Using the growth model to review Himalaya FM’s product growth

I am a product dog. Curiosity drives me to constantly absorb knowledge to improve my product strength. Recently, I have some personal understanding of growth hacking knowledge, so I chose Himalaya FM as the object of analysis. The full text is more than 9,000 words, with pictures and texts. It takes about 10-15 minutes to read it~

Full text logic:

Product Overview → Product Analysis → Product Life Cycle Analysis → AARRR Model Analysis → Analysis Summary & Growth Recommendations

1. Product Overview

Ximalaya FM was founded in 2012. In the early days, it was positioned as an online audio platform. It appeared in the public eye in the form of a radio FM, similar to the music listening format of Douban FM. Later, it was built into a P UGC audio platform, providing users with a platform for recording and sharing their own music. It attracted many grassroots, original musicians, and celebrities to open their own audio albums on Ximalaya. By 2015, the number of users reached 200 million.

It was not until 2016 that Himalaya caught up with the first year of knowledge payment and stepped half a foot into the new field. It finally achieved dazzling popularity in 2017 and became a hot topic until now.

2. Product Analysis

1. Market performance

According to an industry research report by Analysys Qianfan, Ximalaya is currently a leader in the industry, with more than 40 million active users and a penetration rate of more than 55%, which is more than twice the number of users of other products in the industry.

1. User Analysis

Himalaya users are of average gender and cover a wide age range, from young to middle-aged people. They are mainly concentrated in first-tier cities, with middle- and high-income groups as the main force. The peak listening time of the day is from 20:00 to 23:00 in the evening.

In addition, users have a wide range of usage scenarios, with a high penetration rate in education and learning, daily consumption, and mobile payments, which is closely related to the product positioning and content value.

3. Product Logic

Himalaya's product logic is mainly composed of links between content creators, content consumers, content operators and products, and closely revolves around the flow of content from listening to and recording. Content creators and content consumers are closely connected through social interaction, continuously delivering new content and power to the products.

1. Product Structure

Himalaya's product function structure is relatively complex, with many hierarchical relationships. New users need strong guidance to discover all the functions of the product, but the logical relationship between each level is clear, and users can easily understand the product and use it through classification, search, discovery, and subscription.

3. Product Growth Analysis

1. Product growth curve

Since its establishment in 2012, Himalaya has been deeply engaged in the audio field. It can be said to be a unicorn in the field of Internet audio. Since 2016, the knowledge payment market has begun to explode, and the entire knowledge payment field is in an incremental market; and Himalaya chose to enter the knowledge payment field, and entered the knowledge payment field based on its strong audio strength, and rushed to grab users. The product strategy at this time is also very obvious, that is, growth, growth, and growth.

Although the download volume does not represent the actual number of users, the growth of Himalaya can be explored from its download volume growth curve, so for the time being, we will use download volume ≈ user volume as the basis for analysis. Next, I will conduct a comprehensive analysis of Himalaya's growth in stages through App Store rankings , product growth inflection points, and the time it takes for product growth to double.

2. Product App Store ranking

Judging from the ranking of apps in the app store, Ximalaya has been very stable in the book list since 2016, and has always been in the top 3. In addition, its ranking in the free app list has long been within the top 100, with excellent ranking performance.

However, it is worth noting that Ximalaya entered the best-selling list around May 2016, and was ranked only 820th at the beginning. However, it soared to more than 26th place after more than 10 days, and has remained within the top 100 in the best-selling list since then.

In addition, the 3, 4, 5, and 6 points marked in the application ranking chart are the time nodes when Ximalaya rushed to the top of the list , and the rankings of the rushing list are all at the top, as follows:

• Ranked 5th on the best-selling list on December 4, 2016
• Ranked 12th on the best-selling list on June 7, 2017
• Ranked 7th on the best-selling list on December 5, 2017
• Ranked 22nd on the best-selling list on April 22, 2018

From this, we can guess that Ximalaya used June and December as growth nodes, and launched very strong rhythmic operation and marketing forces to continuously improve product growth. Among them, April is speculated to be a new operation node to further enhance product growth.

