Tencent, NetEase, Sohu, Toutiao, the current four major news and information apps competitive analysis

At present, there are many news clients on the market, which can be roughly divided into two categories according to their content: one is the media news client, and the other is the aggregated information client. I chose the top four downloaded apps for analysis. Three of them are media news clients: Tencent News , Sohu News , and NetEase News , and the other is an aggregation news client: Toutiao .

1. User needs analysis

1. Demand Analysis

Reading news is a high-frequency software demand. Most users spend time reading news hoping to achieve the following:

1. Pay attention to social hot spots and industry information anytime and anywhere, keep abreast of current news, and maintain information communication with the outside world;
2. Satisfy the leisure and entertainment needs of participating in interaction and self-expression through relaxing and interesting content;
3. Quickly get the information you want from massive amounts of information and gain a sense of happiness when browsing the news.

The following figure shows the specific needs of users for information content in 2016:

The corresponding KANO model is as follows:

Based on user needs and the above KANO model, we have a clearer direction to dissect and analyze the product.

2. User analysis

(1) User portrait comparison

① Analysis from age

It can be seen that the main users of APP are young people, with 68.25% under the age of 35 and 34.25% under the age of 26. The user group tends to be younger. This is also more in line with the development of the Internet era. The younger generation can adapt and survive more quickly in this era.

② Gender analysis

As can be seen from the table, in the entire mobile news information industry, there are more male users than female users, with a rough ratio of 5:4, which is much more balanced than before.

③ From the perspective of region

It can be seen that Toutiao has the highest proportion of users in first-tier cities, NetEase News has the highest proportion of users in 1-2 tier cities, and Sohu News has a larger number of users in low-tier regional cities.

(2) User usage scenarios

With the popularity of mobile Internet , users cannot do without the Internet in all aspects. At the same time, people's dependence on mobile news clients is gradually increasing. The specific usage scenarios are roughly analyzed as follows:

• Usage scenario 1: When a white-collar worker wakes up in the morning, he wants to see the morning headlines as soon as possible, so he opens his mobile phone and uses the news client to read the news.
• Usage scenario 2: After lunch, during the lunch break, this white-collar worker takes out his mobile phone to see if there is any interesting and entertaining leisure news to pass the time.
• Usage scenario three: When you go home from get off work and take the subway, sit down and look for news about topics that interest you.

2. Market conditions

According to data from iiMedia Research, as of the first half of 2015, the number of mobile news client users in China has reached 489 million, a 9.2% increase from the end of last year.

1. Industry Development

The Internet news industry has entered a mature development period and its model is showing new characteristics.

The Internet news industry chain is becoming increasingly complete, and a relatively mature development mechanism has been formed in the news production and channel distribution links. Market supervision is becoming increasingly perfect, and the participating entities are becoming increasingly diverse. In terms of production model, the UGC user production method is gradually transitioning towards institutionalization, forming a development trend of the integration of professional news production industry and user production; in terms of distribution model, "algorithm distribution" is gradually becoming the main distribution method of online news; in terms of communication model, the characteristics of "decentralization" of the media and "multi-level" of communication are becoming increasingly apparent; in terms of business model , it presents a situation where commercial advertising is the main form and diversified model exploration coexists.

2. Competition landscape

Mobile has become the main competitive market, and Tencent News and Toutiao have obvious competitive advantages.

In the mobile market, social media , mobile browsers and news clients have become the main entrances to the mobile news market. Tencent has maintained its leading position based on its years of experience as a news portal and the powerful channel advantages of social media such as QQ and WeChat . Toutiao uses algorithm technology to provide users with personalized news and information recommendations, forming a differentiated advantage and surpassing most portals. In the PC market, comprehensive portals and traditional news websites still occupy a major position in the market, among which comprehensive portals have stronger traffic advantages, and mainstream news websites have greater credibility.

3. Competitive situation

The participation of capital forces has deepened, and market competition has become increasingly fierce; media integration has accelerated, and a new era of competition and cooperation has begun.

Competition in the Internet news market is becoming increasingly fierce. Capital participation in the competition for content resources, commercial resources, channel resources and ecological layout is deepening, and market competition is gradually upgrading from primary product competition to capital advantage competition. At the same time, the integration of media in areas such as channels and content is accelerating, and the "two microblogs and one terminal" communication matrix has become the standard for all news websites and news media. From news production to content dissemination, news shows a development trend of mutual integration between traditional media and new media .

4. User Conduct

Social media has become an important channel for obtaining, commenting on, forwarding and redirecting online news.

Social media is becoming the source of communication for the generation and fermentation of hot events in the online society. After forming a communication influence, it drives news websites and traditional media to follow up with reports, and ultimately forms a larger wave of public opinion. CNNIC data shows that in the past six months, the proportion of users who have obtained news information through social media is as high as 90.7%, the proportion of those who participated in news commentary on social media such as WeChat and Weibo is 62.8% and 50.2% respectively, and the proportion of those who forwarded news through Moments and WeChat public accounts is 43.2% and 29.2% respectively.

