Competitive product analysis of Tik Tok and Yoo Video!

Framework of this article

1. Background and Purpose

1. Background

The short video field is very popular at the moment, and various companies are entering the market. You are the product manager of Tencent's "Yoo Video". The company is currently preparing to launch this product, hoping to directly target "Tik Tok Short Video" and use it to enter the short video market. However, you are not very clear about the current short video market, the specific competition situation, what products are on the market, and whether there are still development opportunities if you enter the market now.

2. Purpose

After a comprehensive analysis of the "Tik Tok" App, we understand the current market situation of short videos, analyze Tik Tok's core business logic, product function architecture, iteration route, key operating points and product performance, and analyze what references Yoo Video can make before launching it into the market.

2. Market size

1. Industry development history

The photographer mode of PC video websites is the earliest exploration mode of short videos. With the rapid development of mobile Internet technology, a large number of mobile short video applications such as Kuaishou and Miaopai have emerged, attracting capital attention. Currently, short videos are in the early stages of rapid development, and the market still has huge room for development.

2. Market size

The overall growth rate of the short video market has been strong since 2017. There were some fluctuations and adjustments in the first half of 2018, but it has generally maintained a high level, with a user penetration rate of over 50% across the entire network.

Compared with the nearly 1 billion users on the entire Internet, short videos undoubtedly have a lot of room for growth. However, the occupation of users and user time by short videos continues to grow strongly. Short videos have also become an important part of the ecological layout in various fields. The industrial upgrading trend brought by short videos to various industries has begun to emerge. Therefore, in the future, the occupation of user time and traffic by short videos will continue to rise, and it will also bring more profound changes to users' lifestyles.

In 2017, the scale of China's short video market will reach 5.38 billion yuan, with a growth rate of 175.9%. With the strengthening of short video industry supervision, the standardization of industry ecology and the promotion of the healthy development of China's short video market, the scale of the short video market will further grow. In 2019, the scale of China's short video market is expected to exceed 20 billion yuan and reach 21 billion yuan.

3. User situation

Judging from the current data, the scale of mobile Internet traffic access will continue to increase in the future, short videos will also occupy a large share of it, and the consumption demand for short videos among mobile Internet users continues to increase.

The penetration rate of 3G and 4G mobile networks is already very high. The construction of 5G networks will be completed in 2019. The maturity of mobile network technology and the dynamic content dissemination advantages of short videos themselves will further increase the demand for short video consumption, and the thresholds for short video creation, viewing, and consumption are all being lowered.

From January 2017 to February 2018, the average daily usage time of users in the domestic mobile short video market was about 64 minutes (independent platform)/67 minutes (comprehensive platform), and the average daily launch times were 7 times (comprehensive platform)/5 times (independent platform).

4. Conclusion

It can be seen that the market for short videos itself is growing year by year. The continuous improvement of national policies, the popularization of mobile Internet and the continuous optimization of 4G and 5G networks have provided a good basic condition for short videos. Consumer demand has been further amplified, and the thresholds for short video creation, viewing, and consumption have been lowered.

Compared with other typical pan-entertainment consumption areas, the short video industry has excellent user stickiness, which is at a high level and occupies a large amount of users' fragmented time.

From the user characteristics of short videos, it can be seen that there are still differences with the distribution of users on the entire network, and there is still a lot of room for growth

In summary, whether from a macro or micro perspective, short videos still have certain opportunities. The entire industry is on an upward trend, and Yoo Video still has room for development if it chooses to enter the market at this time.

3. Industry Map

Interpretation: Through the analysis of the short video industry chain, it is found that its core is the content production end, content distribution end, and user end.

Competition on the content production side is fierce, and the emergence of new models such as PUGC and MCN has greatly improved the quality and quantity of content.

In recent years, the MCN model, as an imported product, has risen rapidly. More professional management and more efficient operations have encouraged content producers to provide higher-quality content.

If Yoo Video enters the market, it will belong to the comprehensive platform matrix of short video distribution platforms. The current mainstream products include Douyin, Kuaishou, Volcano Video, etc., especially the two giants Douyin and Kuaishou, which will put great pressure on later products.

It can be seen from the current short video comprehensive platform matrix that the main core competitiveness of the leading platforms lies in content production and operation. This is worth learning from, and Tencent’s own resources should be used to focus on content to avoid excessive overlap and form its own advantages.

