Why is it easier for Weibo to attract hackers than WeChat?

It is no exaggeration to say that Weibo’s product managers are the most hacked group of people in the Chinese Internet industry. Almost every revision will be criticized by users. “Weibo is the only one in the Chinese Internet. A product that would be perfect if only a few functions were reduced..."Complaining about Weibo's new functions seems to have become a form of political correctness.

Among these criticisms, a common sentence is: Why can’t product managers like Weibo pigs learn from WeChat? Look at how simple the design of WeChat is, why do product managers have to Why make the good Weibo so complicated?

That’s right! This is indeed a very good question in the product field: Why can’t Weibo be designed as concisely as WeChat? Is this really just a matter of differences in design concepts?

? The product positioning of WeChat as an “instant messaging tool” and Weibo as a “social media” determines the design ideas of the two applications

The most important function of WeChat is to solve communication problems. Weibo solves the problem of information acquisition.

Although WeChat Moments, payment, shopping and other functions continue to accumulate, all of them are based on the basic premise of instant messaging tools. Under such a general premise, the first screen of WeChat will always be the conversation interface. , while conversations and address books occupy two precious two of the four buttons at the bottom of WeChat.

Despite the growing importance of Moments in terms of user time spent, WeChat has not prioritized Moments: you can see the conversation as soon as you enter WeChat, but you need to click twice more to access it. Enter the Moments, and even the Moments function can be turned off in the settings. The design logic behind this is to enhance the instant messaging function, which is the foundation of the WeChat empire.

After understanding WeChat’s basic function of “instant messaging tool”, we can understand the simplicity of WeChat design. The originator of all “instant messaging tools” is SMS. We have not seen any mobile phone’s SMS. The interface is designed to be complex. If a text message interface that can be used by a 70-year-old man or a 3-year-old child is designed to be complex, it will significantly increase the learning cost for new users.

This is the interface of the four major instant messaging tools with the most users in the world: Facebook Messenger, WeChat, WhatsApp, and QQ. The surprisingly consistent chat interfaces show that they have the same vision in gaining support from the widest range of people. .

In fact, it is difficult to make a text message interface complex when the dialogue needs to be clearly presented, not to mention a restrained product manager like Zhang Xiaolong.

Weibo is different. Its positioning as a "social media" makes information acquisition its primary function, from early celebrity gossip, current political news, and funny jokes to the current celebrity updates, vertical opinions, and short videos. Videos, live broadcasts, and information acquisition have become the most basic functions of Weibo. Therefore, the first screen of Weibo is a direct feed stream, and you are faced with information.

Generally speaking, on the premise of efficiently presenting information, it is difficult for anyone to think that an APP with a first screen full of information is a simple APP. Therefore, we say that based on the simplicity of the interface, Weibo will suffer in terms of impression points. In fact, if you compare the major news clients, Weibo’s interface is not the most complex one.

The above describes the simplicity and complexity of WeChat and Weibo interfaces. At this time, some people will say: Since the interface cannot look simple, can Weibo not be functionally simple? Will you die if you don’t have two functions?

? The monopoly track of WeChat and the competitive track of Weibo determine the difference in horizontal expansion of their functional levels

Once upon a time, there was a large community called "Mobile". A large supermarket opened not far away, specializing in selling the necessities in the community: firewood, rice, oil, and salt. The design is neat and large. Since there is only one supermarket in the surrounding area, almost everyone in the community must come here to buy the daily needs of firewood, rice, oil, and salt. Hence its popularity.

So the supermarket built a large square called "Friends Circle" at the entrance, and also placed an ATM machine and a game arcade next to the supermarket. This supermarket actually makes no money selling firewood, rice, oil, and salt, but it makes a lot of money from the nearby game arcade, a billboard in the square, and ATM machines.

In another direction farther away from the community, there is a department store. At the beginning, it often held celebrity meetings and press conferences to attract popularity, but not everyone in the community was If you are interested in celebrities, you don’t need things like department stores every day, so the popularity will definitely be lower.

However, this department store has not been idle. It has been working hard in the past few years: first of all, it no longer only invites celebrities but also invites experts in various fields to give different small lectures. , it opened a movie theater, opened a bookstore, and put a live broadcast screen on the department store, and then hired a group of promotional vehicles to go to surrounding villages to promote... relying on different places in the mall The billboards are making money, and they are actually doing pretty well.

