The future of Chinese version SNS

Since the end of March this year, Sina Weibo has released two iconic signals: 1 Sina uses its own search engine technology instead of Google search; 2 Sina Weibo enables weibo.com domain names. These two actions appear to have no direct connection to the surface, but in essence, search will become an indispensable support technology for the future development of Weibo.

I. Micro-BLOG Posts

The end of the contest will be with the portal, search, and even social networking sites, such as competition in the same way, is the user to use the Internet "portal" competition, and as users of the "entrance", functional and content is indispensable. Recalling the development of the internet age, as far as content is concerned, the content limitation that the user obtains directly in the portal age is "known known"--the limited content of the editor to the universal user; The content that the user gets directly in the search era is filled to the "known unknown"--the content that the user obtains the personalized demand; And from the functional point of view, the portal era of all the introduction of e-mail messaging services, the search era Gmail also appeared in the search page, and social times Facebook and Renren also launched the Mail service function. Compared to the two, functional easy to copy, and content navigation and possession is the core issue of competition. That is why Facebook insists it is not open to Google.

From the user's need for content, the competition of microblog is embodied in two aspects: the first is the capacity and quality of content itself, the core question is how to encourage users to contribute content spontaneously and integrate content effectively; second, the way users get content, and the core question is how to improve the user's experience of providing and acquiring content, such as interface and client side. (the author described in this "content" is not limited to news content or text, pictures, audio and video information carrier, also includes a variety of applications and services. )

In recognition of the importance of content, Sina Weibo is the most intuitive embodiment of the application content only accept the "input" synchronization (such as the lbs role of the street, can be the content of the synchronous release in Sina Weibo), completely rejected the "output" synchronization (such as Baidu's "box Weibo" and food service providers such as "Sync" function), As soon as Sina accepted the sync, he contributed to other microblogging service providers, which would lead to the loss of Sina's own competitiveness. Sina Weibo's "community binding" services more and more subtle, happy net and 139 of lobbyists services are killed, only the remaining is no longer the community of MSN, and "chat robot" service is a saves QQ ambiguous, has been "Please look forward to" words.

To look back on Sina Weibo's success, celebrity and event operation is an indelible factor. The so-called "celebrity" has always been Sina's trump card, as early as the Web2.0 blog era, Sina has a "celebrity" accumulation, and this is Sina Weibo is not easy to be defeated by Tencent Weibo one of the reasons. Even though Tencent has arranged microblogging operations on almost every channel, Sina has never slowed its pace. Make a comparison of the number is very easy to see the role of "celebrity", up to now some well-known micro-bo control of the number of fans Cai 3220441, kai-fu Lee 4655815, the grass-roots nature of the cold jokes selected, micro-blog comedy table up to 290w and 190w of the number of fans, Their microblogs are carefully edited and collated, and the minimum number of Weibo 2000+ to 16000+, and sometimes even with a prize-winning strategy, while some other star characters fans such as Yang 5035009, Leehom Wang 3498856, Luo 2798382, even if their content is relatively casual , but they are more likely to attract the attention of fans and fans. From the operational aspects of the incident, Sina is almost ahead of the whether it is the Ark of the fight against Tang June's "Education gate" or guoqing PK "Morgan Stanley Women", and later Wei's resignation, numerous media reports of the source of information are Sina Weibo, and Shire launched the "micro-bo anti-trafficking" and "Earth Hour" and other public-action implementation, Also reflects the media value of Sina Weibo and the social power that drives. (Note: This data interception time is April 12, 2011)

Sina Weibo success of the reason must not only "celebrity" and the operation of the incident two aspects, simple operability is also one of the important factors. But is there a time for Weibo or is there a lasting boom in Weibo? Will he be as happy as the net and Renren and other domestic SNS in Twitter and Facebook did not reach the peak of the early recession? This is an ugly but realistic problem, now the objective environment is "everyone micro bo" potential is not false, But until last year, the "People stealing food" is really cool. If only a new sense of transfer, the user base group to grow fast, but lost will soon, only the essential to meet the needs of users in order to sustainable prosperity. But from the content point of view, the media and information sources are the rigid needs of Internet users, and the current microblogging can only as fast information dissemination of high-quality news media, the content of the integration of the search engine and Facebook has the content of precipitation and accumulation. If Sina Weibo is a product in the midst of Twitter and Facebook, as Mr. Chao said, this product will be better than SNS itself to adapt to Chinese users, or as Tencent Ma said, "China's SNS is micro-bo", I believe that micro-bo in the future development of China has a long way to go.