1. Product growth stage analysis

Based on the analysis of the appstore rankings, we learned about Himalaya's operating nodes. Therefore, combined with the product growth curve analysis, we found that there are 5 obvious growth outbreak points in the product growth curve.

• 2016-07-16: Mid-year growth burst
• 2017-01-07: Growth explosion point at the beginning of the year
• 2017-06-25: Mid-year growth burst
• 2017-12-21: Growth explosion point at the end of the year
• 2018-06-08: Mid-year growth burst

From this, we can speculate that Himalaya's growth explosion time is concentrated in three time nodes: the beginning of the year, the middle of the year, and the end of the year. Through an overall analysis of the product growth curve, growth inflection points and App Store rankings, I divided Himalaya's growth stages by years and summarized them into the following three keywords : a big start in 2016, rapid progress in 2017, and a rapid rise in 2018.

2016 - First to win

1. After Himalaya entered the knowledge payment field, the product growth rate has accelerated. From the figure, we can see that it took 11 months for the first product growth to double. Three-quarters of the first doubling of growth was completed in 2016, and the corresponding growth node was around July 16.
2. This result is quite good, which is equivalent to doubling the product growth within one year. The growth rate is gratifying and objective. For Himalaya, choosing the knowledge payment field is a correct and wise choice.

2017 - Great Progress

1. Then in 2017, the number of users doubled for the second time, which took only 8 months. The growth rate increased by 30% year-on-year. The corresponding growth nodes were January 7 and June 25.
2. The operations, products, and marketing actions taken during these two growth inflection points provided Himalaya with full firepower support, supporting Himalaya's product growth throughout the year and achieving the gratifying result of doubling product growth.

2018 - Soaring to the sky

1. The third doubling took only 7 months. The time it took for the product to double in growth was shorter each time. The corresponding growth points were December 21 and June 8.
2. The data shows that the number of users has tripled since 2018 compared to 2016, which means that Himalaya has found its own fast-growing track. As for what Himalaya did and how it did it during this growth process, we will explain it in detail from the perspective of function iteration and key operational events.

1. Product Life Cycle Analysis

By combining the growth curve and application ranking data analysis , we derived the five key growth points of Himalaya. We then collected and sorted out the key operational events and product function iterations corresponding to the growth nodes and cycles, and drew the following product growth path diagram based on the product growth curve:

By collecting and sorting out the functional iteration & key operation path map, combined with the growth curve and application ranking, Himalaya's growth can be traced:

1. For Himalaya, entering the field of paid knowledge is a new life cycle. From the roadmap, we can see that the frequency of key function iterations of Himalaya in 2016, 2017 and 2018 is also constantly increasing.
2. According to the characteristics of each stage of the life cycle, combined with the roadmap & growth curve, and the application rankings , Himalaya's product life cycle is divided into three stages: the exploration stage in 2016, the growth stage in 2017, and the explosive stage in 2018.

4.1 Knowledge payment exploration period - 2016

Take the lead and enter the knowledge payment field to seize the incremental market

(1) Functional iteration:

• Content recommendation: New recommended channels, new discovery page, one-click listening, local channels, new product rankings, Q&A, and listener circle
• Audio function: Improve the recording function and play audio at double speed
• Live broadcast function: live broadcast, anchor program management
• Payment system: launch the Xibi system and add exclusive boutique areas

(2) Operational actions:

• The Rap of China: Ma Dong's "Speak Well", Wu Xiaobo's "Hearing Wu Xiaobo Every Day", Ye Wubin's "10 Lessons in Time Management", Gong Linna's "Singing with Gong Linna", "The Road to Financial Freedom"
• Won 70% of the audio copyrights of best-selling books and the entrepreneurial program "Dream Acceleration"
• The first “ 123 Knowledge Carnival ” was held and the operating income exceeded 50 million yuan!