3. Competitive product information

I mainly selected the top four news and information apps based on the download volume rankings for analysis.

• Experience environment: iPhone 6Splus Version: 10.3.2
• Analysis time: July 2017

4. Comparative Analysis of Competitive Products

1. Product strategy layer

Below are the slogan, product positioning, and product advantages of the product I analyzed.

This is a comparison chart of the product's business model. Tencent News has a relatively broad business layout. Compared with others, its feature is that it involves the gaming and entertainment industry, and it also has its own natural advantages. Compared with other companies, Toutiao's scope of business is relatively single, but its philosophy is to focus on the news field and make it more convenient and easier for users to use. Sohu News first came into people's attention as an Internet consulting platform. To a certain extent, it has accumulated users and has a good reputation in the industry. NetEase is a company I admire very much. They always consider things from the user's perspective, focusing on user experience and improving user enjoyment.

2. Product scope layer: functional comparison

I will focus on the three functions of news:

(1) Social circle

In a software that is used frequently by users, the social circle function retains users by building a circle of friends and strengthening interactions between friends, which also greatly increases the length of stay and the length of time the client is used. The usage scenarios and motivations of users visiting the friend dynamics page are: to read the stories of friends around them during chatting time and to interact with friends.

Therefore, the value of the friend dynamic page lies in timely updating friends' works for users, allowing friends to actively participate in interactions and creating a good environment for discovering and watching interesting things and anecdotes.

The following is a brief introduction to the social circle model of the product:

① Tencent News

Tencent News does not have its own social circle because Tencent’s other products, WeChat and QQ, are all dedicated social software. However, I think it would be great to have an interface on WeChat to directly use Tencent News, so that users can directly click to view the news when using WeChat or other software.

②Sohu News

The social circle of Sohu News is Fox Friends. Entering this interface will directly display the updates of friends, allowing us to quickly see the updates between different Fox Friends. It also supports functions such as dynamic publishing, forwarding, private chat, and commenting. There is a search box in the top bar of Fox Friends - the function of finding people, which greatly enhances the interaction between users. By adding and finding your favorite Fox Friends, the fun of using Fox Friends is enhanced. This shows that Sohu pays attention to the connection between people and the interaction between Fox Friends, and provides personalized recommendations of related news based on the categories you are interested in.

There are also multiple entrances to Fox Friends Circle. On the personal center page, there are three entrances - Fox Friends, Fox Friends Dynamics, and Read Sohu Articles. This not only gives users multiple options to enter, but also has a visual impact, as if this thing is very important and meaningful, increasing the publicity of Fox Friends Circle.

Click to see Sohu articles, there are two major categories. Already followed, the friends we follow, and the friends who have posted the latest updates are placed at the front, so that users can obtain and read information in the first time, which improves reading efficiency and attracts users to use this function again; Recommended, the client recommends corresponding friends through the users we follow and the types of articles we often read. These two categories greatly improve the attention and publicity of Sohu accounts and develop fixed friends, increasing user stickiness.

Another thing we can do when reading an article is to get to know the author or the author's article more deeply and read more content. We can directly click on the author's name to enter another interface. This interface has the author's avatar, author name, number of followers, number of fans, dynamics, and articles. This can help us understand the author better and more comprehensively. The specific functions include: private message chat, following as a friend, viewing dynamic messages, and viewing published articles. Private message chat allows users to express their ideas directly to the author, or if they have any questions, they can chat directly like friends; following greatly increases the frequency of interaction with the author, and the author's latest dynamic messages and published articles will be directly displayed in the Fox Friends Circle. Here, dynamic content is divided into dynamics and articles. Because most users add friends for the purpose of reading their published articles, the articles are listed directly here to facilitate users' search, reducing the time users spend searching in dynamic pages, greatly improving efficiency, and providing a comfortable and easy-to-use experience.

③ Toutiao

Toutiao has also gradually launched its own social circle - Wei Toutiao. The specific usage process is similar to that of Huyou, but Wei Toutiao's user experience is better than Sohu. Articles can be published in three forms: text, pictures, and videos, which greatly increases the fun of users posting articles and makes the interaction more vivid and interesting. In addition, this function is pinned to the top bar. When users browse any news, they can post the content they want to send anytime and anywhere. This is also in line with the characteristics of people changing at any time. In Wei Toutiao, the user's rightmost button is displayed to follow, which is convenient for users to directly follow friends. The operation is simple and greatly increases the interaction and communication between users.

There are also many entrances to Weitao, much more than Huyou. My following, my fans, my updates, my visitors in my personal center, and the entrance to the authors I follow when reading articles. My followers, my fans, and my visitors are all on the same page, divided into these three categories and switched randomly to facilitate user viewing, saving the process of browsing different pages. Like Fox Friends, when users read articles, they can follow the author and enter the Wei Toutiao interface.

In summary, from the above analysis we can see that:

As a platform that focuses on user behavior analysis and personalized news recommendations, Toutiao's social circle micro-toutiao function is undoubtedly more complete and professional, and can better promote user interaction and increase the number of Toutiao users. The functions of Sohu News' Fox Friends are relatively simple and can meet the basic needs of users, such as posting updates and reading Fox Friends updates. However, some more professional and detailed needs are temporarily ignored, such as the complicated article publishing process, difficult to find entrances, and poor quality of dynamic content. Continuous optimization is needed.

