Chapter 22 Chapter 21 The Crisis of the Winner

Although 360 is flourishing in the capital market, has a great reputation in the eyes of the media, and is even regarded as a "money tree" that has "lost bets", but what is going on in its bones is a battle between trapped beasts. 360 must step out of the current relatively simple business model and establish "revolutionary bases" in more fields.But all the surrounding places are surrounded by tigers and wolves, and outsiders are not allowed to interfere. 360 Every step forward, it will be like the initial battle in Rome, injuring a thousand people and injuring ourselves by eight hundred.

When Apple's infinite scenery and Android system are booming, Nokia and its loyal fans are extremely tragic. They still firmly believe that the beloved Nokia is just in transition, and they still expect it to perform miracles like it did in the 2G era.After all, for the mobile Internet, it seems that everyone's starting point seems to be similar.Moreover, it has not been a short period of time for Nokia to realize its own crisis. Since its heyday in 2007, it has announced its move to the Internet, and it seems to be the first team. However, since 2010, Nokia has fallen into a situation where it has been attacked from both sides, and has never broken out.The high-end market is overtaken by iPhone and Samsung, and the low-end market is also under pressure with the rise of the Android camp and the rise of local brands.According to the survey of consumers replacing 3G mobile phones, Apple is the first choice, followed by Samsung, Motorola or Coolpad.For those who have no money, there are already a lot of thousand yuan smartphones, and the choice is also very wide. Anyway, there is nothing like Nokia.Seemingly overnight, Apple, Samsung, and Motorola ate into its market share.

Faced with all this, Nokia seems helpless and more and more passive.Then there are layoffs. Many people wondered that its Internet strategy was earlier than that of Apple and Google, and the market at that time also proved that Internetization is indeed a trend of mobile phones.But why is it still so helpless?There are probably three reasons. First of all, although it puts forward the goal of transforming to the Internet, it does not see clearly what constitutes a real smartphone and mobile Internet, and the focus of thinking is always on "how to make a better mobile phone".The difference in thinking between mobile phone manufacturers and the mobile Internet is like two people on the other side of the gap. Those who understand it will pass through a bridge, and those who cannot understand will eventually become rigid.

Secondly, although the high-end is weak, the huge shipments of low-end and mid-end mobile phones have guaranteed a considerable portion of profits, and the urgency for reform is not so strong.Reform is bound to hurt muscles and bones, and everyone is afraid. If you make mistakes, you will have to bear the main responsibility. It is better to be a monk for a day and hit the clock for a day. Finally, clinging to the Symbian operating system will not relax.In the era of mobile Internet, the Symbian system has revealed many disadvantages and shortcomings. Many 2G manufacturers have given up. Motorola announced that it will completely abandon Symbian, and immediately turn around after switching to Android; Samsung, Sony Ericsson, etc. support Symbian As the name suggests, development is almost at a standstill.But Nokia still loves Symbian deeply.

The decline of Nokia can be summed up by choosing the wrong operating system strategically, losing sensitivity to new technologies, lack of response to changes in user needs, and insufficient investment in new market formats.The company was still making money, but in essence, they totally missed the disruption of the crisis: it was a revolution.Revolution means that the lifestyle formed by the entire mobile phone industry has completely changed. Reliable and solid, no longer a first choice, not even a second choice.Unfortunately, for multinational giants who have been enjoying success and enjoyment in China for a long time, it is too difficult to see the essence of change.

When success becomes a fixed trend, when enjoyment becomes a pursuit, the keen intuition and entrepreneurial spirit are exhausted.What's more, Apple's mobile phone product iPhone had not entered China at that time, and its music management software iTunes did not perform well in the Chinese market; although Google is a traditional Internet company, it is a new entrant in the mobile phone field, and it also develops business in the Chinese Internet market. Things are not going well; Motorola is in the midst of a difficult transition and looks even less of a rival. There is no sense of urgency at all, and when I am afraid, I find that the increasingly rigid management has killed the gene for innovation.This is the predicament faced by almost all former victors in most markets. Motorola has encountered it, Kodak has encountered it-some stood up, and some completely fell down.Because the foundation is thick and the plate is big, a thin camel is bigger than a horse. Although the market share continues to decline, Nokia has not been completely defeated.However, its brand has become low-end.

It is normal for multinational giants to enter China with glorious glory, and their Chinese teams have a weaker sense of urgency and less entrepreneurial spirit.However, the decline of all big names starts from within, and local companies are no exception, including Qihoo 360. Fortunately, Zhou Hongyi was more vigilant and had already realized and started to act. Qihoo 360 is now a big company, and the common problems of big companies have also appeared. First, value-added services are still being explored, and there are not many profitable products. Qihoo 360's financial report shows that its current income mainly consists of two pieces: website navigation and game joint operation, and game joint operation is essentially a special advertising model that pays for its effects.Therefore, 360 has not completely got rid of the problem of being a company that sells advertisements.Regardless of whether it is security software or browsers, it is difficult to break through the installed capacity, because 360 ​​is already a leading company in the industry.

