Chapter 318 Use non-mainstream to seize the market
In the conference room, Yao Yuan continued:
"Many users are actually lazy, or don't like that the community has so many functions. They just want to look at the space and listen to music.
But the foundation of the community is the web page. You need to constantly open the web page to get what you want, which is very troublesome. Let me give you the simplest example. You are working on the computer and you find it convenient to hang up a MaiMai.
, or is it more convenient to open the web page?
In other words, we have simplified the community and turned it into Maimai, making it easier for netizens to use it."
Yao Yuan clicked on a function with the mouse and said: "For example, this one, add friends with one click! You don't need to register a new account, you can log in with the community account, and with one click, all your community friends will be transferred to MaiMai.
Secondly, in the row of function bars on the left, the first space is for music, the third is for the mall, and the fourth is for games...
But please note that in this space, the music is not a community version, but a simplified version, with more concentrated and concise information, and more suitable for lower-income age groups."
ah!
At this moment, everyone suddenly realized.
They thought they understood Commander Yao's train of thought, but in fact they had just begun.
"From now to next year is the first phase, and the top priority is to promote MaiMai and M coins!"
"I have done it before, using text messages to recharge and reward. Later, the text messages were sold and I didn't manage them much. Now I want to pick them up. How to make virtual currency valuable?
Give it enough goods to exchange, and this is the value. For example, the mall can use M coins for discounts. Of course, we will not mention the mall today.
Remember the key points, the two core projects!”
Scratching, scrubbing, everyone below has a notebook in hand, ready to record.
"The first one is personal space. I plan to launch value-added services. For example, for a monthly subscription of 10 yuan, you can decorate your own space at will, just like decorating your home.
For another example, for a monthly subscription of 15 yuan, we have so many music copyrights, right? Hey, you can play songs in the space, and you can also request songs for your friends!
Everyone was talking about it:
"Then let's make another Mai Mai Show. That thing is said to be very profitable!"
"Hey, that doesn't count as plagiarism?"
"You're just kidding, the QQ show is also copied. Who on the Internet is laughing at who?"
After all, Wu Jun is worth 0.08%, and raised the question: "Value addition is secondary, the key is how to develop users? Even if all the community population downloads, there will only be more than 20 million users.
QQ has 300 million registered users and is deeply entrenched and difficult to fight.”
"I didn't say we wanted to kill QQ. We can no longer kill this market, but we must have our own market share and have a product to stand there."
Yao Yuan continued: "This is the second project I'm talking about, the game!"
“Use various games to bundle users with Maimai and Space, use game and M-coin discounts and giveaways to let netizens download Maimai.
As for what game it is, I'm already in contact."
"..."
After all these words, everyone was worried. This is taking the initiative to make enemies with QQ! Why take the initiative to make enemies? Isn’t it good to develop the community honestly?
This is the difference of the times.
The online community has been booming in just a few years. Although it was very powerful at its peak, when smartphones came out, almost all of them were wiped out. Never mind Tianya, Maopu, or Renren...
Commander Yao didn’t mean to make enemies, but he had no choice. In May next year, QQ Space will be released. With the number of QQ users, once it enters the community track, the first one to be squeezed will be Maiwo.
You must strike first to gain the upper hand!
To put it simply, QQ now wants to move from instant messaging to community, and Maiwo wants to move from community to instant messaging.
Yao Yuan's goal is even longer-term, and he will take two steps in the future: the community will be directly converted into Weibo, and MaiMai will be converted into WeChat.
As for relying on games for promotion, naturally they are social games such as stealing food, grabbing parking spaces, etc. It’s still a bit early, and what we are currently working on is the Korean “Audition”, which later got a Chinese name.
Call it Audition!
What is the concept of Audition? It has been in operation for 5 years and has 540 million registered accounts.
Yao Yuan never does a single project and likes to collaborate, so the idea is: Mai Mai - Space - M Coin - Audition - Shen Ke.
Abbreviation: non-mainstream.
He wants to target age groups and seize market share with non-mainstream products!
…
In addition, QQ Space was not a dominant player at the beginning. At that time, there was a strong competitor called 51.com with 200 million users. It was inseparable from QQ Space.
It was just defeated in the end.
………………
"Cheng Wei, Mr. Yao calls you!"
"okay!"
In the office area of the mall, Cheng Wei, who was about to go out to develop suppliers, paused, ran upstairs with excitement and a little doubt, and walked along the long corridor to the end, like a pilgrim.
"Dong dong dong!"
"Please come in!"
"Hello, Mr. Yao!"
"Well, sit down and have something to drink?"
"No, no, no!"
Cheng Wei waved his hand quickly, but unexpectedly the other party took a cup of tea and a cup of coffee and placed them in front of him. He hesitated for a moment and chose coffee.
As a result, Mr. Yao directly picked up the tea and took a sip.
Ouch!
Touched, touched!
"Don't be nervous, let's chat casually. How long have you been working in the mall?"
"Almost a year."
"Do you have a career plan?"
"Uh, hehe!"
Cheng Wei giggled.