Yoo Video needs to ensure the quality of its content in the early stages. It can choose to cooperate with good MCNs and also needs to open up a marketing platform when distributing content in order to better disseminate it.

Thanks to the support of infrastructure, the short video field has been continuously segmented, and areas such as social, video playback, consulting, and even e-commerce have been laid out to deepen their vertical fields.

4. Structural Analysis of Douyin Short Videos

1. Product positioning and introduction

Through comparative analysis, we can see that: although the three companies all use short videos as their product positioning, their emphases are different. Douyin focuses on 15s music short videos, while Kuaishou mainly focuses on ordinary people's life sharing videos of different lengths, and Yoo focuses on Vlog and various track mechanisms.

Although Douyin and Kuaishou have already divided up most of the short video market, vlog has become an important breakthrough for many new short video platforms.

2. Black box analysis (product internal logic)

2.1 User Group

• Among young people under 35 years old, the gender ratio is relatively balanced.
• Celebrities, internet celebrities, self-media, etc.

2.2 Requirements

• There is a lot of fragmented time on weekends or during weekdays when commuting to and from get off work, so you can kill time and relax by watching short videos.
• They have a strong desire to perform, like to record their lives through short videos and gain a lot of exposure, becoming internet celebrities.
• Gain a certain degree of fame and influence, reshape personal brand, accumulate fans and reputation.

2.3 Product Highlights

Users can create their own works by selecting songs, using a variety of filters and props to shoot short music videos.

2.4 Solution

• Based on the algorithm, interesting videos that users are interested in are provided for viewing, providing a full-screen immersive experience.
• It provides a variety of filters and props, with rich shooting methods to satisfy users.
• For celebrities, internet celebrities, etc., we provide a lot of exposure and recommendations so that more people can see them.

2.5 Key indicators

• Downloads
• DAU (Daily Active Users)
• MAU (monthly active users)
• VV (Video Views)

2.6 Channels and means

• Celebrities and big Vs settle in and use it for promotion.
• Sponsor and promote online variety shows.
• Media promotion, app store promotion.
• Online and offline advertising.

2.7 Identify strengths

• Provide users with high-quality videos of interest through algorithms.
• A variety of filters and props increase the fun and playability of the video.

2.8 Benefit Analysis

Growth Model:

• Make use of social platforms with large traffic to achieve social fission.
• Introduce KOL celebrities to join and use traffic to bring in new traffic.
• Online and offline advertising, and sponsorship of various variety shows.
• PGC high-quality content drives UGC content creation.

Profit model:

• Advertising cooperation income
• Live Rewards
• Cooperate with Taobao to attract customers

2.9 Cost Analysis

• Common costs: Marketing costs
• Development costs: server maintenance costs, new function development costs
• Operating costs: user operating costs, event planning and promotion costs, content review costs

Through black box analysis, we can have a clear understanding of the product's users, needs, and scenarios, as well as the product's highlights and gameplay, and focus the analysis on the product's internal logic.

3. White box analysis (product external performance)

3.1 User-Scenario-Requirement

It can be seen that Douyin's users are mainly divided into two categories: content consumers and content creators. Content consumers mainly use it to kill fragmented time and relax, while for content creators it is mainly a way to express themselves and gain attention.

The vast majority of Douyin users are content consumers, and only a small number of users are creators of high-quality content. This may be one of the reasons for the homogeneity of Douyin's content.

3.2 Core Business Logic

As a platform, Douyin has strong operational capabilities and has effectively promoted the activity of content consumers and content producers through various means.

3.3 Product Function Structure

It can be seen from the functional architecture diagram that: in terms of hierarchical structure, Douyin's operation path is shorter and the hierarchical division is more reasonable, with a maximum of three levels.

The entrances to Tik Tok's two core functions, watching videos and making videos, both belong to the first level in the functional structure diagram, while less frequently used and less important functions are stored in more marginal positions. Coupled with its automatic repeated playback in vertical screen and simple sliding interaction, it ultimately brings users a good immersive experience.

From the functional structure diagram, we can see that Tik Tok allows video viewing and recording based on multiple dimensions such as location, topic, music, etc., forming a perfect closed loop.

3.4 Core Business Processes

Release video:

As can be seen from the above picture: Douyin provides a variety of shooting modes, shooting speeds, edited music, beauty/filters, props, etc. when posting videos. A variety of auxiliary forms greatly increase the playability of video shooting and increase user stickiness.