From a product point of view, 360 is in the business of security software, and advertising is the source of revenue for security software; from the perspective of current business, 360 is more like an advertising company whose core business is website navigation services, browsers, Security guards and anti-virus software are all means of promotion for website navigation. According to Sogou Wang Xiaochuan’s so-called three-stage rocket architecture description, 360 Security Guard and antivirus are the first-stage rocket, Safe Browser is the second-stage rocket, website navigation and search portal so.com is the third-stage payload.

It can be said that Zhou Hongyi led 360 to this level, which is enough to demonstrate his excellent business intelligence.But from this level up, it is a new challenge for him and for 360. In fact, including Tencent, Baidu, and Sina, there are almost no large companies that do not have bottlenecks.They each have their own problems. The thicker the foundation and the higher the stand, the more difficult it is to make breakthroughs and innovations.For the 360, the first and second stages were built, but finding the payload wasn't easy. One is professional technology.Each type of payload may be interdisciplinary. For example, 360's cloud disk is very good.However, major Internet companies have launched their own cloud disks one after another. In order to maintain competitiveness, it is difficult to charge for cloud disks.

Of course, some users may be willing to pay, because 360's cloud disk is really good in terms of synchronization, and the classification is also simple and practical.If it can solve the editing function on other terminals and the export function after editing, it may attract high-end customers who are annoyed by the poor synchronization performance of iTunes and the like. Evemote is popular for its powerful combination of syncing and editing features.But the expertise behind the seemingly simple editing and exporting capabilities is hard to come by. The second difficulty is that although the installed capacity is large, the online time perceivable by users, the available marketing resources, and the relationship between the strong needs of users and customers cannot be too optimistic.