(2) Channel customization

The purpose of the channel classification function is to classify different news, clarify users' reading preferences, simplify users' search troubles, and then quickly and accurately recommend news that users like, thereby improving the quality of news releases.

When users are reading the news, if they want to narrow the scope of accurate news or find the type of news they like, or check whether the news classification of this APP is rich or comprehensive, they can use this channel customization to check it out.

Judging from the quantity of column channels, we can find that Sohu News and NetEase News have relatively rich content, accurately understanding users' reading preferences and providing users with a variety of choices.

① Tencent News

Channel customization is divided into 3 categories: selected channels, recommended channels, and local channels. In the selected channels, the channels are neatly arranged in 4 columns. If you don’t like a channel, just click the × in the upper right corner to delete it. This greatly simplifies the process of deleting channels. If you need to add a channel, you can also directly click the channel you want to select. The selected channel will be directly added to the selected channels. The operation is simple and easy to use.

Recommended channels and local channels are placed side by side in the same section, located in the lower middle position of the entire interface, which is easy to be noticed by users, greatly increasing the probability of adding channels and improving users' product experience.

The local channel is one of the features of Tencent News. This channel is a transformation of the channel's characteristics to strengthen the channel's characteristics and form a new and more competitive advantage. The role of this channel is to specifically explore and interpret local characteristics, and disseminate local real-time news and local cultural values. The channel content includes most existing cities. If they do not appear on the screen, you can click on more local channels to select them. The operation process is simple and clear.

② Toutiao

Channel customization is divided into 2 categories: My Channels and Channel Recommendations, which are added and unadded channels. When deleting a channel here, the user first needs to click Edit, then an × will appear in the upper right corner of the channel. After deleting, click Done. An operation that originally only requires one step now requires three steps, which reduces the user's interest in use to a certain extent. It is very inconvenient and it is recommended to change it.

In the recommended channels, there are many categories, and there is a '+' symbol next to the words, which directly tells users that they can click directly to add them to my channel. It is convenient and easy to use, but because of this symbol and the numerous words, people are dazzled and easily have difficulty in making choices, and it also increases the time of useless choices.

After carefully comparing the channel contents, I found that there is no great innovation in the channels. They are all common channel contents, and the channel contents are similar. They have not formed their own characteristics in style. It is recommended to design the channels to be richer and more attractive.

③ Sohu News

Channel customization is also roughly divided into two categories: My Channel and More Channels. But more channels have been meticulously classified: recommendations, featured channels, technology and digital, entertainment and sports, car wash and real estate, life and leisure, etc. The classification standards are very specific and detailed, giving people a clear and logical feeling, which greatly reduces the time users spend browsing channels and improves the efficiency of quick search.

There is a search box visible in the top bar, which allows users to quickly and conveniently search for the channels they need among dozens of channels, reducing the time of searching one by one, simplifying the process of channel selection, and improving user experience.

Scroll to the bottom of the page and you will find that there is also a search box in the bottom column. This is to allow users who have browsed all the channels and did not see what they like to search again quickly, so as to avoid users leaving in disappointment and having a bad experience.

Although the interface does not provide detailed instructions on how to delete or add channels, users only need to tap the desired channel, move it, and then delete or add it. This is more in line with the use of smartphones, and allows direct interaction between the function and the user, enriching the flexibility of the deletion and addition functions.

④ NetEase News

Column channels are divided into two categories: switch columns and click to add more columns. To delete a channel here, you need to click Sort and Delete, and then you can move or delete it at will. This increases the process and time of adding and sorting. It is recommended that you can imitate the direct sliding feature in Sohu News, which is convenient and efficient.

In all columns, the more popular channels will be marked for users to choose at the first time, giving pertinent advice to those who have no goals, and also promoting their more famous and innovative channels.

There is a local column in it. There is no need to manually select a location. It can automatically locate local news and push local news. This improves the timeliness and reality of the news, but it also lacks dynamism and you cannot see local news from other places.

Summary and suggestions : The channel customization function is quite complete. Tencent News has relatively complete functions and has a major feature of local channels. Toutiao has a clear gap with the other three apps in terms of channel customization. The operation is not convenient and the content quality is poor. Sohu News has obvious advantages in channel customization, and its advantages are reflected in both channel interaction and content quality. NetEase News' functions can basically meet user needs, and provide users with popular channel choices, which is very innovative.

(3) Sharing

The purpose of the sharing function is that after users browse the news, they find the news meaningful or interesting and are eager to share it with their friends.

Then how to share? Of course, we share it on the platforms that are most frequently used by users. At present, users use mobile phones most frequently and use WeChat, Weibo, QQ and other social software the most. Therefore, sending it to the APP is most conducive to users checking it in time, increasing the news sharing rate and achieving our sharing purpose.

