Charles Zhang's Internet age: What else do you do besides show?

Since April 20, 1994, China has been connected to the world through a 64k international special line, and this country is inevitably involved in a new change that covers the work, life and politics of the Chinese people. And now Chinese Internet entrepreneurs are taking part in the country's transformation with a more disruptive technology and a more assertive subversion, such as Internet finance.

In the glass room on the top floor of Sohu mansion, I see Zhang Chaoyang. The glass room has been a gathering of celebrities for a long time, but in the last year, Zhang had only lit the glass room when it was extremely necessary, such as the release of the Sohu video show or his presence at the star event. In the 90-minute interview on March 19, he and I had a strange estrangement from his retreat, which kept him in a state of excitement and confusion-he often asked the answer.

I could see he was answering my question very sincerely, but in many cases his sincerity made it difficult to answer the question. When I wanted him to answer why he had suddenly disappeared for two years in all the normal circumstances of Sohu, he was trying to explain why people were suffering from a mental crisis.

"The most recent mutation in the human brain is the emergence of the Internet, and each of us receives a significant increase in the amount of information received and received, so it is easy to create mental problems ... In the end our brain becomes our enemy, and we ourselves become enemy (enemies), and our brains are infinitely recycled, causing us to end up suffering. ”

When the photographer gives him a photo, Charles Zhang told me that he had been in the woods recently, and that I had pulled him out of the woods in advance, and he had set his comeback for a few months-then he would lead Sohu back to the center of the Internet.

His last-minute statement aroused my curiosity, and I wondered how the CEO of China's "favorite Show" internet company was repositioning himself in the age of a technology-led product manager and the means to return to the center of the Internet.

It is undeniable that Zhang Chaoyang has led the internet company's marketing trend.

February 1997, Yinghai founder Zhang please come to the "digital survival" author Negroponte, the day of the press conference, Charles Zhang volunteered to take the stage to translate, and to the media he is Negroponte descendants, he has just created the love of the company also received by the Nile's investment; A large number of media reported the story of Charles Zhang and Negroponte, and the real invite to Gropanti Zhang is reduced to foil. Zhang 17 years later still complained to me: "I invite Gropanti is to popularize Chinese Internet knowledge, Zhang Chaoyang has brought him to fame." ”

He was able to see how hard he wanted to stand in the middle of the Internet at the beginning of his career.

Today's Charles Zhang, still maintain the use of press conferences and topics to hype their habits. He says most of his marketing comes from "the first person in China Internet" Zhang. That year, Zhang most of the money and manpower are invested in the propaganda of Yinghai Granville, Charles Zhang also learned to do so.

In China, the Internet is still in a low-level imitation of the United States Silicon Valley, product shape convergence of the era, the three major portals of competition is the advertising investment and marketing tools. Although Zhang is short of money, but very early to study in the United States, familiar with the rules of Vanity Fair, he is well versed in the way to create the topic, each time he used to seek the greatest exposure rate.

Due to poor financing, the funds available to Sohu is only 1/10 of Sina. Therefore, Zhang chose the cheapest and most effective way: to build a personal brand. At one point, he talked like all CEOs about the "bubble is the Internet revolution", and occasionally in various public places, but in private but nervously squeezed costs.

Charles Zhang's success story is a personal show history, October 1998, he was elected the United States "Time" "50 Global Digital Heroes" ranked 45th. At the same time, his picture of skateboarding in front of Tiananmen Square was hung in the eyes of southern weekend, known as the first person in the history of China's show.

Zhang's Waterloo began in 2009, the eve of the mobile internet era, SINA launched micro-blog. Although he has followed up on Sohu Weibo and intends to use his marketing skills again to pull people's attention to Sina Weibo, he has tasted failure. During the time that Zhang was playing Sohu Weibo, people are concerned about Zhang's wedding with Weibo and Wang, and journalists are also willing to participate in the attentive Sohu microblogging beauty PR, but people's popularity is often only a moment, not enough to shake the market has been the first Sina Weibo position.

In 2012, Zhang finally admitted that Sohu Weibo, which was personally in command, had lost in the business competition. In a press conference, he said: "In the past two years, we have indeed lost the battle of the microblog."

The CEO, who likes to be a show, once confessed to micro-Bozhong, Weibo and micro-mail fan his two ears. But now he's telling me, "We don't have a chance and we don't do a micro-credit or Twitter, but we're going to make better mobile news clients." ”

Charles Zhang, who is now looking to grow with users of search, video, gaming and news clients, is making a comeback in the media's 2.0 social networking services, but said: "It all depends on whether Sohu can innovate." "He believes that there are many kinds of innovation in China's Internet enterprises, not only Tencent to develop micro-letters as a sudden explosion of star-grade products, but also a kind of innovation is a cumulative innovation."

He told me that the future success of Sohu depends on a good layout, "we have to seek our breakthrough-our Sogou in Tencent shares after how the outbreak, from the media platform to the video to Sogou to the game is the first thing I want to consider." ”

Zhang said that the changes in the Internet often come from the daily improvement of product details, through improving operational efficiency, improve marketing methods, accumulated to a certain extent, in the outside world appears to explode. "To achieve innovation, it is necessary to achieve internal efficient operation and the user's product experience has a kind of ultimate pursuit." ”

After laborious and earnest talk of these tedious and tedious theories, Charles Zhang lay down heavily to the armchair behind him and continued his silence. After all, it's not the way he used to talk about marketing, but more like a product manager talking about his philosophy of technology.

But that does not mean that Charles Zhang is willing to give up the marketing routines he was good at. April 2, 2014, he again appeared in Sohu Toupai's Homemade TV series "hurried that year" of the film, this time he was on the scene "guest" a teacher. On the same day, he wrote a famous film name "Break" on the blackboard. The movie name partly fits his current behavior and mood, in this era of product manager Wang, Zhang's heart and philosophy have been with that only for "Bo eyeball" he produced a subtle rift, but he is still willing to continue to maintain his former public image-the entertainment tycoon wandering in the Vanity Fair.