QQ’s core businesses of instant messaging and security software are also unprofitable, but as mentioned above, QQ has incubated at least four major secondary business platforms, as well as dozens of sub-businesses.However, 360's truly invincible secondary business currently has only one secure browser.This is also easy to understand, after all, QQ itself is used for communication.Information flow is one of the most basic interpersonal needs, so it has the foundation to be a platform; information flow is also a highly interactive function, so it naturally has the possibility of developing into a community.But security is different. First of all, although security is a basic requirement, it is not a function that must be used all the time. Therefore, although the installed capacity of 360 is at the same level as QQ, it is far inferior to QQ in terms of frequency of contact with users.As a continuous flow of information, typical users of QQ are online for several hours a day on average, and send and receive dozens to hundreds of messages on average. Throughout the process, users have very frequent opportunities to interact with the QQ client software, and are actually more tolerant of the appearance of marketing information.Of course, due to the emergence of new products such as Weibo and WeChat, the online frequency and actual usage frequency of QQ users are also decreasing. The lack of online time perceivable by users leads to a direct consequence, that is, it is impossible to push advertisements and other marketing content in large quantities.This is not a problem at the product level, but the result of the essential difference in form between security products and chat tools, and it is not a problem that can be completely solved through product optimization. However, God made the company 360 after all.The browser, almost the only weakness of the QQ empire, was seized by 360's armored blitzkrieg troops, resulting in today's confrontation.It is difficult to match several big players in terms of size, but it is self-contained and can be attacked and defended. No matter which direction the attack is launched, the opponent will be very uncomfortable. This is why smart people like Ma Huateng and Li Yanhong can only snipe and encircle any major 360 move while calling for help.The problem is that 360 cannot fail to attack.Once a company goes public, the performance requirements force people to move forward. The launch of the search business was interpreted by the outside world as 360's aggressive attitude, but Zhou Hongyi was also forced to do so.How high is the sky of website navigation, you can touch it with your hands.Search is the most natural extension of the browser and website navigation business, the best storytelling material in the capital market, and Zhou Hongyi's long-cherished wish. In the eyes of outsiders, Zhou Hongyi, who is sharp in thinking and high in fighting spirit, is just one side of his character—a side that has to be strong in a fierce competitive environment, but his heart is always full of worries.Although he is now much more confident than before, and his thinking and actions are orderly in the face of no matter how strong an opponent is, he is quite heroic, but the reality is much more severe than when he founded 3721. Although 360 is flourishing in the capital market, in the eyes of the media, and even regarded as a cash cow, it "has attracted much attention", but what is going on in its core is a battle between trapped beasts. 360 must step out of the current relatively simple business model and establish "revolutionary bases" in more fields.But all the surrounding places are surrounded by tigers and wolves, and outsiders are not allowed to interfere. 360 Every step forward, it will be like the initial battle in Rome, injuring a thousand people and injuring ourselves by eight hundred. However, Zhou Hongyi is a fighter, he is not afraid of war; he is not just a warrior, he has courage and strategy.After beating Tencent and Baidu, he scolded Ma Yun from the air, and then mocked Lei Jun. It seemed that no one paid attention to it, but all of this was just offense and defense, buying time for 360's future efforts That's all. What really worries Zhou Hongyi is not the business problem, but the possible internal rigidity of 360. No matter how difficult a business problem is, it can always be overcome.If the technology is insufficient, make up for it. If the secondary platform is insufficient, it can be explored and redeveloped on the basis of development search.But with the internal ossifications common to large corporations, all will be for naught. What is the future of 360? In 2011, Citron, a short-selling agency for Chinese concept stocks, tried to short-sell 360’s stock, which also prompted 360 to reflect. Qihoo 360 pioneered the concept of "free security", and the business model established on this basis is unique in the world, and has been hailed as the Chinese model of the Internet by overseas.Because there is no corresponding reference in the United States, 360's stock price has been performing well. If you understand it from the perspective of goodwill, Citron can't understand it, so it adopts the thinking mode of presumption of guilt, thinking that there must be something wrong with it, and there is room for short-selling to make profits.This shows that regarding the business model of 360, or what kind of Internet company 360 will become in the future, they need to strengthen communication with overseas investors, and they have to think more deeply. What is the future of 360? 360 has more than 370 million users, with a user penetration rate of 89%, and has also formed a complete product system, which has laid the foundation for 360 to become an influential platform company.Zhou Hongyi's hope is that 360 will develop into an influential, open Internet platform company that will contribute to the healthy development of the industrial ecological environment in the future. First of all, the platform is the soil for the growth of new products, new businesses, and new models. Platform companies gain a large number of users by providing a universal service, and their brand and product experience can have a strong influence on users.This universal service can be instant messaging, search, or security.Platform companies can generate huge traffic every moment, and this traffic is the sunshine, air and water needed for the growth of new businesses, new products and new business models.This is especially important for startups.Zhou Hongyi believes in the words of Stanford Business School: small companies are the driving force for social development and progress, and the innovation power of the Internet comes from small start-up companies, not large companies. Secondly, 360 will stick to the road of an open platform. An open platform will be the mainstream development direction of the Internet in the next 10 years, and openness is the corporate gene of 360. From the very beginning, 360 took the road of cooperation and sharing.Because no self-enclosed platform system has been formed, 360 has no historical burden when China's Internet is transitioning from closed to open. Instead, it can enter the fast lane and quickly form a platform.Today 360's two major revenue sources, website navigation and web games, have been cooperating and sharing with many partners from the very beginning. They insist that they do not make games and do not compete with partners for profit, so that they can recruit talents; 360 website navigation has also become a platform to support and help small and medium-sized Internet companies obtain traffic and start businesses.Today, there are more than 150,000 applications on the 360 ​​open platform, from large and small entrepreneurs; 360's e-commerce platform has also become an important traffic portal for e-commerce companies.In the future, they will also tap the potential of the 360 ​​open platform to create more opportunities for partners and entrepreneurs.The open platform will not only achieve 360, but also a healthier industrial ecology. Finally, they will continue to focus on safety and pursue the ultimate. In terms of platform strategy, 360 takes the road of openness and cooperation.But in terms of safety, 360 will be more focused and focused. 360's mission is to become the largest Internet security company in China and even the world. Security is the core value service for 360 to accumulate users and build a huge user base.Therefore, Qihoo 360 must maintain the leading position in security to the extreme, and on this basis, become an influential platform company on the Internet in China. However, Zhou Hongyi has repeatedly emphasized that if a start-up company focuses on building a platform from the beginning, it will definitely not be able to build a platform.Today, he would like to emphasize that if a platform company is full of platforms, blindly chasing commercial interests, abandoning user supremacy, and keeping away from user value, then even if the platform is established, it will still be a castle on the beach. Vulnerable. Some people say that customer first is a pretense, a flashy slogan, and an enterprise still has to pursue commercial interests after all.However, for a platform company, with a large base of loyal users, it can keep pace with the times and graft a suitable business model. The business model will continue to change, but users' recognition of the company and products is the greatest lasting asset.Without user value, there will be no commercial value, and all commercial value is based on the user value created by the enterprise.The so-called "if the land is lost, everyone will lose it; if the land is lost, everyone will gain it."People are user value, and land is business value.This principle is applicable to all Internet companies. Therefore, adhering to the supremacy of users, pursuing first-class user experience, and establishing sustainable and long-term user value are the driving force behind 360's development today and the foundation for establishing an influential Internet platform in the future.As long as it can create value for users for a long time, 360 will definitely be able to have its own world.