From the perspective of the author, the future development trend of Weibo will have two ways: one is Twitter-like news media, and the other is the Chinese version of SNS, which exists as a carrier of social networking sites. But if the latter, Weibo may have to do a few things well. One is the rich content: not only news and text, pictures, audio, video and link bearer information, but also open platform for a variety of applications, so that the micro-BO platform itself and information more enriched; The second is the development of the client: for now, micro Bo relative domestic SNS client is leading, It is also essential to maintain a user-friendly and comfortable user experience; third, the user access to information upgrade: Now users in the microblogging platform to search for targeted information is difficult, even if there is a # #的话题搜索, but also far from enough, direct access to information sources of the page is only the latest updated information, and the collection of micro-Bo also temporarily no label classification function , it is difficult to reuse.

Now the microblogging has suffered the favor of the domestic internet giants, four of doors are scrambling to do, the more focused on the optimistic, the more likely to produce bubbles. And the final form of Weibo relationship between the vertical industry's ecological development, if it is the media, do a good job in the media to do, if it is a platform, do a good job platform to do. The future of Weibo is expected and requires caution.

Ii. Community Chapter

By the end of March this year, Facebook's nearly 9 million users in Taiwan accounted for nearly 40% of the population, and Facebook's entry to China was on the news again April 11, but at least two authorities said it was still being approved; The professional person Community Jingwei Network and the group community Sea Shellfish net also all gradually toward the stage. There are signs that China's social warfare will soon be officially launched, the Chinese version of SNS may appear complete body, competitors are not only the portal microblogging, Renren, happy net, there will be more strong players participate.

The author in the "Micro-Bo and the future of China's SNS (i)" in the development of micro-BO has made a trend analysis, but for the future China version of SNS full experience is in which way to present, the Facebook model may be to the Chinese local SNS exploration brings certain enlightenment. After all, SNS (Social Networking Services) has changed people's way of life in many countries, and Chinese local social networking sites are basically a replica of the pattern, from interactive interface, application components to Community marketing, The stickiness of Facebook users has not really been shown in terms of function and demand. The value of SNS application itself has not been fully embodied in Chinese mainland. One of the reasons for Li Kaifu's analysis of China's SNS lack stickiness is the rise of Weibo. And the author in a different perspective, the rise of micro-bo in China is one of the reasons for the development of local SNS is the loss of power. The three kinds of characters that Facebook has shown are in some way a reminder of the sensible direction of China's SNS development.

The role and application of SNS in the present age

Since the rise of SNS, Facebook embodies three social roles: content integration service provider, social Media Center and comprehensive application platform. Perhaps at the start of Facebook, SNS was just a social media center with limited content, and with the development of social media and entertainment, Facebook tended to mark. The Internet "operating system" Zuckerberg describes as "the gateway" for users to use Internet services.

1. Content Integration Service Provider

Content is always the needs of Internet users, and who can as the navigation of content, who may be as the "portal" of Internet users, such as the portal era of Yahoo!, Google in the search era, as well as the social era of Facebook.sns initially content is only from individuals, from the record, The spread of logs and photos began, but with the popularity of social networking sites, SNS content began to cover a wide range of areas:

1 News Category information: News is a kind of enduring universal demand, the rigid demand that each kind of media satisfies together, the Facebook performance is providing a lot of potential information source for the journalist. Ed, producer of social media at NPR. Peralta, Eyder Peralta, says its Facebook community is more than 1.5 million, an important channel for finding sources. On the other hand, the reproduction and sharing of social networking sites is an effective channel for disseminating information and encouraging individuals and institutions to contribute their content to social networking sites. The embodiment of the domestic Xinhua News agency has entered the home of the celebrity organization, the People's Daily network and Ft中文网 have also entered the public homepage of Renren, which has similar functions to the media's official microblog.

