Li Jianzhong: The power of links

Author: Li Jianzhong,Weibo: http://weibo.com/jzli

When talking about the logic of software or app product innovation at the 36kr and Microsoft events, slide once said that "app software must embrace the power of The Link (embrace the magic of links) ". During this period, investors and entrepreneurs were very interested in this issue. Unfortunately, due to the time of the venue, it was impossible to fully expand. After returning to Shanghai, I want to write a blog to discuss it in detail.

Before or after reading this article, I suggest you read the article "my Internet beliefs" I wrote a year ago. this gives me a clear understanding of my narrative logic. The software mentioned here refers to the client software or app on PC, pad, or phone.

History can be used as an example to learn how to replace. Let's take a brief look at the history of PC software in China. Those who know about China's software industry should be familiar with the following software: Network ant, Winamp, RealPlayer, ACDSee, super solution, Rising antivirus, WinZip, QQ ....... Except for QQ, other software is almost gone, or even neglected. What is the reason behind this? No more user requirements? This cannot be said. In fact, most of them have similar software active in the moment: thunder, pptv, meitu xiuxiu, storm audio and video, 360, etc. Aside from factors such as operation, management, and founder, what kind of product factors lead to the decline of these software?

If we compare them with their powerful successors, we will find that these microservices have one thing in common: Missing links or low quality.

In fact, no matter whether it is Chinese or foreign, a great company in the history of the Internet, there is no company that makes the link the ultimate. The core of Google's search engine PageRank is the link between pages, Amazon creates the link between people and product, and Facebook's social network is the link between people, apple has created mobile links anytime, anywhere ......

Take the latest mobile Internet app software companies that have been gaining traction and valued at hundreds of millions of dollars: Instagram, Evernote, Flipboard, path, drawsomthing, etc, I believe that many of my friends may have doubts when they read their software functions. "I don't want to write or draw any pictures. This kind of software is worth this price?" However, from another perspective, that is, from the link perspective, none of these creates rich, fast, and high-intensity links. I dare not say that the link is a sufficient condition for an app's success, but the link is definitely a necessary condition for an app's success.

Links are from hyperlink in the Web field. Since the Web has gained an overwhelming advantage over traditional software-in fact, the overwhelming advantage of web is the victory of links. Although traditional software does not have the specific form of hyperlink, it is found that client software and servers, each communication process between client software and server software is actually a link process.

The link is not a simple "exist or none" problem for the product, and there are quality differences in the link. To better understand the power of links, we need to establish some evaluation dimensions for link quality. The following is my personal summary:

1. Number of linksThis is the most basic criterion for evaluating a software product or software form. For example, for social products such as Facebook and QQ, or Google search engines, the number of links processed is exponential (in the extreme value of theory, the number of links that can be created between N users or N webpages is n !). The number of links processed by many common software products is zero or very small (such as WinRAR, various notebooks, optimization masters, and other tool software)-such rare links, the value of software products is doomed to be low when the number of users is large.

2. link speedOn the surface, as long as it is a link on the Internet, it is basically the speed of light (optical fiber as the transmission medium ). However, if you go deeper (especially considering a round-trip link feedback), the speed of different product links is actually different. For example, the speed of email links is not as high as that of QQ links (user a writes an email to user B and B returns feedback, so that a round-trip link is less than a few days, and most are last month, this seriously slows down the speed of light. And a round-trip QQ conversation runs at the speed of light ). The speed of blog links is not as high as that of Weibo links (the speed of feedback for writing a blog is different from that for Weibo posts ). This is also one of the important reasons why "email is far less valuable than IM and blog is far less valuable than Weibo"-human eyes are naturally at the speed of light, only links with the speed of light can match.

3. Frequency of linksThe frequency is the number of links in a unit of time. Some software cannot be linked several times a month (for example, the early Windows Phone 6.0 system software), and some software generates countless links a day (for example, iPhone System Software: iMessage, iTunes store, app Store, Podcast Store ......). High-frequency links have absolute product advantages.

4. Link AccuracyIs the link rough? Or accurate? The difference is huge. The precise positioning of Web URLs makes web links highly accurate, this is why most web sites are more successful than client software or apps. It is hard to imagine that the shopping applications of mobile apps can create a larger transaction volume than those of taobao.com or 360buy.com. If you see a good product, you can copy and paste the URL on the web to Weibo or QQ and send it to your friends. However, it is difficult to recommend products in an app.

In fact, one of the root causes of the current PC Internet business models such as search and advertising that are not working on mobile is "mobile apps lack the accuracy of the Link", and only accurate links are available, search, advertising, and other ecological environments can be established on a large scale.

Accurate connection standards are what I think the next generation of mobile Internet APPs must solve in terms of technical architecture-similar to the rest architecture, to isolate the app status into precise unit pages, and then add a stable address representation. This must be achieved by Apple, Google, and Microsoft platform-level players sitting down to establish unified standards like Web URLs. It makes no sense to play in small circles. Of course, another possibility is that these large platform-level players are so noisy that they cannot establish accurate link standards like Web URLs on mobile apps.

5. Link strengthLinks are weak and some are weak. However, strong connections are much better. The links created by LinkedIn are definitely different from those created by Facebook. This is also the reason why LinkedIn's value is significantly different from Facebook's value.

6. Link dimensionOne-way, two-way, and one-way links (for example, in the Web 1.0 era dominated by Yahoo and other portals) are certainly not as good as two-way links (for example, in the Web 2.0 era, such as blogs, forums, and social networks ).

7. the adaptability of links some products also try to create a large number of links, but these links are very low in line with their main functions, and they are "selling products". Therefore, the value of the Chat cannot be a great product. For example, Kingsoft battery doctor is equipped with the so-called "installation essential" and "Download ranking" link elements. However, this method creates links outside of the main function (battery maintenance, it is doomed that the link quality cannot be high. High-quality links must be highly compatible with the product's main functions.

8. Communication Power of linksDifferent links have different communication power. Some links can only be transmitted from A to B, but some links can create links from A to B, then to C, and then to d ..... In this way, we will be able to quickly spread the chain. For example, the power of Weibo's chain transmission is far greater than that of forums such as Tianya and discuz, this is because the links of social networks are naturally chained and can be transmitted. Note that the link is a product feature, not the information content carried by the link. Although the interest points of different content are certainly different in dissemination.

Of course, the eight dimensions of the above links are only personal product experiences and reflections, which are not necessarily comprehensive. You are welcome to complement each other and learn from each other.

With these eight dimensions of evaluation links, you can view products from the perspective of links when planning products or positioning products. It can help us analyze the growth space of this product, for example, applications such as perpetual calendar, battery doctors, and battery phones sometimes look at the product and the installation volume is huge, so some people are very excited. But there are almost no links in these products, or even if there is, the link quality is also very low, this is doomed to these products cannot grow into a great product.

Why is the link so important? Essentially, every link behavior on the internet is "a person's needs, aspirations, and emotions ". Its size, strength, and speed are the size, strength, and speed of "human needs, aspirations, and emotions.

Links to software are like nerves to the body, transportation to the city, rivers and lakes to the Earth. The water is not corrupted, and the account is not corrupted. No link. With the rich and flourishing links, there will be endless and endless vitality.

Therefore, my biggest advice to my friends who are software products, especially mobile app products, is to create connections with an empty mind to increase the speed, frequency, intensity, and orientation of links, so soon you will find that your software products will have an incredible magic. Such software is called Internet software!

 

I have an iron rule for my current products: I am determined not to do products without links. Software without links has no vitality.