A glimmer of hope for being a community in the mobile era.

     Recently, I read Robbin's article "Is there a way to be a community in the mobile era?", and I feel that I have learned a lot. As an editor of the technical community and media, I am also thinking about the way out for the community in the mobile era.


The core point of the article is: "In the mobile era, especially the era when WeChat dominates mobile, starting a mobile community from scratch (a community based on content operation) is a dead end."


I am convinced that three keywords are enough . Explains the origin of the "dead end": WeChat domination, starting from scratch, and content operation.


Let us carefully think about the current development status of domestic and foreign communities. It is almost difficult to find a living and decent community that meets the above three conditions at the same time. Therefore, everyone is not stupid, and no one will step on the mine and go forward.


On the other hand, if you want to be a community in the mobile era, if you want to hope, it is these three paths:


relying on WeChat. I don’t know how to clearly define the boundaries of a community. The so-called wise person sees wisdom. However, at present, various circles of various sizes have developed based on WeChat groups. This is also a kind of community, which can not only share knowledge, but also expand contacts , a bit of a simplified version of the community, in such a rapidly evolving era, perhaps the WeChat ecological community can meet the needs of most audiences. Of course, as Robbin said, the convenience of content production on the mobile terminal is far less than that on the PC terminal, so the content sharing forms on the mobile terminal are basically pictures, hyperlinks, short messages, etc. The advantage of this form of content production is that it can be quickly generated. Rich information, strong timeliness, and various forms; the shortcomings are also obvious. Too much information makes it difficult for readers to see what they want. Fortunately, technologies such as personalized recommendation have been widely used in various fields, and search is more convenient.


Move to mobile based on existing content. Although everyone is accustomed to conquering everything with mobile phones, in some scenarios, the form of the PC side is still attractive, such as structured codes, lengthy discussions, etc. The display effect of these contents on the mobile side is put aside, fragmented The reading time is not suitable for understanding such a profound problem. For readers who come from search engines, the PC side is more convenient to "utilize" the content found. From these interpretations, the PC terminal must have value and will not be completely replaced by the mobile terminal. The mobile terminal is suitable for likes, and the PC terminal is suitable for producing liked content. The content output of the mobile terminal of many websites is very different from the website, which is also an optimization.


Content operation is not the ultimate goal. Due to the constraints of the mobile terminal, it is difficult for a community that targets content operation to be sustainable. However, there are many communities at present, all of which are attached to the product. Often, after a phenomenon-level product becomes popular, a community formed by its fans is established. The community of products is now a more common model.


In a sense, traditional content communities have a greater advantage than emerging communities in the mobile era, because traditional communities have accumulated and accumulated content before, which is incomparable to emerging communities. No matter when you are a community, where the content comes from is the first question to consider. Generating content from the mobile terminal is a very worthy question. It may be suitable for pan-entertainment communities, but it is a serious problem for more orthodox communities. challenge.


From the perspective of the development trend, the proportion of the content operation community is declining, not because the value is not high, but because not many people are willing to do it, and if there is fast money to make, who wants to be a slow company. Moreover, the community is a popular business model, it is difficult to generate high added value in the short term, the cycle is long, the model is relatively mature, and the innovation is insufficient, and it is in a peak or decline stage in the growth curve of the entire industry. Similar competing products do less content operation, and do more marketing and channels. Moreover, being a community requires users to generate high-frequency demand, especially for communities in specific fields, if there is no frequent content production and interaction, the activity and content will be very low. The design of some community products is a low-frequency demand, and this direction requires the support of a large number of users, otherwise it will not last.


In the past year, from the perspective of the development of the technical community, we can see that many companies have chosen to start from the community, diversify their operations, and some are recruiting, some are doing online education, and so on. These gameplays are not innovations of the community itself, and are based on the realization of an added value of the community. In the same industry, there are not many new players, and the power of capital is also insufficient.


In terms of community, there have been cases of corporate mergers and acquisitions in the past few years, which also reflects the dilemma of community development. Recently, there has not been much news. The development of the mobile Internet has left little space for the community, and everyone is busy doing social networking. , making games, etc., the community is not the first and second choice for entrepreneurship.


Having said so much, don't be a mobile content community easily. If you want to do it, you can refer to the above suggestions. In the mobile era, what is wrong with doing something!




The article is excerpted from Lao Cui Xian. Editor-in-Chief of inforq China. For sharing and reading only.