How to create an app with 500 million users?

How do we create a mobile Internet application that has long-term user stickiness and can continuously expand business imagination space? Apart from super apps like WeChat that use social networking as an entry point, are there any other examples worth referring to?

In the past two years, mobile Internet applications have emerged in an endless stream, especially some apps that aim to satisfy people's curiosity and entertainment. For example, Faceu, Magic Camera, Baidu Magic Photo, and the recent how-old, etc., often suddenly become popular on social media overnight, obtaining a large number of search and download records in a short period of time. However, similar to the speed of their "rise to fame", their decline and cooling are also extremely rapid.

So, how do we create a mobile Internet application that has long-term user stickiness and can continuously expand business imagination space? Apart from super apps like WeChat that use social networking as an entry point, are there any other examples worth referring to?

Recently, Youdao Dictionary announced that its users have exceeded 500 million. Many people were surprised and astonished by this news. How did this application, which once started out as a translation tool for people, achieve such a large user base? Youdao Dictionary's business logic and path may be worth reference for many APPs.

Solve a single need and use tools to establish an entry

Many mobile applications hope to meet as many user needs as possible from the very beginning. In fact, truly successful applications all start from a very subtle point. Therefore, the development of mobile applications requires not only technical considerations, but more importantly, the insight and exploration of the "pain points" of people's work and life needs. A heavy verticalization of a "pain point" can establish an entry that may bring huge traffic.

In today's globalized world, the use of English has become a rigid demand in the work and life of many white-collar workers. "Learning a foreign language" and "real-time translation" have also become pain points in language applications. This is also an important market support for Youdao Dictionary to gain the favor of users. According to relevant data from Nielsen, 81% of users use online dictionaries when learning a foreign language, and 77% of users use online dictionaries when reading foreign language materials. Compared with those applications that are "laughed at" or short-lived, the target population covered by dictionary applications has very clear population characteristics and very specific needs.

Youdao Dictionary has grasped the demand for learning foreign languages ​​and naturally became a tool that people rely on. Youdao Dictionary is also constantly optimizing the user experience. Currently, Youdao Dictionary supports translation between five languages: Chinese, English, French, Japanese, and Korean, covering 37 million entries, including 8 million professional vocabulary, and 23 million massive examples. It receives more than 400 million translation requests every day.

At the same time, in order to meet the needs of different users, Youdao is constantly improving peripheral products centered on Youdao Dictionary. In September 2014, Youdao launched the "Youdao Oral Master" APP. After only two months of launch, the number of users has exceeded one million. For another part of users who have text translation needs, Youdao launched the Youdao Translator product, which provides fast and high-quality translation services through the Internet.

Since the birth of Youdao Dictionary, the issues that need to be considered in mobile application development are:

First, whose needs did you meet?

Second, is this demand real, rigid and clear?

Third, can the extensibility of this demand be continuously stimulated?

From tools to content, using scenarios and products to drive native marketing

In the mobile Internet era, after establishing an entry point, if applications want to gain more large-scale applications and enhance their commercial value, they must be integrated into various scenarios of users' lives and allow users to perceive their value and "importance" in different scenarios.

Youdao Dictionary has developed into more than just a dictionary. It is becoming an important part of life scenarios centered on "language communication".

For example, in the film and television entertainment scenarios, Youdao Dictionary has provided language services for "Chinese Partners", "See You Tomorrow", "My Love from the Star", etc., integrating into people's entertainment scenarios; in business office scenarios, it provides users with English communication, translation and other services; when traveling abroad, it triggers people to use dictionaries to translate scenic spots, route maps and other content; when people shop overseas, it helps people translate some difficult-to-understand product parameters in real time.

In addition, Youdao Dictionary also provides support for application platforms such as WeChat, Sina Weibo, 360, and Sogou, providing services based on users' multi-touchpoint language needs. The interface of Youdao Dictionary has also changed from a simple word lookup and real-time translation to a foreign information aggregation platform, becoming a window for many "international" people to see the world.

From different scenarios, we can see that Youdao Dictionary's user base is mainly concentrated in the highly educated class aged 18-35. Data shows that 74.1% of users have a bachelor's degree or above. They are familiar with the Internet and pursue a high-quality lifestyle. High education, high income, high consumption, high potential, high transmission rate and high stickiness are the common labels of this group, which gives Youdao Dictionary a higher marketing value.