At this time, it is particularly important to simplify the steps of publishing and sharing, reduce user waiting time, increase publishing platforms, and improve the efficiency of news dissemination. The sharing process is the same for different news clients: click Share, select the sharing platform, and send. However, the sharing form and the sharing platform are different. The following comparison will promote the development of the sharing function.

① Tencent News

During reading, the sharing function is always displayed on the screen, which makes it convenient for users to see interesting content during reading and share articles with friends in time, greatly improving the sharing rate.

The sharing function is located in the lower right corner of the interface, as if telling us to do things from the left to the right, that is, read comments first, write comments, and then share in this order, which is in line with people's usual form. However, during the experience, I feel that the sharing icon is a bit small, easy to press the wrong position, inconvenient to operate, and more likely to cause user irritability.

After clicking Share, 5 options will appear. Slide back and 3 more options will appear. The number of people you share with will also affect the user experience. Of course, the most appropriate thing is to choose the social software that users use most frequently. This will not only make it easier to use, but also better promote the product.

The first four are all Tencent products: WeChat friends, Moments, QQ friends, and QQ Space. Tencent News puts its own products at the forefront, which not only achieves the purpose of publicity, but also allows users to consider sharing on these platforms first. WeChat is currently the most frequently used social software, and according to statistics, each person opens WeChat the most times every day, so it naturally ranks at the top, followed by the related sharing platforms of QQ products. Sina Weibo is also a community with a relatively dense concentration of users, and sharing on Weibo can also achieve the effect of news publicity and re-publicity.

Copy the link, which is used to share to social platforms that do not appear in the interface, making it convenient for users to share and have this link, you can send it to any platform to read the news, which adds infinite possibilities.

A more creative way is to take creative screenshots, which you can make yourself to share with your friends. It enhances the fun of sharing function and greatly increases the number of times users use the sharing function. If you do not want to share, just click cancel.

② Toutiao

Similar to Tencent News, the sharing button is also located in the lower right corner of the interface. The shared content can be either articles or videos.

In terms of sharing methods, Toutiao has 10 types, the first of which is: Wei Toutiao, which is the social circle of Toutiao. It increases the number of times users use Wei Toutiao and also promotes Wei Toutiao. The other four are social software that are currently used by many users. This can not only increase the sharing rate, but also increase the rate of information dissemination. The last five sharing methods are also Toutiao's unique sharing methods, which help to get on the headlines and share systematically, with rich sharing platforms.

Compared with Tencent News, the biggest difference is that Tencent News shares are displayed in one column, while Toutiao displays them to users in two columns. Everything is displayed clearly at a glance, and users can also reduce the process of sliding to view, make quick selections, and share, greatly improving the comfort of use.

③ Sohu News

Sohu’s sharing method is similar to Toutiao’s, but the sharing button is not conspicuous enough, which arouses unnecessary suspicion.

After the user clicks, multiple sharing methods will appear on the page, and there are three words "Share to", which clearly answer the doubts. In addition, the 8 sharing platforms previewed on the interface are all colorful patterns. The overall picture is not monotonous, and can be presented to users better and more beautifully. Moreover, these are also the social software that users use most frequently today. If you swipe back, you can copy the link, leaving the extra options behind.

Compared with Toutiao, the sharing methods here include Weibo sharing, Alipay , and Life Link, which has increased the scope of news dissemination. This also shows that Sohu has the closest connection with society. Almost all social apps used in life can be directly shared in this client, and there are only 4 in a row, unlike Tencent News and Toutiao. This gives people a uncrowded and comfortable feeling, with better visual guidance and direction.

In addition, it can be found that Sohu puts Huyou in the third place, instead of the first place like Toutiao. This is because the number of WeChat users is far greater than Huyou. If Huyou is forced to be placed in the first place, it will leave users with an inconvenient user experience.

Put your friends at the back, in a more central position, so as to attract attention, focus vision, and promote your social circle. QQ has two sharing platforms. If it is forced to be placed behind Sohu, QQ Space and QQ will be in different positions, giving people a feeling of unclear ideas and messy layout. In order to have a better visual effect, we have added two more social platforms, Alipay and Life Link, to provide users with more choices.

It can also be found that there are fewer sharing methods such as text messages and emails, because nowadays very few people use text messages and emails for communication, which not only increases the immutability of coaches, but also wastes money. It is feasible to delete these two methods, which reduces the trouble of development and promotes the dissemination and communication of social platforms.

④ NetEase News

The sharing button of this client is the second to last icon in the bottom bar. I think this icon is too small and difficult to press accurately. If you are not careful, you will press the button behind it, which will increase the user's repeated clicking annoyance and bring a bad user experience. It is suggested that you can layout the interface like the other three apps, place the last one, and enlarge the icon.

As we can see from the picture, there are 10 ways to share NetEase News. These icons are presented to users with a white background, which increases the prominence and highlight effects. The first one is screenshot sharing, which is a new feature and is ranked first. The color and picture of the icon are eye-catching, letting people know that they can choose this feature, which increases the fun of sharing.

