Portal mode is in a lot of trouble.

Summary: Portal mode is a big hassle. As the Internet companies have released the first quarter of 2012 earnings, the traditional significance of the four portals of the report, let the observers issued such a sigh of regret. According to earnings, Sina, the head of the portal, increased advertising revenue by only 9 in comparison with last year.

"Portal mode is a lot of trouble." "As Internet companies have released the first quarter of 2012 earnings, the traditional meaning of the" four major portals "report, let the observers send such a sigh of regret.

Earnings show, the first portal of Sina, advertising revenue compared to last year only increased 9%, Sohu in the removal of search and video brand advertising revenue, only an increase of 7%; In an industry where growth is below one-third, even "weak", the portals ' performance looks a bit inadequate. Although the first quarter is the most ad-free quarter of the year, the portal still feels pressured compared with the same quarterly results in previous years.

As a kind of information system, advertising revenue is the lifeline of the free information and advertising-supported profit and operation mode in the Portal website. Now, the growth of advertising revenue of domestic portal is slowing down.

Economic slowdown brings cold meaning

As in 2009, Sina CEO Charles Chao once again explained that the reason for the slow growth of advertising business is the weak economy.

"Due to China's macroeconomic weakness, the first quarter of Sina's brand advertising business growth slowed." We expect macroeconomic resistance to continue into the second quarter. "Sina CEO Charles Chao explained the decline in advertising revenue growth after his first-quarter earnings report.

In the first quarter of 2012, Sina's advertising revenue was $78.5 million trillion, less than 10% per cent from last year's quarter. In 2008, the same Olympic year, the increase reached 50%.

In the first quarter, the decline in the macroeconomic index almost offset the profit growth of most web portals.

China's economy for the first quarter slowed for the fifth consecutive quarter, the growth rate of only 8.1%, the beginning of the two quarter has not seen any improvement, plus April foreign exchange accounted for the first drop in the year, the fund face a serious loss of blood. The combination of two factors has prompted the central bank to announce a second cut in reserve requirements over the weekend.

And from the export, investment, consumption of the "troika" April data, the situation is not optimistic.

The advertising revenue of the portal site has always been closely related to the economic situation. In the first quarter of 2009, it was the first year of the collapse of Lehman and the economic crisis that swept the world. Chao was forthright in expressing the reason: "China's economic uncertainty has caused a severe impact on our quarterly online advertising business." ”

In the portal business has been closely followed by Sina Sohu, has been fortunate in the first quarter of 2009 years to maintain a 17% increase in advertising revenue, but this year, their feelings are not good where to go. "We have seen some advertisers postpone their marketing plans, especially in the automotive and real estate sectors," said Sohu Coo Wang, after the first quarter of this year's earnings release. In the auto industry, sales of new cars have slowed this year. In the real estate industry, regulation affects the marketing plans of new developers. ”

Sohu's brand advertising revenue for the first quarter was $61 million trillion, up just 7% from last year's quarter. During the 2008 Olympics and 2011, the increase had reached more than 40% per cent.

There is China's internet industry "size S" called Sina and Sohu, at the same time feel the economic slowdown and policy control of the cold.

According to Ctr-adex Power's statistics, the first quarter of this year, the Chinese advertising market "total plate" for 151.15 billion yuan, only an increase of 1.7% per cent.

Moving ads to new platforms

Tencent's strong increase in advertising revenue shows a new trend in internet advertising: the media platform for advertising is moving. A well-known car website even completed the whole year's advertising sales in May.

Outside the larger environment, new competitors and new businesses from the Internet industry are also challenging the portal model based on brand advertising revenue.

In the traditional meaning of the four major portals, Tencent's advertising revenue in the first quarter of this year alone, the growth rate of 92%, close to doubling.

In interpreting this contrarian growth, Tencent Chief strategy officer Michel used the term "open source", "We will use some new business development, on the new platform to carry out advertising business." ”

Different from Sina's "free news, page placement advertising" model, Tencent staff revealed that their ads are packaged configuration. "Our advertising resources include ads for QQ clients, search ads, QQ space and friends of the relevant advertising, open platform self-service advertising and the position of the Electronic Business platform ads." Tencent Web portal provides the usual meaning of the display of advertising is only part of this package, so for Tencent, the portal to create ads should not be listed in the financial, the whole group of advertising revenue is a combination of the whole. ”

Tencent's strong increase in advertising revenue shows a new trend in internet advertising: the media platform for advertising is moving.

Iris analyst Yutenyu told reporters that the flow statistics show that the integrated portal type of Web site in the two years of traffic growth is only a small increase, some topics and focus on the vertical site has been rapid growth. Auto, easy Car network, such as car sites, SouFun and other real estate vertical sites have been diverted a lot of real estate, car ads, and these types of advertising before the portal site for large advertisers. A well-known car website insiders told reporters, 2012 years until May, the site has completed the annual advertising sales task, the rapid growth of the high level are surprised.

Search and social threats

In the United States, Google has already defeated the portal mode of the representative of Yahoo, sat on the throne of Internet advertising champion. In China, Baidu is also widening the gap with the portal site.

Search engines are increasingly becoming strong rivals for portals.

In the United States, Google has already defeated the portal mode of the representative of Yahoo, sat on the throne of Internet advertising champion. In China, Baidu is also widening the gap with the portal site. A quarterly survey shows that Baidu's revenue from online marketing to reach 676.5 million U.S. dollars, more than twice times more than the total advertising revenue of four major portal sites. In the first quarter of the general weakness of the environment, Baidu's income still achieved a year-on-year growth of 75%.

Tencent vice president, the history of science and Technology, "the top of the tide," author Wu, said that in the Google and Yahoo competition era, search engines and portals in the advertising market in the "impinging" subdivision of the relationship, the portal relies on high-quality content to obtain a large company's brand advertising, Search engine is mainly aimed at small and medium-sized marketing area, the two sides share the food internet advertising market cake.

But in China, this balance is increasingly being broken. In addition to the brand advertising market by the above-mentioned professional vertical web site encroachment, search engines have become increasingly strong competitors. March 29 This year, one of the world's largest consumer goods companies Unilever CMO Keith Weed with marketing senior team to visit Baidu. Keith Weed revealed that Baidu (including Archie Art) is Unilever's largest strategic partner in the digital media sector in China, and Unilever has doubled its marketing effort in Baidu over the past two years by 6 times times.

May 9, another FMCG giant, the company, and Baidu reached a strategic partnership in digital marketing. In the past, fast-moving consumer goods have been the portal of large advertisers.

Baidu Business marketing director Chenzhi to reporters, P & G and Baidu cooperation, mainly focus on the Chinese netizens through Baidu's high coverage and depth of data accumulation, to understand the characteristics of Chinese consumers, for the future of the rapid transformation of netizens to online consumers lay the foundation.

"It is not yet possible to say that the companies of Procter and Gamble, Unilever, will have more ads on the Internet than traditional channels, but once they have more than half their online sales, the shift will happen very quickly," he said. Globally, they are also exploring this form of collaboration with Google and Facebook, which will become their main position once the online market is in the future. "Chenzhi judged.

In this strategic cooperation, the two sides also involved in advertising and other aspects of the negotiations, but Chenzhi did not respond to specific details.

According to the Tianyu analysis, for the portal site, the page can not be infinitely large, so the ad on the page is also limited. But the search engine does not have this kind of restriction, the user always sees the advertisement on the newly generated page. This is also Baidu can have 400,000 customers, in the order of magnitude far more than the major portal reasons.