2 Life Class Information: Today SNS community release, reproduced and shared content is no longer limited to private text and photos, various types of life information including health, food, constellation, anecdotes and a variety of life and work skills are also widely disseminated, the carrier is not limited to text and pictures, has now been extended to audio and video, Share content can be music, movies or DV clips. The domestic network of "reprint" and Renren "sharing" is the carrier of this kind of information, and readers ' digest Chinese version of the Puchi, each period has opened a "Happy net fashion vane" plate, regularly recommended to the reader happy net popular vote and reprint, This means that SNS has become an important source of life information.

3 Media Links: Since the advent of Facebook's common account model, Renren and Sina Weibo have also opened up synchronous login and authorization functions for more portals, communities and functional sites, and the same community accounts can be used on multiple sites. In addition, whether it is personal blog and public website content, or lbs and other applications of the feedback can be used as a share of content at any time in the SNS community, so that their own communication circles know. Today, the links to the community are everywhere, and this has turned social networks into a base for content integration services. Recently, the Facebook "like" button is growing at a rate that attracts 10,000 of websites a day, and the latest "Send" button is being popularized at a rapid rate.

2. Social Media Center

In the Facebook effect, "even Harvard students, the fundamental need is money and sex, too, and SNS starts out by promoting social activities, such as not only to get to know your friends on Facebook, but to share your situation, your work, and your photos. You can also find people who share your interests, such as who can play bridge all night, or with whom you can have love. Facebook is the most prominent place compared to MySpace in the user's real identity confirmation, such as the first Harvard edu-Mail or accept a friend's invitation to register successfully, so SNS users of information reliability will be more easily contribute to the development of relations, such as "0 relationship-weak relationship-strong relationship", The strong relationship itself has the expansion and interaction of the relationship. Later, Facebook groups have developed into more than just "a lap of people", "discussion groups," Interest groups "," current affairs groups "and" activity groups "and other roles, the online group function is fully extended to all areas of life offline, even including parades and elections and other political activities of the initiation and promotion, The promotion and interaction of environmental protection and love projects, as well as the advertising and operation of various commercial activities.

SNS Renren in China (formerly School Network) is also the introduction of the relationship between students, net is a social game (happy Farm and grab parking) to introduce users, but now these two SNS "topic" and group influence than BBS mode of watercress, and local itself also relatively lack of Sharon, carnival and party culture, So Renren and kaixin are not as important as social networking to save the cost of social activity, or the subversive changes that Facebook has brought to Western lifestyles.

From the point of view of the social media Center, I can easily think of Howard. Schultz's description of the Starbucks Café 's role-People's "third space" outside their homes and workplaces: people in the living and work, once chat, party and leisure will be habitual to think of the same place-Starbucks café, and finally lead to even though it is in your own time, choose to read or surf the internet, Could not help but walk to Starbucks. That's a similar thing to Facebook's role. When you want to know the status of your loved ones, you choose Facebook, you choose Facebook when you want to share something new, you choose Facebook when you want to travel or party, and even if you want to contact someone or find a friend, Or will you choose Facebook: The end result is that you will inevitably log on to Facebook with your social media center role, and become the basic service that you use the Internet in conjunction with e-mail and instant messaging.

3. Comprehensive Application Platform

The breakthrough of the use time of foreign SNS users without the contribution of Web/social Game, and the domestic happy Net's start is also rely on white-collar like to play the two Social Game, so the game became SNS Community basic services outside the first application, but with the "open platform" concept of the rise, More and more Web sites and mobile Internet service companies have developed SNS community components, such as group purchase, lbs and the United States and other applications such as Mito software, more enriched the application of SNS, a variety of plug-ins in the SNS community is like a variety of software to the operating system, with the rich of Facebook application components, will strengthen its own role as a user of the Internet "portal" status.

Social demand analysis of SNS

The evergreen of any Internet product needs to be constantly updated to meet the needs of users, and any basic product is to meet the fundamental needs of people. Following the development of technology and times, all kinds of new demands will be excavated, but the fundamental demand is nothing more than the framework of Maslow's demand theory. For example, in the non-internet age, people in the "offline" search for a variety of ways to meet the needs, and "online" appearance is to improve the performance of the original demand, people are more accustomed to use the Internet. Return to the existence of the product's mission and function, nothing but two: first, meet the needs (better meet people's existing needs), and second, create demand (actively meet the potential needs of people). Social needs for SNS can be resolved from three social roles of Facebook:

1 information needs (SNS role: Content Integration service provider). Since ancient times, the demand for information has always existed, information is the carrier of news, knowledge and story, and it is an important medium for human cognition, growth and communication. Meeting People's Need for information includes: content delivery, dissemination and access to three levels. The internet has completely changed the way people access information, and social networks not only in the form of "relationship" into the use of the Internet is more consistent with the habits of people, but also a rich content carrier, can better meet the needs of people's information. such as charts.