If you look closely at the layout, it is actually a bit unreasonable. It is best not to place sharing platforms like QQ separately, as this gives people a feeling of logical confusion. It is recommended to put Weibo behind WeChat Moments , which will look much better. We have also added YiXin Sharing and Youdao Cloud Notes. This is because these two products are NetEase products and they also serve to promote NetEase products.

However, NetEase’s sharing function cannot share news to other platforms. It is recommended to add a copy link operation.

Summary and suggestions: As for the sharing function, Tencent News, Toutiao, and Sohu News have all done well, with relatively complete functions and simple and convenient interactions. After sharing, you can choose to stay in the social software or return to the news client, but the sharing function of NetEase News needs further modification in terms of interface design and interaction. Here are my general suggestions for sharing:

1. There is no need to make the share icon too small, which will make it inconvenient for users to click or they may click the wrong icon.
2. It would be best to sort and add sharing platforms to facilitate users to use commonly used sharing platforms and also meet the needs of a small number of users.
3. This sharing function is limited to sharing the entire news. Individual pictures and texts can be shared, and there is no need to add the step of saving pictures.
4. Certain rewards can be given to shared articles, forming a sharing reward mechanism for the news client, which will greatly improve the coverage and dissemination efficiency of news.

3. Structural layer

(1) Product structure diagram

Tencent News product structure

Toutiao’s product structure

Sohu News Product Structure

NetEase News product structure

(2) Structural analysis

From the perspective of information architecture, the structures of the four are very similar, with modules such as video, news, personal center, search, and channel customization. Watching news videos and searching news are the main needs of users, so it is correct and reasonable to divide them into these modules.

• Tencent News : The product structure diagram is clear at a glance. You can read the news directly on the homepage. If you want to watch live broadcast , you can switch directly. There is no operational threshold and it is ready to use.
• Toutiao : Toutiao focuses on user behavior analysis and builds data mining models to recommend personalized news. The homepage directly displays recommended news, and the pages randomly switch between Xigua Video and small videos. There are two video columns on one page, and the focus is on video rather than news reading. It is a bit cumbersome and troublesome. It can be integrated into one video, while the personal center page can only be entered by clicking on the personal avatar. The entire functional architecture is not easy to use and not concise.
• Sohu News : Sohu's friend interaction circle - Fox Friends, can directly view friends' dynamics on the page. Sohu has also integrated a large amount of video resources into a video section. There are also many categories in this section, which is in line with the characteristics of contemporary young people who love to watch videos. In short, Sohu News' product functions grasp future trends and meet users' needs for personalized, video-based, social, and localized information.
• NetEase News : It can be seen that NetEase News has the richest product structure diagram, and the distribution in each category is relatively complete and full of functions. If you look at this picture carefully, you will find that the details of the product are very well done. For example, in the search history function, it can search by date, which makes it easy to find historical records and reduce query time. The sharing function is placed directly after reading the news, and a module is listed for users to share quickly and promptly. This is because NetEase believes that reading has a market, and compared to Tencent, it has a more thoughtful recommendation function. NetEase's products are intended to expand user experience and have a profound impact on users.

4. Product framework layer

At the product framework level, I drew a flowchart of the product reading news (right-click and open in a new tab to view the large picture):

Tencent News

Today's headlines

Sohu News

NetEase News

① Tencent News: The process is long, but the functions are simple and the operation is convenient

When you first read the news, you will have a variety of choices and rich news information. The special feature is that after reading the article, users will be given direct hot reviews. On the one hand, it will attract the reader's attention, and on the other hand, it will encourage readers to write comments and share their ideas. The subsequent processes are similar, including writing comments and sharing articles, which is relatively simple and convenient to use.

② Toutiao: The process is relatively long (relatively short), it is easy to use, but some functions need to be improved

In the interface, news reading can only be selected on the homepage, which makes news reading monotonous. Then, the homepage is divided into many categories, which makes it dazzling. Generally, it is enough to use recommendations. Recommendations can be listed separately to facilitate user reading, shorten the news reading process, and improve reading efficiency.

While reading an article, the top bar displays the author's avatar and name. Click to see more information about the author and then go to another page to follow. This consumes the patience of impulsive readers who want to follow the author. What’s strange is that most articles on Toutiao don’t have the function of recommending related articles, so the reading process is not complete.

suggestion:

1. You can display a follow button directly next to the author in the top bar;
2. Add the function of recommending related articles, and display pictures and texts in the column of recommended related articles.

③ Sohu News: Long process and rich functions

Its overall process is very traditional and conventional, combining the advantages of Tencent and Toutiao. Thanks to its professionalism, it is rich in functions and also meets the needs of users in different scenarios. During reading, it is faster and more convenient to follow authors, comment on news, collect news, and share news.

④ NetEase News: Long process, innovative features

NetEase has always focused on user experience. During the reading period, the function is innovative. The number of replies is displayed in the top bar, which informs us of the popularity of the news and allows us to view and comment on the news anytime and anywhere. It also simplifies part of the process of viewing and writing comments, focusing on communication between users and increasing user stickiness.