However, as a language tool application platform, how can it create value for advertisers? Obviously, traditional Internet advertising forms are difficult to integrate into user scenarios. For this reason, Youdao also has its own new gameplay.

In the past two years, native advertising has quickly swept the marketing circle and become an innovative point of attention for advertisers and the media, especially the information flow advertising in WeChat Moments, which has made "native" a hot word.

Youdao Dictionary has explored a native advertising model that cleverly integrates English learning content with "advertising". Without harming users' language learning and application experience, it achieves the purpose of communication for advertisers by implanting advertisements that are highly relevant to the content. This initiative is called "product-driven marketing" by Youdao's vice president and general manager of Youdao Dictionary, which means "learning a foreign language while learning a brand."

At present, Youdao Dictionary has matched various native advertising forms such as focus pictures, daily quotes, information streams, startup headers, bilingual examples, bottom banners, etc. The brand name, slogan and pictures can be deeply embedded in bilingual vocabulary, sentences and focus pictures, creating a combination of native words, native sentences, native pictures and native texts.

For example, the native advertising planned by Youdao for Surface is deeply integrated with the bilingual examples in the Youdao Dictionary. When a user searches for the word "performance", Youdao immediately gives bilingual examples with embedded Surface, perfectly combining its instrumentality and commerciality. This triggered native advertising that matches the content and user language application scenarios has generated hundreds of millions of revenue for Youdao.

For another example, Telunsu cooperated with Youdao Dictionary to launch the “Trumsu 99 Better Plans”, which leveraged users’ daily reading and learning habits to allow users to naturally absorb brand information in the learning process. On the day of the cooperation, the campaign received 35 million exposures and 200,000 clicks.

Today, many mobile applications are thinking about how to realize marketing value for advertisers. In fact, the core of marketing value lies in:

First, does your advertising or marketing not affect the user experience?

Second, does your advertising or marketing provide something that users find valuable?

Third, can you ensure that users are exposed to your brand without being noticed?

From application to platform, building an online education platform

As a platform that meets people's needs for language application and learning, Youdao Dictionary is constantly exploring users' language-centric needs and building an ecosystem based on language learning. After accumulating a large number of users, Youdao Dictionary began to transform into a platform and entered the online education vertical market.

On April 11, 2014, Youdao Dictionary launched the "Discovery" channel, which provides free downloadable e-books and courses. In addition to traditional formats, there are also multimedia interactive e-books and courses such as audio and automatic scrolling subtitles. In addition to word search and translation, users can watch audio and video examples, search for encyclopedia knowledge, read bilingual information, choose courses, and engage in in-depth learning. The whole idea is to change from providing word search tools to providing a diverse content service platform.

In 2014, Youdao Dictionary announced its entry into online education and launched the live course platform Youdao Academy to provide users with online learning services and use tools as the platform entrance. Youdao Dictionary, Youdao Translator, Youdao Oral Master, etc., constitute the Youdao education product matrix.

It is reported that Youdao is still making plans for its future platform. The first is to create personalized education with intelligent recommendations. Youdao's core advantage is its big data engine and algorithm. This engine, when applied to online education, can recommend personalized learning content to students. Second, create intelligent learning tools that can achieve adaptive learning based on the user’s language level and ability.

Many applications face bottlenecks at a certain stage of development. How to break through? Youdao Dictionary provides several perspectives for thinking:

1. Expand based on user needs and create an ecosystem in vertical fields;

2. Transform from a tool and marketing platform to a service platform and expand more related services;

3. Driven by technology, we will achieve a better personalized platform and increase service accuracy.

Unlike those short-lived applications, Youdao Dictionary has accumulated 500 million users after 8 years, from the earliest word lookup and translation to today's online education. Based on user needs, it continuously optimizes, improves and enriches products, and continuously explores users' product usage scenarios. From a short-term use tool to a sticky content platform with continuous attention, and then to an in-school education platform built based on the same language needs. This is the core logic of Youdao Dictionary, and the essence of all this logic is to connect people, rigid needs and services .