Now you must know that this large supermarket is called WeChat, and this department store is called Weibo. At this time, if someone asks: Why does this department store have so many tricks instead of being like a supermarket? Still operating quietly? It’s a movie theater (short video), a big screen (live broadcast), a bookstore (headline articles), expert lectures, Q&A (expanded vertical V, Weibo Q&A)...

Isn’t the answer very simple: because it is not a monopoly supermarket that is always popular. It is not good at selling necessities such as firewood, rice, oil and salt. If it doesn’t come up with some tricks, won’t it lose its popularity? How can you let people live, not to mention the new business formats it introduces are very suitable for itself. You know, the competition in this industry is fierce, and interesting things are opening one after another around the community: there are striptease bars, pornographic book stalls, other movie theaters, photo studios...you can count them all. Not sure...

Now you must understand why Weibo needs to expand its functions, because the track where Weibo is located is a highly competitive track and not a monopoly of WeChat track, it requires more users and longer user time.

Zhang Xiaolong once shared a product philosophy of WeChat - "just use it and go". However, the reason why Brother Long is so confident is because he knows that if you leave, you will come back. You can't live without it. If other Internet products also believe in this philosophy, they will become dead and leave as soon as they are used. She really leaves and never comes back.

So WeChat has firmly grasped the "pain point" needs of users, while Weibo has grasped some of the "beyond itchy points" needs of users (it seems inappropriate to say that it is just an itchy point with over 100 million daily users). Why don't we call it a "sour point"? Life in a sour spot is so difficult...

Okay, now you understand why Weibo needs to expand so many functions horizontally. But you still have a question: Why can't Weibo restrain itself and fold these functions layer by layer? You see, WeChat also has many functions. It’s so simple to do. You just click in when you want to use it, and you usually lie there completely peacefully. Huh? Yes, why is this?

The answer lies in the above case. Just imagine if a department store hides its big screens, movie theater signs, celebrity posters, and lecture information airtight, and you can’t wait to open one door and then another. If you can only see the door, will users still go in? Users' original goal of visiting department stores is to have fun aimlessly. If you hide it and turn the mall into a fortress, users will say goodbye to you long ago!

The simple and calm Wal-Mart and the noisy Wangfujing

The supermarket does not have to do this. It will not place its game arcade at the most conspicuous entrance of the supermarket, because it knows that most People still come to buy rice and groceries, not to play games. Setting up a smoky game arcade in the most conspicuous place will scare these people away. As long as some people discover the game arcade in the corner, it can also make money. It's so cool, not to mention that it can come out from time to time to put up posters in the game arcade.

In order to better explain this problem, I will use a picture to illustrate the relationship between the functional characteristics and its corresponding presentation results. We will classify the main functions of Weibo and WeChat according to "frequency of use. The two dimensions of "high and low" and "strength of purpose" are divided into four quadrants.

At this time, we will find that the two applications have an obvious similarity and an obvious difference: the biggest similarity is the "high frequency and strong purpose" function in the first quadrant. The two applications were placed on the homepage at the same time, such as the conversation on WeChat and the main information flow on Weibo.

The difference is reflected in the second and fourth quadrants. We will find an obvious rule: most of WeChat’s functions are in the fourth quadrant, while most of Weibo’s functions are concentrated in the second quadrant. This is because WeChat's secondary functions (except Moments) are mainly divided into two categories. One is tool functions, such as shake, scan, mini programs, etc.; the other is commercial products: shopping, games, payment, card packages. .

Their most common characteristics are "low frequency and strong purpose" (low frequency is compared to WeChat chat and Moments). Low frequency means that users are not sensitive to operating costs, and folding It doesn’t matter if the user takes two more steps, and they don’t use it frequently anyway; strong purpose means that when using these functions, the user clearly knows what they are going to do, so users can also find it when it is folded.

Why does the same picture appear twice? Because it allows you to read without having to scroll up

The functions in the second quadrant of Weibo, "Popular Weibo", "Hot Topics", and "Popular Videos" are just the opposite, they belong to "high frequency, purpose "Weak" function (high frequency is compared to the main information flow of Weibo). Due to the high frequency, folding will increase the user's operating cost; due to the weak purpose, users may not use it if folded at first glance. Users may leave if they don’t see interesting videos and hot topics, so you need to expand the presentation.