4.2 Product Growth Stage-2017:

Strong product, operation and marketing drive rapid growth

(1) Functional iteration

• Content recommendation: Home page recommends interesting content, category-based boutique navigation, search personalized recommendations, new categories and selected listening lists, new listening lists by category
• Audio functions: audio manuscript function, set episode to close playback, one-click listening by category, high-quality download, scan to listen to audio, new version of recording
• Live broadcast function: Ximalaya live broadcast is online, live broadcast supports connecting with anchors, supports asking anchors questions and interacting, new anchor entrance is added to the discovery page, anchor list is online, red envelopes and gift combos in the live broadcast room
• Sharing function: share coupons when purchasing albums, share free audio, invite friends to listen to purchased audio, earn commissions by sharing paid programs, and buy albums and send them to friends
• Membership system: exclusive rights for top members, members’ rights to remove advertisements
• Hardware function: Support Ford SYNC3 mobile phone interconnection system

(2) Operational actions

• Former Luoji Siwei contributor Li Yuan's "Interpreting the British Empire", Kai-Fu Lee's "Ten Artificial Intelligence Lessons", Guo Degang's "Guo Lun", Kevin Tsai's "201 Emotional Intelligence Lessons"
• Himalaya Knowledge Experience Store, CCB Himalaya FM Credit Card, the 2nd 123 Knowledge Carnival , 66 Membership Day, Zhejiang Satellite TV New Year's Eve Gala

4.3 Product explosion period-2018:

Soaring to the sky, accumulating strength, deepening audio and knowledge payment, and innovating and polishing products

(1) Key functions

• Content recommendation: Hot search rankings, subscribe and play with one click
• Audio function: voice support for adding manuscripts, album artwork packaging guide, album creation editing preview
• Live broadcast function: group chat interaction with anchor fans, exclusive gifts for fans, anchor listener circle community, live broadcast multi-person interactive friendship mode, anchor workstation adds data center
• Membership system : Member rights upgrade, free listening of celebrity columns and popular audiobooks, member channels support free listening of all site-wide word-of-mouth albums
• Sharing function: 0 yuan purchase, share and get books and membership
• Hardware function: support carplay driving listening

(2) Operational actions

• Liang Dong's "Sleep Peacefully", Chen Kun's "Time", Cui Yongyuan's "Talk Like Him", Ma Sichun's "Ma Sichun's Suspenseful World", Hunzi Yue's "History of Youthful China", Richard Thaler's "Bilingual Stanford Economics Audio Course"
• iQIYI Himalaya VIP content is free to watch, China Telecom Himalaya Card is available for a monthly fee of 9 yuan, Himalaya and Sogou Input Method cross-border cooperation, when Himalaya meets Starbucks Xingyi Cup, Shanghai Book Fair Himalaya Brain Gas Station, Himalaya joins hands with "Little Chinese Scholars" to fully upgrade the second season
• Himalaya's "Ten Thousand People and One Billion New Voices Plan", 423 Listening Festival, 66 Membership Day

4. Product AARRR Model Analysis

1. User acquisition

(1) Product acquisition

Product Contents:

After 6 years of deep cultivation and accumulation, Himalaya's audio content diversity and strength are unquestionable. The audio content is extensive, covering entertainment, knowledge, life, music, history, crosstalk, emotions, humanities, jokes, etc. For users, good content is the best and most important way to increase users.

Product features:

In terms of product functions, everything revolves around content, helping users obtain recommended categories of content, quickly switching content categories, and clearly selecting content categories, all of which reduce the difficulty for users to obtain content.

(2) Operational acquisition

In terms of operations, Ximalaya mainly seeks to increase user growth by discovering high-quality UGC anchors and inviting celebrities/ KOLs to join.

Invite celebrities/KOLs to cooperate

• Celebrities and KOLs such as Wu Xiaobo, Ma Dong, Li Yuan, Chen Bing, Kai-Fu Lee, Guo Degang, Kevin Tsai, Cui Yongyuan, Ma Sichun, and Uncle Qiuye have joined the Himalaya app, transforming their experiences and knowledge into PGC audio albums for sale on the app, with the platform and creators sharing the revenue
• For creators, they can gain money, prestige, fame, and popularity. For platforms, they can use the traffic attributes of stars/KOLs to convert the fans of stars and introduce a large number of accurate users who pursue knowledge.