3.5 Core Function Comparison

(1) Home page

Tik Tok: Enter and watch directly, the video content will play automatically, and the interactive functions while watching videos are richer.

Yoo Video: Arranged in a grid, select the content you are interested in and click to start watching. The watch page has simple functions and provides recommended videos and content to watch. The search function is obvious. The author speculates that this setting is because the product has not accumulated users' tagging habits in the early stage and cannot make accurate recommendations for the time being. Therefore, in order to ensure that users can quickly find the content they are interested in, users are encouraged to search for content.

Kuaishou: Grid arrangement, select the content you are interested in and click to start watching. The watch page is relatively simple and provides not only follow and discover, but also recommendations for videos in the same city. The entrance to shoot videos is placed in the upper right corner of the homepage, instead of at the bottom like the other two. The author speculates that due to Kuaishou’s long-term operation, it has cultivated users’ shooting habits and accumulated a large amount of content, and currently hopes to focus on consuming content.

(2) Shooting page

Tik Tok: It supports taking photos, single-click shooting and long-press shooting. The maximum video duration is 15 seconds. It provides a rich music library and props, and is extremely playable.

Yoo Video: It provides a variety of shooting templates and can shoot videos up to 5 minutes long. It supports editing, filters, music and other operations. It does not have a speed change function and does not support taking photos.

Kuaishou: provides photo taking, 57s and 11s video shooting, and karaoke mode shooting

Summary: It can be seen that the three have their own highlights in core functions. Douyin has a short viewing path, multiple shooting methods, and a richer music library and effects; Yoo Video has shooting templates as its highlight, and can shoot long videos, which is also related to its Vlog positioning; Kuaishou can shoot videos of different lengths and support karaoke recording to meet the needs of its mass user groups.

3.6 Product Performance

(1) User reviews

According to the data from Kuchuan.com: Douyin's overall rating is 5 stars, and the trend chart shows that the vast majority of users have positive comments. I believe this is related to the brand tone created by Douyin itself, the diverse and interesting gameplay, and the product polishing that took a long time in the early stages.

Through a large number of reviews from users with less than 3 stars, we can see that the main concerns are:

• The simplicity of interface operation and user experience.
• A rich variety of auxiliary tools such as props, stickers, filters, etc.
• The simplicity of video shooting and editing, and the diversity of templates.

3.7 Product iteration and operational actions

Exploration period ( September 2016 - July 2017 ):

During this stage, version iterations were relatively fast, with an average of one iteration every less than two weeks. A large number of product features were launched around the shooting function to explore user needs. The product was polished in a low-key manner, with less exposure to operational activities . After accumulating a certain amount of high-quality user-generated content, it appeared in people's sight, which also laid a solid foundation for subsequent explosive growth.

In March, Xiao Yueyue reposted a video on Weibo in which a Douyin user imitated him, which brought in a large number of new users. This was also the first time that Douyin saw a large number of users grow.

Growth period ( July 2017-July 2018 ):

In July 2017, TikTok collaborated with The Rap of China, and TikTok began to enter its second phase of rapid growth. During this period, although the product has been iterated, the core functions have not changed much. The main focus is on optimizing the experience and adding new features to attract users. A large number of product functions are updated in conjunction with operational activities (such as New Year’s greetings, etc.).

During this period, Douyin carried out a large number of operational actions, introduced many well-known celebrities, cooperated with many variety shows, and carried out brand promotion. Overall, it carried out large-scale brand promotion and traffic introduction both online and offline.

During the 2018 Spring Festival, TikTok topped the Chinese App Store's daily download rankings for a total of 16 days. This was not only the longest time it had stayed at the top of the rankings since its launch, but also broke the record for the longest number of days at the top set by all other non-game apps since the beginning of 2017.

Mature stage ( July 2018 to present ):

During this stage, Douyin mainly focused on improving the user experience and strengthened its social and live broadcast functions. From the figure, we can see that during this stage, Douyin sought new growth points through a large number of operational activities, and indeed achieved high growth effects in several key events, such as: joining forces with China's Voice, launching the Sunflower Plan, and looking for campus dream koi and other activities.

4. Early Core Drivers

From the early days of Douyin, we can see:

The first step is to continuously polish the product, launch various functions, optimize the experience, and reduce the difficulty of publishing videos to accumulate high-quality original content.