Summary : These four flow charts are basically the same. Tencent News has simple functions and simple operation, which makes it easy for users to like and use it repeatedly; Toutiao's process is shorter, but its functions are not rich enough, which cannot attract users to use it for a long time; Sohu News has richer functions, and NetEase News has more innovative functions, which can attract more users and form loyal users. Tencent News has simple functions.

But we found a common problem. When we are not interested in this type of news, we have to return to the home page and click to select "not interested" or "don't like" it. This adds unnecessary processes, and the buttons are relatively small, so it is easy to press the wrong position and then re-enter the news display page, causing unnecessary trouble to users.

5. Product presentation layer

(1) Layout design

① Tencent News

The main colors are blue and white. Blue represents beauty, quietness, rationality, serenity and cleanliness, giving people a relaxed and comfortable mood. There are about 4-5 news blocks on one page, so you can browse a lot of news at the same time. It is very compact, but simple and clean, and very comfortable to use.

② Toutiao

Red and white simple style. The spacing between articles is appropriate, and it is convenient to flip through and click on the news, giving people a sense of efficiency and simplicity. This bottom bar does not have an "I" and is placed in the upper left corner, which saves space and can also be used to place other project content.

③ Sohu News

The most minimalist style looks too monotonous, and reading the news for a long time will make people feel tired. When the APP is opened, there is a dynamic advertising page with your own slogan in the lower left corner to better promote your brand. In the 'Homepage', one page can hold 5-6 news items, similar to Tencent News, and more news can be browsed at the same time. In the 'Video' section, the top is recommended videos, and below are classified videos, with about 3-4 videos displayed. The interactive design conforms to the public's operating habits and is easy to use.

④ NetEase News

Like Toutiao, the main colors are red and white. The homepage opens, and it has a very beautiful, simple cover design. The fonts and pictures on the page are relatively large. There are about 3 news items on one page, and there is a lot of content in the "Me" section, which shows that the product has many functions and is very comprehensive.

(2) Content experience analysis

Combining the functional framework described above, I chose the entire scenario of reading news to analyze the four apps.

Scene 1: Watching the news

Reading news is the core function of news apps. When users read news, they hope to see a comfortable interface and meaningful content. Therefore, the value of the news details page lies in helping users improve their reading interest and attract more users to the greatest extent possible.

① Tencent News

Take one of them as an example: the layout of Tencent News has news-related pictures at the top, then the title , then the author and publication time of the article, and then there will be bold text marks in the article, which makes it look very logical to users and help them quickly and clearly understand the main content of the news.

The picture of the article is placed first, giving a visual impact and echoing the title below, making it more eye-catching and increasing reading interest. The time on a new line shows the month, day, and hour, accurately recording the time and indicating the real-time nature of the article.

However, when reading news, the distance between paragraphs is a bit too large, which makes users feel that the text is sparse and the article is too long, and they don’t have more patience to continue reading.

② Toutiao

The layout of Toutiao is that the title is in front, followed by pictures and texts. The content is directly after the title, which makes it easy for readers to quickly enter the main content and increase the reading speed. Then the next line is the author and time. The time here is not like the specific time shown in Tencent News, but it is displayed a few hours ago. It is more accurate and direct, allowing users to understand the timeliness of the news.

Taking this article as an example, let’s talk about the problems in the article. It can be seen that the entire article is mostly pictures, which gives people a relaxing experience and is also suitable for busy users to easily browse the article without increasing the reading burden.

However, in some social focus news, too many pictures will make people feel that the quality of the article is very low and has no reading value. Therefore, in some focus news, you can add a comment area or a discussion topic area to improve user stickiness. (Similar to the topic comment mode of NetEase News).

③ Sohu News

The article layout is similar to Toutiao. Compared with other apps, Sohu News’ font is much larger and the spacing between characters is also large, which wastes space, increases the redundancy of the article, and increases the fatigue of reading.

When reading an article, you will inevitably come across some technical terms that you don’t understand. These terms will be marked in blue fonts in the article content on Sohu, and users can search by simply clicking on them, making it easier for users to retrieve information and improve reading quality (just like the carotene in this article).

The quality of Sohu's news is unquestionable. It has a huge amount of exclusive content and resident media, rich omni-media resources and developed self-media , as well as constantly updated column channels to meet the needs of users of different age groups. When reading the news, users feel assured about the content of the articles and gain a lot from it, which increases their re-use rate and trust in the platform.

④ NetEase News

The article is full of pictures and texts, and the article is very vivid, and the word spacing is the largest, which greatly attracts users to browse and improves the length of stay, but it can also cause bad reading effects, the content of the article is empty, and the length of the article is deliberately increased.

The column below the title has author source and subscription. Here, it shows that subscription is different from the other three APPs. The use of the word "subscribe" is much better than "following". Following is like following a single user. Subscribing is like subscribing to the entire journal, giving people a very noble feeling and being more interested in subscribing.

The most distinctive thing is: the post message button in the upper right corner is highlighted, which makes it easy for users to see and click to use, interact with netizens in real time, exchange information, and improve user stickiness, which also makes the relationship between the client and the user closer. Users will click on this function as long as they think about the opinions of other netizens.