It should be noted that any four-quadrant diagram only illustrates the basic logic, not a precise conclusion. Therefore, do not find bugs in the "Moments" function in the above quadrants. The logic is basically non-existent. Wrong, there is room for discussion in the details. If you are confused, look at the picture below. WhatsApp has upgraded its "dynamics" (moments) to the first tab:

? "Experience Variance" It determines the complexity of Weibo's functional design

"Experience variance" is a concept I put forward when describing the difference in habits of a product: for each product, we can definitely find a batch of this product Typical users, the average usage habits of this group of typical users are the "experience mean" of this product, and the farther the usage habits of other users are from this mean, the greater the "experience variance" of this product.

For example, a typical user of WeChat may be like this (for example, the specific data may not be accurate): the number of friends is between 300-600, no more than 30 conversations with friends every day, and checking Moments N times , use WeChat payment several times a month...etc.

Each individual will always differ from these "average" typical usage habits to varying degrees. For example, a micro-business person may post to Moments and chat significantly higher than the average number of times; for example Some single young men may prefer to use Shake to communicate with people nearby...

In the same way, Weibo can also find out the average experience of a typical user and the "experience variance" of other users "Obviously, compared with WeChat, the "experience variance" of Weibo is much larger. A typical user of Weibo may log in three times a week, and each time he or she will look at a few celebrities and check out the hot topics and searches. , forwarded two Weibo posts, but there are too many users who are far from this typical user habit!

Why is the experience variance of Weibo so large? There are many reasons, such as the functional form of Weibo is too diverse, the vertical industries of Weibo content are very different, etc., but in my opinion, the most important reason for the large variance in Weibo experience is: Weibo’s information producers and Information consumers use the same client.

Luhan with 40 million fans and you with 400 fans both use the same client with the same function, so the usage habits are completely different, making it comfortable for both of you, which is very important for any product manager. It's a great challenge.

Producers of information focus on how to produce information efficiently and how to quickly obtain feedback and interaction; consumers of information focus on how to obtain information efficiently and share it efficiently. The usage habits on the blog are vastly different.

Some people will say that after all, a small number of people produce content and a majority consume content. We should ensure the user experience for most people. But if no one produces content, where does content consumption begin?

Papi Jiang stopped posting his videos on Weibo when he was not happy with it; Lu Han stopped posting photos on Weibo when he was not happy with it; scientists were not happy with using it to grow the sun. They won’t post articles on Weibo: The importance of information producers to Weibo cannot be overemphasized.

This revision of the Weibo message box has caused such a big backlash. In essence, it is the conflict between information producers and consumers in their usage habits. Designing a system that allows 5,000 interactive messages per day between big V and 5 It is extremely difficult for novices to use the smooth messaging system for interactive messages. Therefore, Weibo designed a multi-filter selection box and hidden it. In fact, it took into account the needs of big V and novices, but the learning cost of big V and adaptation costs are too high and suffer backlash.

The complicated filtering conditions of the Weibo message box are obviously designed for big V

But in any case, because there is no effective separation between content producers and novice users, it is necessary to Meeting two needs at the same time on one client is by no means a simple solution, which also increases the complexity of Weibo design.

WeChat does not have this problem. His information production and consumption are mutual. The behaviors of Lu Han with 40 million fans and you with 400 fans are very different on Weibo. But when he goes back to WeChat to communicate with her friends, you communicate with your friends, he When it comes to his Moments, if you browse your Moments, the one he chats with most is Guan Xiaotong, while the one he chats with most is Fa Xiaoergou. There is no difference in other aspects.

So the WeChat dialogue model does not matter about information production and consumption. At the same time, because the circle of friends is a strong relationship, they are also producers and consumers of each other. Therefore, there is no problem in using the same client, and the experience variance is too small.

Some people will say at this time: You are forcing nonsense! Isn’t the relationship between the WeChat official account author and its subscribers the relationship between information producers and consumers?

Haha, yes, this is a good question, but let’s not forget that WeChat uses an extremely complex public account backend to solve all the functions of information producers. I believe it is the first time to use the WeChat public account backend. Novice users will definitely not associate it with simplicity.

So, it’s not that WeChat is simple, but that WeChat solves the complex parts with complex modules, so ordinary users can’t feel it.

Part of the functions of the WeChat public platform

Now you understand how Weibo product managers walk a tightrope on product standards. Every time Weibo is revised, the product managers review it again and again. While looking at the grayscale test data in the background while listening to the scolding on the Internet, their thinking was calm and clear: if the data is good, revise it, and if the data falls, don't update it! Let me share two data: Weibo’s daily active users have grown from 76 million to 165 million in the past three years, and its market value has grown from less than US$3 billion to over US$20 billion.