2 social needs (SNS role: Social media Center). Social interaction itself is the third level of demand, as described in Maslow's needs theory, in addition to food, clothing and safety. Early MySpace was a dating site for social purposes, and Facebook's breakthrough in the authenticity of the identity of the network to completely break the situation of the lack of trust between people, the "offline" and "online" really connected to save the stranger communication and weak relationship between the cost of advancement, It is the authenticity of LinkedIn that has developed into a medium for tapping into the workplace connections. SNS makes it easier for users to establish relationships with the people or groups they want to contact, more convenient to maintain long-term contact with their own network, can even arbitrarily initiate community activities between netizens, including academic, interest, entertainment, political and public welfare aspects, and then to SNS personalized privacy settings, Enable social networking sites such as Facebook to save users ' social costs to the fullest.

3 Functional and recreational needs (SNS role: Comprehensive application platform). With the popularity of SNS, users stay in the social network time is more and more long, and the user's own time is very limited, many people have admitted that the competition of Internet products is to users use the Internet time of snatch, if functional applications and entertainment integrated in the popular SNS platform, to users, Social networking sites and applications themselves have saved relative time costs, development costs and promotional costs, and SNS "relationship" has contributed to the "Happy Farm" category social game of the popular, so that the whole SNS ecological and perfect a step, if SNS in the future more popular, Users are also more likely to meet other needs in the SNS platform, such as reading, listening to music, entertainment, shopping, even work and so on. Foreign SNS is the first to meet the needs of users of social networking, to expand to the information and recreational needs, and one of the domestic well-known SNS happy net itself is to entertainment as the center of other development, this reverse is also Facebook and LinkedIn is also accelerating development, and happy net is very prosperous one of the reasons. Early American Yahoo! also because of the web game brought a lot of users and portal PV, but the entertainment and freshness of itself is relatively information and social is more easily to be transferred and replaced the demand, so the entertainment as the core SNS difficult to do lasting.

The future geometry of Chinese version SNS

The significance of Internet products is also to meet demand and create demand, while the pursuit of fresh elements will not be a persistent demand. To do a good job of evergreen Internet products, is to better meet the fundamental needs of users. For example, for information needs to do some testing: content to provide the dimension, you can start to encourage users to contribute content and integration of the essence of information, the dimension of information dissemination, need more to understand the user's relationship circle and mining user share content habits; the dimension of information acquisition, The service quality of the product can be radically improved from the simplicity of the operation and the improvement of the user experience. I just put forward a sample, the fate of local SNS is still in the hands of more people who practise.

In response to the local SNS, Facebook and Twitter have done a benchmark for China's SNS development, but unfortunately, China's local Renren + happy Network + microblogging meet the demand is far less than Facebook+twitter in the west to meet the needs of the core of Renren is "address Book" , social fundamentals are good, but the development of the late, the core of happy Net is the game entertainment center, content and social are very limited, and micro-blog is only the core of the news media, even if relative to Twitter is a richer content carrier, but the temporary form of micro Bo is difficult to classify and accumulate content well, Like the internet age of the "newspaper", but the most valuable information is in the form of "books" accumulated, Chinese users and users around the world will have the same needs, but China so far only the concept of Facebook, and no one is the real Facebook role, The current local community pattern is like a city in a certain area only fields and residential, B City only factories and office buildings, c City only hospitals and schools, users can only live between the two cities, and in one place. The future of Chinese version of SNS also need more collaboration, not an internet company to do all the things, the division of labor can focus, focus is easier to create the ultimate.

Believe that in the foreseeable future, China's SNS will appear new pattern, if Renren, Kaixin, Sina Weibo and Tencent Weibo can not further satisfy the needs of users beyond freshness, more opportunities are likely to turn to the budding question and answer community, with its broad path, wide island, little net and push, Or some other new Internet element that is being nurtured.