Discover high-quality UGC anchors

• Product growth is inseparable from meeting user needs. Under Himalaya's pan-content strategy, users have a variety of content needs. Therefore, discovering high-quality UGC anchors has become one of the important actions to meet user needs and achieve product growth.
• A high-quality anchor can not only bring a large number of new users to the product, but also create greater revenue. Yousheng Zijin is a typical representative of a high-quality anchor.

• In addition, Ximalaya is also working to discover high-quality UGC anchors. Every year, it holds an annual anchor selection, awards and bonuses for high-quality live broadcasts, in order to encourage anchors to record well and make progress every day. Ximalaya will not treat its brothers and sisters unfairly~

(3) Marketing acquisition

In terms of marketing acquisition, Ximalaya has achieved user growth through marketing methods such as sponsoring programs, subsidies, and brand cooperation.

5. Analysis Summary & Suggestions

1. What can be improved on Himalaya

Through the analysis of Himalaya's A AR RR model and growth trend, my view is that Himalaya is not weak in any of the five stages of AARRR, because in each stage, we can find the shadow of the three carriages of product, operation and marketing, and for Himalaya, AA-RRR may be a more suitable traffic model, but I think Himalaya needs to work harder on user retention , for the following reasons:

• In the first eight months of 2018, Himalaya continued the growth momentum of 2017. The growth curve at the beginning of this article shows that the product doubled in just seven months this year. Although this number is not very accurate, it also reflects a very intuitive reality that Himalaya is still growing rapidly.
• I would like to quote Mr. Bumian's classic quote, "Born by attracting new users , die by retaining existing ones ." Although Himalaya has entered a period of explosive growth, facing such a large number of user growth, Himalaya's product, operation, marketing and other teams are under great pressure. How to retain this large number of new users will be their first pain point.

1. Growth recommendations and action plans

In terms of user retention, Himalaya faces different types of user groups and adopts strategies such as recommended content, hot search lists, VIP membership, live broadcasts & circles, user levels, certified anchors & anchor manuals, etc. It can be seen that retention is improved around the two major directions of content consumers and content creators. My suggestion is to make it easier for users to obtain information and audio, and for anchors to gain listeners more easily.

(1) Make it a habit to listen to audio quickly

• According to official statistics, there are 470 million activated users, 5 million anchors, 200,000 celebrities, and more than 100 million audio contents. Both audio data and user scale have reached unprecedented heights. Therefore, using the accumulated user behavior big data and AI intelligent recommendation, the threshold for users to obtain anchors and audio is further lowered.

• Although Himalaya has a similar form in terms of functional positioning, the names of the functions are not well distinguished. The two "Daily Must Listen" and "One-Click Listen" are not clearly distinguished. The name of Xiami Music can be used as a reference. For example, 30 songs a day, AI radio, new songs and new albums, rankings, etc., so that users can quickly recognize

(2) Encourage and support content creators

• Content consumers and creators are the balancers of the two-sided supply market. While providing users with more content entrances, it is also very necessary for creators to continuously provide high-quality content. The creative motivation of content creators can be viewed from the perspective of Maslow's needs. The first is to make money to support themselves or get more income to improve their quality of life. The second is to gain a sense of identity and belonging and establish a close relationship with the audience. Finally, realize the value of oneself and contribute one's own strength to the platform and the industry.
• Therefore, at the beginning of this year, Himalaya launched the "Ten Thousand People and One Billion New Voices Plan", investing 3 billion yuan to support audio content creators and provide them with incubation tools , growth paths, and more monetization channels.
• By becoming a high-quality reader of Xima Audiobooks, you can get a share of the funds subsidy. By becoming a contracted anchor, you can get a contract fee, etc., and obtain more high-quality content creators through subsidies + resources.

Source: Xingxingzai