Li Zhi: Impatient companies can't do classified information

"We still want to be free, and we want every user to have access to this service." At the same time for high-end users, to provide more value-added services. ”

the original intention of Word-of-mouth network

I was in June 04 from Alibaba out of business, then do the purpose of Word-of-mouth network is to provide users with a clothing, food, housing, line, play life-style community platform. 2-3 founders invested 80,000 yuan together, in fact, originally originated from a meal of the personal experience, at that time that this will be a helpful platform for everyone, a good prospect.

China Internet We all know that the most need to do is to insist, we must stick to it. At that time I made a decision to put 50,000 dollars into our website, and the other 30,000 to stay living. Our idea is: the demand will be developed slowly, will be better. A year later, more and more visitors, Word-of-mouth users more and more, membership development to more than 100,000 people, many people come to us to check for such as restaurants, looking for a house, rent the house information.

the market value of classified information in China

There are more than 1 billion people in China, everyone will have such demand in the future, so the market is absolutely huge. Last year, catering consumption has exceeded 1 trillion, to 2010 will reach 2 trillion of the consumer market.

The real estate may be bigger, including recruiting, making friends, every industry is very big, is a trillion-meter industry. Although local search in the United States has just begun a few years, now the United States only local search engine accounted for more than 1/4 of the share.

In the future, we can imagine that everyone will use this platform to spend, to find their own suitable for consumption of places, such as restaurants, bars, rent.

credit can be accumulated and shared.

Some people think that some sort of information needs such as buying a house is a one-time, ID card audit is not necessary. In fact, the classification information involves a wide range, all over the life of every corner. For example, today's rental, a year to buy a house, two days will eat, make friends, look for work and so on. While some services are intermittent, all services are strung together to find every nook and cranny of your life. You are renting, buying a house to accumulate the credit, at the same time will be in making friends, or sell second-hand mobile phone when manifests. Because credit is cross-industry, personal consistency and consistency. Credit can be shared in the whole classified information field of Word-of-mouth, even with Taobao and Alibaba.

In this way, identity certification will give members a direct value, because the identity of the authentication and more likely to be trusted, such as identity certification, the House will be better sold. So although we let everyone have the opportunity to publish and see information, but we will be willing to do the certification of members, will give him a higher honor and promotion.

For example, our integrity, a lot of people do not feel much value at first, but with more and more praise, in fact, many people only with the praise of people doing business. If Taobao is typical, only with diamond-grade people doing business, it will feel that my business is to promote, will be willing to do this thing.

The United States also faces the same problems with respect to privacy, including national laws, that accompany identity authentication. The key is to grasp the balance between credit and privacy. The purpose of our credit is to make people use credit, to do other things easier, rather than to learn more privacy.

It should be said that as the Chinese market matures, many attempts are needed. We think that the accumulation of credit will take credit-related things out of the privacy, but everyone feel the benefit. If everyone is anonymous, the community will develop in a bad way.

suggestions for making classified information in China

First, any company that is too impatient is not very suitable for this area. Because its vitality in China is relatively long, such as the United States Craigslist has been doing for more than 12 years, and increasingly permeate the lives of every people, in China has just established three years of Word-of-mouth.

Just as Alibaba started to create business-to-business in 1999, it has been 8 years since the development of more and more businessmen doing business online, as well as the emergence of online group influence. Its development is slow, but once it is developed it will be explosive. Classification information is also such an area.

Why do we choose to cooperate with Alibaba? It is also because Ma Yun has sufficient knowledge and enough support for this piece, the General venture capital Chamber is anxious to make you earn money, but Alibaba will not mention such short-term demand. As long as we provide users with better services, better information, we will be able to have greater input to nurture the market. So, this piece of us has plenty of patience.

Secondly, we should treat the classified information industry rationally. Long-term market also shows that the classification of information fields must be a lot of input, so now many small companies just go in and exit, this phenomenon is very normal. Through this wave of oscillation, the development of classified information will tend to be more rational.

Again, classified information is also a trading market. The classification information is similar to the C2C, has the service side and the service party. My 5 years experience at Alibaba tells me that the online trading market is a big community because buyers and sellers need good interaction. What we do is to set up a good platform for everyone to come in to trade, exchange, communication.

Four, do the classification information first in the medium and large cities development, gradually to the small and medium-sized city infiltration. The larger a city, such as Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and even cities such as Hangzhou, there are millions of people, a large area, to find a message is not easy, then very need a platform. So classified information, c2c and so on must be in large and medium cities to develop first, will gradually penetrate to small and medium-sized cities.

Take advantage of value-added revenue from high-end users

In terms of profitability, I feel that we need to nurture the market over the long term. We will try to walk while trying to make every people in the future to develop habits, in the local platform to form a netizen interaction, will feel the value of this platform.

But there is a point to be clear, we have to make this market rapid development, we must have a revenue model out. We will do something in the whole community development process, such as some netizens are willing to do some promotion, to obtain higher, more value-added services, we will be on the basis of free service to provide value-added services. such as restaurants, intermediaries and so on will have many such opportunities.

We still want to be free in general, and hope that every user will have access to such services. At the same time for high-end users, to provide more value-added services.

(Excerpts from April 2007 media interviews)