The second step is to attract a large number of users to watch by accumulating a certain amount of high-quality original content.

The third step is to use strong platform operation capabilities to guide content consumers to perform social actions such as following, liking, commenting, fission, private chatting, etc., while attracting a large number of celebrities to settle in and achieve rapid growth in traffic.

The fourth step is to use the larger traffic to introduce merchant video advertising for monetization. The last step is to develop the live broadcast function, introduce Douyin coins, and cooperate with Taobao to conduct product external links.

5. Comparison with competitors

By comparing Douyin, Kuaishou and Yoo Video respectively, it was found that as short video products, their core functions are basically the same, but due to different product positioning and user groups, there are obvious differences in specific functions, interactive experience and activities. In terms of gameplay, both Douyin and Kuaishou are richer than Yoo Video. In the future development, we can learn from some of the functions of the two in combination with their product positioning - for example, based on the Vlog mode, we can add new functions such as publishing pictures and animated images; and add more special effects.

5. Typical User Stories

User 1:

Wang Xiaona, 25 years old, female, single, UI designer, has been working in Beijing for three years. She has a 2-hour commute to and from get off work. She is a typical stay-at-home girl who likes to lie at home on weekends.

In the past, in order to kill time on my way to and from get off work, I would download good movies at the company in advance and watch them on the subway. I also watch TV series at home on weekends and occasionally go shopping with friends.

One day, after I saw TikTok downloaded on Weibo, I tried it out and found that the guys on it were all so handsome and the girls’ lives were very interesting, so I commented and liked the posts. Gradually, I developed the habit of checking Douyin on my way to and from get off work or when I had nothing to do. I would often watch it until one or two in the morning on weekends without realizing it.

User 2:

Chen Dongming, 28 years old, male, Java development engineer, has a partner, has been working in Beijing for five years, is a photography enthusiast, and likes to record beautiful things in life.

During my free time, I would go out with my girlfriend and take pictures of many beautiful scenery and of course my beautiful girlfriend. After uploading a short video he took for his girlfriend on TikTok, he found that it attracted over ten thousand views and hundreds of comments, praising him for being someone else's boyfriend and being good at taking photos. This gave Xiao Ming a great sense of pride. From then on, he would frequently upload videos and study various interesting shooting methods on Douyin. Sometimes he would also post some tutorials and attracted countless fans.

VI. Conclusion

Through the analysis of Douyin's core business logic, product function architecture, iteration route, key operating points and product performance, it is found that Douyin's biggest highlight is its tactical coordination of product + operation, as well as the excellent polishing of its product functions and interactive experience, which makes users extremely addicted. Douyin has stood out among many competitors in a very short period of time, surpassed the old short video giant Kuaishou, and became a national phenomenon-level product.

The following are some of the analyses on Tik Tok addiction:

1. Operational aspects

• The exposure and brand building of a large number of online and offline operation activities have led to a large number of users downloading and using the product, leaving behind a trendy and cool brand impression (paid trigger).
• Create a variety of hot topics, let KOLs speak out, and arouse heated discussions among users (feedback trigger).
• Various interesting activities promote forwarding among users and word-of-mouth communication (interpersonal triggering).
• The brand communication of "recording a beautiful life" has made people develop the habit of opening Douyin to record when they see beautiful scenery or interesting things. The high-quality content makes ordinary users unconsciously open the app to watch content in fragmented time, forming an emotional bond between users and products. (Internal trigger).

2. Product

• Tik Tok uses 15-second short videos, a full-screen immersive experience, and does not display time. Once a user enters the app, the content is loaded within seconds and plays automatically. This design makes it very easy for users to forget the passage of time during use, and unknowingly spend far more time than expected.
• The interaction is done by swiping up and down to play, swiping right to view personal homepage, double-clicking to like, and long pressing to show disinterest or report. It gives users a sense of curiosity every time they scroll down to view the next item, and artificial algorithms ensure that every item users see is of interest. (Prey Reward)
• For creators, video shooting is simple, and there is a rich music and effects library. For ordinary people, after a work is released, it can also receive a lot of exposure, likes, comments, and shares, which greatly satisfies the user's need for self-realization and further promotes the creation of the next piece of content. (Social rewards, self-rewards)

3. Usage habits

Long-term use by ordinary users enables the system algorithm to find content that users like and continuously recommend it, allowing users to develop a habit of long-term viewing and, to a certain extent, to create their own works to gain likes and comments.

