to classify the existing contacts, and Facebook needs to assign further roles to the existing contacts. Not small.

          Perhaps this is also a new opportunity: a pureCommunication tool products, to communicate, but can connect more scenes (shopping, content, life, games, etc.) Due to the competitive relationship of domestic existing products, It didn’t do a good job at connecting scenes.

          This article comes from the WeChat public account: everyone is a product manager (ID: woshipm) , author: Yao Fan Core