Summary suggestions: By using these four APPs, Toutiao can give me the most relaxed reading sense. It does not have a lot of fancy texts and is rich in pictures and texts. The news quality of Sohu News is relatively high, and you can see various news in different aspects. Using NetEase News, you can often see most people’s comments and topics, which are very interesting. When reading, it is mainly about the quality of the news, and the news is interesting and meaningful, it will attract readers.

Therefore, when displaying the news details page, you should try to highlight the main content, combine pictures and text, and have appropriate spacing between paragraphs. At the same time, you should also pay attention to comments and sharing functions. For example, NetEase News highlights the comment function in the top column, increase user interaction, and increase the frequency of client usage.

Scene 2: After reading the news

After reading the news, users will definitely have many ideas, including their own opinions on this news, want to see most netizens’ evaluations of this news, want to see similar news, want to share with friends, etc. The page after reading the news helps users think again and increase the depth of reading.

① Tencent News

After reading the news, you can see the module with a news standpoint, allowing users to participate in the news interaction in time as soon as they read the news. This not only brings people closer to their understanding and re-understanding of the news, but also collects the awareness and attitude of most people in this news. This is also very similar to a small questionnaire. By reading the news, fill in the answers, it gives people a relaxed and natural feeling, and can see the voting results, increasing the fun of user interaction and voting.

Next is the hot comments from users, you can read the comments of different netizens to attract users' curiosity and attention. Here users can only display a few hot comments, and if they want to see more comments, they need to click on hot comments or all comments, jump to another comment page, and then they can see all netizens' comments on the news, which can be liked or replied. The simple operation of likes and replies here requires jumping to another page, which seems a lot of trouble. You can directly display the likes so that users can also like and reply directly when they see hot comments.

Finally, there is a related recommendation module, and the APP will recommend news similar to that news to users. Functional modules are connected to each other, and the overall user experience is very concise and clear, which is very consistent with the user's use process.

② Today's headlines

After reading the news, there will be related similar news recommendations and user hot review modules, which have relatively simple functions. What is special here is the evaluation of news, likes/dislikes. When likes, Toutiao will build a refresh data model through your preferences. Next time, similar news is recommended on the homepage and recommend it to users. When you click on it, the data model will avoid this type of news and try not to recommend similar news. The seemingly simple functions are actually the basis for modeling.

The user hot review module here, put it last and you can see all comments by pulling it down. There is no need to jump to the page, which reduces the process of reading comments. Users can directly like the like gesture next to it, and then directly click on the comments to reply, so that users can express their opinions and emotions directly.

③ Sohu News

After reading the news, there will be a lot of readings and evaluations of the article. Good articles or boring articles indicate the popularity of the article. The higher the popularity, it will be recommended to most users to read, which will improve the readability and dissemination of popular articles. Then there is a relevant channel display, telling us what type of article this article belongs to. If you like this type of article, users can directly click to add channels to facilitate users to add channels and follow such news.

Another is an advertising area that pushes advertisements that are consistent with the article, improves the quality of advertisements, and achieves the role of advertisements, increases sales and deepens people's awareness of advertisements. Then there is a recommendation for a related article. The picture and the title are displayed together to attract users to read the relevant content again. However, some pictures and texts are displayed on the left and right modules, and some upper and lower modules are displayed on the top and bottom modules, which gives people a look messy and inactive. From the pictures, we can see that there are related ad pushes (this ad push is really unaware of it).

Finally, there is a user comment module. Compared with the other three APPs, its user comment function is the best. Like Toutiao, it is placed in the last module to facilitate users to view comments. There are also direct likes and comments next to the comments, which place the frequently used functions of users on the page to facilitate user operations; click on the comments, and 4 function operations will appear, reply, share, copy, and send private messages to increase the fun of reading comments, share interesting and meaningful comments with friends, paste and copy or directly send them to friends.

Overall, Sohu News has a complete range of functions and is well-designed.

④ NetEase News

After reading the news, there will be a 'Like' module. Everyone is encouraged to like this article and use bright red colors to put them in the middle, which will also make users pay attention to reading and commenting on the article.

Then there is the sharing module, which is brought to the page to encourage users to share good articles and promote NetEase News' client. The two social platforms shown here are WeChat and Weibo, because the user activity of using these two social APPs is the highest, which improves sharing and increases the interaction between friends.

The comment module has been cancelled here, and the comment module is directly placed on the function of posting, merging the function, simplifying the process and making it easier for users to use.

Then there are the recommendations of related articles, the graphics and text are displayed in the same format, both neat and beautiful, and finally, check out more content of this type of news.

Summary: These four news clients have personalized recommendations, comments, and sharing functions, but it can be seen that Sohu News is doing a relatively comprehensive and complete basis in recommendations, comments, and advertising. Toutiao is relatively simple and has a relatively large room for development. For example, Sohu News Learning, the other two are similar. Tencent News’ news position is a good innovation. NetEase News improves the sharing module, which has their own advantages and characteristics.