For creators, high-quality content gets a lot of exposure and likes, and they gain a lot of fans, which prompts them to continue to produce content.

7. Yoo Video Suggestions

1. Market direction

Through market analysis, it can be seen that although the leading products in the entire short video market have already occupied a great advantage, the entire market still has a lot of room for growth. For Tencent's various channel resources and product operation capabilities, there is still a lot of room for development if it enters the market now.

In addition to independent short video platforms and comprehensive platforms, short video + models have emerged in recent years, including short video + online rental (Tujia), short video + online music (NetEase Cloud Music), short video + food recommendation (Dianping), short video + knowledge Q&A community (Zhihu), short video + recruitment (DingTalk) and short video + e-commerce (Taobao), etc. It seems to be a trend for short videos to replace and supplement traditional text and picture information, and market opportunities can also be sought in this direction.

Today, with the booming development of short videos, in a market that has been divided up by major platforms such as Douyin and Kuaishou, vlog has become an important breakthrough for many new short video platforms. Against the background of vlog being considered as a new aesthetic high ground in the field of short videos, some vloggers have begun to appear in the follow-up lists of many young people.

2. Product positioning

Through the analysis of Douyin, Douyin mainly focuses on short videos of 15 seconds, and has achieved great success in content and established certain barriers. It is recommended that Yoo Video can start with medium and long videos as an entry point, and consider using Tencent's social resources to focus on the social direction.

In terms of content, we can use some of Tencent Video’s exclusive copyrighted resources, such as NBA games, as an entry point to gain an advantage.

3. Style and tonality

Because it is also aimed at young people, it is recommended to use a simple style and adopt the current popular fashion UI elements and color schemes.

4. Function settings

1. Through an in-depth experience of Tik Tok's core functions, it is recommended that the full-screen immersive browsing method can be used as a reference in terms of functionality. After entering, content can be automatically played, and users can switch by sliding up and down. In addition, decentralized intelligent algorithm recommendations can be used to ensure that users can see the content they want to see, thereby increasing their usage time.
2. In terms of content production, the publishing process is simplified and shooting filters, props and other functions are enriched to facilitate the accumulation of high-quality content in the early stages.

5. Version iteration rhythm

Because Yoo is still in the exploratory stage, it is recommended to conduct rapid iteration and trial and error in a cycle of 1 to 2 weeks to continuously explore the market direction, and at the same time continuously polish the core functions to ensure its perfect process experience.

6. Operational aspects

• An analysis of Douyin found that the product had less operational exposure in the early stages, and focused mainly on product functions and the accumulation of high-quality content . This is worth learning from.
• During the product growth stage, you can introduce celebrities to generate backflow, sponsor various online variety shows with large traffic to build your own brand, hold various interesting activities, mobilize the activity among users through in-depth operations, and enable interaction between content consumers and content producers. Product functions, services and operations at this stage
• Through analysis, we found that after entering the mature stage, Douyin focused on improving product experience and operating activities to find new breakthroughs and seek new growth. This is worth learning from, and both products and operations should be given equal importance.
• Through the analysis of Douyin user reviews, it was found that during the rapid growth of Douyin, the problem of high content repetition has gradually been exposed. The author believes that this can be solved through in-depth cooperation with MCN to ensure the continuous output of high-quality content.
• Compared with "traditional" short video platforms, vlog content creators are still relatively niche, and top creators are even fewer. During the development of the platform, we also need to pay attention to cultivating excellent Vlog creators.

The above are some suggestions for Yoo Video to enter the short video market based on the structured analysis of the short video market and Douyin.

Related reading:

1. Douyin operation methodology: 500,000 followers increased in 2 months!

2.2019 Tik Tok promotion and operation strategy!

3. Douyin promotion method: 6 types of content that Douyin limits traffic!

4. Tik Tok promotion skills: 3 steps and 7 key points!

5.What are the essential factors for Douyin promotion?

6. Sharing of practical tips on Douyin promotion and operation!

7. Douyin operation and promotion: How to use hot products to improve retention?

8. Douyin promotion method: 6 types of content that Douyin limits traffic!

Author: Actually I am very lazy

Source: Actually I am very lazy