Yao Yuan also smiled and said: "You have outstanding business capabilities and are very talented in sales promotion. I should have allowed you to continue to develop in the mall, but there is a more important task in front of you, which can only be done by you.
The nature has not changed, it is still promotion, but this time it is a game.
I am planning to set up a game department and officially launch an online game next year. As a college student, you must know that the home base of online games is in Internet cafes.
How to get Internet cafes to download our games, how to set up point card channels, how to let people play games, etc. This requires a professional promotion team.
I want to transfer you here, starting with a city. Once you are done well, you will be a province, and then you will be a large region. Except for my position, there is no cap on your position. It all depends on your own ability.
How about it, do you have confidence?"
Hiss!
Cheng Wei took a breath and Liu Shi Zhonglie, how could the young man bear this? His liver and brain were immediately shattered, and it was not a pity to die.
Yao Yuan was also very pleased. Young wage earners are easy to incite.
…………
"Audition" was operated in South Korea in mid-2004, with less than 400 people online at the same time, so it was not popular at all.
The result was a big hit in the mainland, and Korean netizens were baffled and ran to play one after another. The number of people online increased to more than 10,000, and the server was barely shut down.
There are a lot of bad things about this game.
The developer is T3 and the publisher is Yedang Online. It was first represented by Jiuyou.com in Shanghai. The boss of Jiuyou.com is Wang Zijie, and later he went to start a girl group. SNH48 is his handiwork. This crossover is also very big.
In short, it is very popular. Jiuyou.com wanted to go public in Japan through Audition, but was blackmailed by T3 in various ways:
For example, during the listing audit, T3 required payment of US$250,000 in communication fees, US$2 million in appearance fees, US$20 million in contract renewal, etc. Otherwise, it would block the listing.
In the end, there was a lawsuit and all kinds of conflicts.
The IPO of Jiuyou.com failed, so I held my nose and reconciled, renewing my contract with T3 at a sky-high price. I thought of stabilizing the situation and restarting the IPO, but something happened again in 2008.
Coinciding with the Wenchuan earthquake, entertainment activities were suspended, and a woman named Zhang Ya suddenly appeared and recorded a video cursing the people in the disaster area.
Then public opinion quickly fermented, saying that this person was cursing because he couldn't play Audition. Later, Zhang Ya was arrested by the police. The next day after his arrest, "QQ Dance" was released for public testing.
According to subsequent investigations, the original video did not mention Audition at all. But it was too late. Audition was repeatedly named by the officials, and its momentum was greatly reduced. Its market share was quickly swallowed up by "QQ Dance".
This is business war!
No matter how disgusting it is, Wenchuan dares to use it to talk about it...
Beijing, 99 Company.
Xiaoxiba from publisher Yedang Online is waiting. The company itself is also a game manufacturer, and its representative works include the "Elf" series.
Now responsible for the global distribution of "Audition".
The Korean server of this crappy game is about to be shut down. There are less than 400 people online. I still have to pay for a song copyright fee and look for someone to represent me everywhere. Finally, someone is interested in it, and I come over to discuss it.
Before coming here, I also investigated to what extent Maiwo existed in mainland China, and the results were surprising.
After waiting for a long time, the representative of 99 appeared with instructions from Yao Yuan.
The two got straight to the point.
Online game agents generally have agency fees + profit sharing, but some have strict requirements. For example, World of Warcraft: Ninetowns spent US$13 million, 22% profit sharing, and US$70 million in computer room construction fees to win the four-year agency right.
The little game Audition is much simpler.
"3 years, 2 million US dollars in agency fees, 30% share!"
Representative 99 was immediately happy to hear the other party's conditions, shook his head and said: "500,000 US dollars, 15% share!"
"No, no, no, you have no sincerity. Your price is humiliating."
"Our costs are also very high. Let me give you a simple calculation. We have to give at least 30% of the share to the telecom operators and point card channel providers, and then give you 15%. We can only have 55% of the profit left. Is this ratio right?
Is it very high?"
"Telecom operators, point card channel providers..."
This is the expenditure that every game has, about 10-15%, 99 means it is deceiving people, but Xiaoxiba has no idea at all.
The two continued to argue, and they couldn't agree on the 15% life-or-death deal. He insisted on paying another $2 million and refused to let go.
Representative 99 asked: “Are you responsible for the music copyright of this game?”
"Of course, we have packed the Korean pop music library."
"But if you want to operate in the mainland, you must have Chinese songs. Let's do this. We will negotiate the copyright of the Chinese songs ourselves, and the price is US$1.2 million!
With all due respect, you have to look at our size. If you find a small company to represent a game like this that is quickly released in Korea, even 30% may not be as good as our 15%."
"..."
This is indeed true. Xiao Xiba thought about it again and again, and finally nodded in agreement.
Agency fee of US$1.2 million, 15% profit sharing, 2005-08.
After the conversation, 99 representatives knocked on Commander Yao’s office and reported the situation, and a sentence came out:
"Contact the record companies. We need to make up for the things that have slipped through the net before. Remember, it is not just for this game, but we have the right to use it for any game!"