6. User experience analysis

(1) Experience analysis

I have been using Toutiao for the longest time, and the other three models have only been used for about 2 months. The Toutiao’s personalized recommendation function is really powerful. After reading this news, similar news will appear after refreshing, so the more you use it, the easier it is to use it.

Tencent News was the first to come into contact with it. I downloaded and used it a long time ago. I thought the news content was dull and unattractive, so I removed it. I recently downloaded it and used it. I have a different understanding of Tencent News. I carefully considered each small function and found it very interesting and placed just right. But I always feel that the interface UI design is not the type I like, it looks too monotonous.

Sohu News and NetEase News have only been used for 2 months. Sohu News’ news quality is indeed very high. When using the client at the same time, Sohu News’ news content covers the widest and richest content. Many things that cannot be seen on other APPs can be seen on Sohu Client. NetEase News' UI design is similar to Toutiao, giving me a very friendly feeling and getting started quickly. It has more functions than Toutiao I used before, including posts and building buildings, topic news, etc. It turns out that watching news is so interesting.

Suggestion : From the above analysis and the process of using it myself, I recommend to you how to choose a client that suits you:

1. People who have a reading preference and are leisurely recommend using Toutiao, because Toutiao’s data mining model is very powerful. You can judge your personal reading preferences in less than a week, and accurately give the news you want, and you can also spend your leisure time;
2. Those who want to browse exquisitely can use Sohu News, because Sohu News' overall news quality is still relatively high and you can also see many good comments;
3. I have no personal reading preferences and just want to browse all kinds of news, so I can use NetEase News. I prefer the layout of NetEase News, and I can also increase the entertainment mood and cultivate reading preferences by browsing topics by netizens, interacting with netizens;
4. As for Tencent News, I personally think it is not as easy to use as the other three models, and the news quality is average and has no characteristics.

(2) Feedback Analysis

On the Apple APP Store, the following points are summarized by observing user comments:

① Tencent News

• Advantages : The news is true and reliable.
• Disadvantages : Often pushing spam information, the content is vulgar and vulgar; there are many naval forces, and the speech is not free; there are many errors in the content and articles; it is easy to crash and the software cannot be opened.

② Today's headlines

• Advantages: Rich and colorful content, unique perspective and depth of news content; it is convenient and fast to use, and get news as soon as possible, fast and timely; comprehensive content and wide coverage.
• Disadvantages: The article is not positive enough and has no reading value; the content has been repeatedly published; the video is not smooth; there are too many advertisements; the title does not match the content.

③ Sohu News

• Advantages: Different news consultations are updated every day, with clear picture quality; the news section design is great; news reports are timely and powerful, and the news content is comprehensive.
• Disadvantages: There are always advertisements inserted in the middle of the article; the news quality is poor.

④ NetEase News

• Advantages: It has an exclusive column; the interface is comfortable; the search suggestions function is easy to use.
• Disadvantages: low news quality; NetEase Big V pushes too much content; there are many title parties - attract readers' attention with news titles; there are many advertisements and many false advertisements; it is inconvenient to use, and it will be stuck or crashed.

From the above feedback, we can see that there are four main aspects of user dissatisfaction with the news and information APP, and have given suggestions and measures :

1. The quality of news content needs to be improved, and the control of articles should be strengthened;
2. If too many advertisements are placed , it will affect the user experience. Ads should be placed appropriately. Similar to Sohu News Client , similar advertisements should be placed according to the categories of news, which not only improves the efficiency of advertising delivery but also affects the user's reading experience;
3. There are no objective comments in the comment area and no freedom of speech. Control should be strengthened and comments should not be deleted at will;
4. The fluency of video playback or news loading needs to be improved.

V. Conclusion

In the future, the market will be moving towards mobile, and more users will use news clients to pursue more aggregated information.

• With its strong user scale, timeliness of news, and simple and clear layout logic, Tencent News believes that Tencent has a broad road, but it should pay more attention to the convenience and efficiency of interaction in some functional details, such as the simplicity and speed of sharing, the clear operation of channel customization, and the improvement of reading process.
• Toutiao has its powerful data mining model and accurate recommendation of user news as its core competitiveness. It also has a simple and clear news reading process, frequent intersection and interaction between users in the WeChat Toutiao social circle, but it is relatively single in terms of functional structure, and some operational processes are complicated, such as the single function of commenting on news, complicated operations of channel addition and deletion, etc. It hopes to further improve and get better and better on the platform of functional client.
• With its vast consulting platform, a wide variety of news types, and a clear reading process, Sohu News believes that the quality of news can be guaranteed, but it also pays attention to the optimization and personalized recommendation functions of the Hu Friends circle, which is also the trend of future news development and the basis for accumulating users.
• NetEase News is known for its high-quality comments, rich news channel categories and comfortable reading user experience. It attracts many netizens who like to share personal opinions and forms a circle of users with strong dependence, but it also needs to improve on some small functional points such as interface introduction and sharing functions.

Big data is becoming more and more popular now, and all APPs should pay attention to the personalized recommendation function. This function has strong core competitiveness, which is a good development prospect.