Lizhi Micro Class Competitive Product Analysis Report!

The pan-knowledge payment industry is like a car driving on a highway, and its development speed is astonishingly fast. There are so many paid knowledge software on the market, what are their characteristics? The author of this article takes Lizhi Micro Class and Qianliao APP as examples to analyze them. Let’s take a look.

1. Purpose of analysis

There are three main reasons for conducting this competitive product analysis : first, it hopes to help myself better understand this type of knowledge payment platform product; second, through analysis, I hope to find out the similarities and differences between the two apps, what advantages they have and what problems they have; finally, I hope to make suggestions for the problems and give thoughts and results on the next iteration direction.

2. Market Analysis

From its development in 2011 to the present, the pan-knowledge payment industry has been like a car driving on a highway. Its development speed is astonishing. From the first wave of trial knowledge payment that attracted major players in the industry, to its gradual maturity, it has formed industry giants/unicorns such as Zhihu, Himalaya, Fan Deng Reading, Qingting FM, Get, Lizhi Micro Class, Qianliao, etc., in just ten years.

So, how has the knowledge payment industry developed step by step in the past decade? What are the influencing factors behind it? What is the current status of the industry under the influence of the epidemic? What predictions may exist in the future? Let's analyze it from the following aspects:

Figure 1 Analysis of the development stages of China’s paid knowledge industry Source: iiMedia Research

2.1 Industry PEST Analysis

2.1.1 Policy factors

Since the promotion of "National Reading", the government has always attached great importance to the development of China's cultural industry. In recent years, the overall strength and competitiveness of my country's cultural industry have continued to increase, the cultural industry has become a pillar industry of the national economy, and the structural layout of the cultural industry has been continuously optimized.

Government support for the cultural industry. Since the outbreak of the epidemic in 2019, the government has directly stated that it will comprehensively promote a series of industries such as culture and tourism. To this end, local governments have also introduced policies to protect the development of the cultural industry, which is very beneficial to the online knowledge payment industry within this industry.

The government’s support for the science and technology industry provides more possibilities for the development of the Internet. At the same time, in recent years, the government's support for emerging technology industries has helped industries such as artificial intelligence, 5G, and big data to develop rapidly, which has indirectly provided more possibilities for the development of the online knowledge payment industry based on such technologies, and comprehensively promoted the upgrading of the Internet + industry.

In addition, the country's protection of intellectual property rights is becoming increasingly strict. The National Intellectual Property Administration continues to strengthen the construction of a rapid and coordinated intellectual property protection mechanism and strictly supervises copyright content. This has put forward higher requirements for the development of the knowledge payment industry, while also bringing more positive energy and ensuring that the industry develops in the right direction.

Figure 2 Policy promotion of cultural industry Source: Analysys Qianfan

2.1.2 Economic factors

In recent years, the country's GDP has continued to rise, exceeding 100 trillion in 2020, and the per capita disposable income of residents has steadily increased. For the knowledge payment industry, this means that residents are more likely to consume and the number of consumers will also increase. Of course, due to the epidemic in 2020, some industries such as catering, tourism, etc. were affected to a certain extent, which caused a decline in residents' consumption expenditure that year. Fortunately, the epidemic prevention and control achieved positive results and the decline was not high.

Figure 3 China’s GDP growth from 2015 to the first half of 2020

Source: Compiled by the National Bureau of Statistics Prospective Industry Research Institute

Figure 4 China’s PCDI and consumer spending from 2014 to 2020 Source: Compiled by the National Bureau of Statistics’ Prospective Industry Research Institute

For the knowledge payment industry, there is another economic data that must be looked at: the Engel coefficient. Data in recent years show that the Engel coefficient of urban/rural residents' households in my country has basically shown a downward trend, falling from 68% in 1978 to around 32% in 2020. Although the coefficient has rebounded to a certain extent due to the impact of the new crown epidemic in 2020, the magnitude is not high.

If we use Maslow's hierarchy of needs to define the level of knowledge consumption, then it should belong to the top of the pyramid; and the Engel coefficient is getting smaller and smaller, which means that people are pursuing more and more diversified consumption, and consuming to meet higher-level needs.

Figure 5 Maslow's hierarchy of needs pyramid

Figure 6 Trends in Engel coefficient of urban and rural households in China from 1978 to 2020 Source: Discovery Data website

2.1.3 Social factors

In 2017, General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out in the report of the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China: "As socialism with Chinese characteristics has entered a new era, the principal contradiction in our society has transformed into that between the people's ever-growing needs for a better life and the unbalanced and inadequate development." This means that at the moment of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects, the people are no longer satisfied with material satisfaction, but are increasingly considering spiritual pursuits. In this light, it is no surprise that the knowledge payment industry is developing at an astonishing speed, and this also indicates that higher requirements will be placed on the future development of the industry.

At the same time, due to the country's education system reforms in recent years, the education level of our people is constantly improving, and the knowledge and cultural level has significantly improved. The proportion of people with college education and above has increased from about 8% to about 15%. This figure will continue to increase in the future. For the entire knowledge payment industry, this means that its target users are constantly increasing.

Figure 7 Changes in residents’ education level in 2010 vs. 2020 Source: National Bureau of Statistics HSBC

In addition, changes in people’s lifestyles have also become a key driving force for the development of the knowledge payment industry. In order to meet the needs of social production development and keep up with the pace of change of the times, people need to constantly supplement new knowledge to fill their cognitive deficiencies in certain aspects and help themselves develop more smoothly in various aspects such as work, life, and study.

However, due to the fast-paced environment, people are becoming more and more accustomed to learning through fragmented time. The knowledge payment industry itself relies on smart hardware such as mobile phones, artificial intelligence, and in-car voice, which just adapts to the current situation and allows people to supplement their knowledge anytime and anywhere.

In an era of information explosion, people have increasingly higher requirements for the quality of knowledge content. They hope to find the content they need quickly and accurately, and they also hope that the relevant content can meet or even exceed their expectations, allowing them to gain and grow quickly and efficiently.

2.1.4 Technological factors

In recent years, the popularity of electronic hardware devices such as mobile phones, computers, and tablets has increased, and the size of Chinese Internet users has also grown. As can be seen from the figure, as of 2020, the scale of mobile Internet users has grown to nearly 1 billion, accounting for 99.7% of the total Internet users. At present, most of the traffic acquisition entrances for the knowledge payment industry also come from mobile phones. At the same time, mobile devices are constantly expanding in capacity and cloud storage is constantly developing during the research and development process, which also better satisfies people's needs to download more apps and store more content.

Figure 8 Scale and penetration rate of mobile Internet users from 2016 to 2020 Source: China Internet Network Information Center, Huabao Securities Research Institute

The 5G era is coming, empowering the knowledge payment industry. Without the Internet, a mobile phone is just a phone and text messaging machine. The development of 5G can increasingly meet people's pursuit of information transmission speed and quality. If 4G created short videos, then 5G brings more possibilities for the development of the Internet. The knowledge payment industry can also rely on this to find new business lines and demand growth points.

Figure 9: Cumulative construction of 5G base stations nationwide from 2019 to 2021 (unit: 10,000) Source: Compiled by the Prospective Industry Research Institute of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology

Smart hardware devices are constantly upgrading, providing more development carriers for the knowledge payment industry. People can learn knowledge and improve the quality of learning through different devices in different scenarios. For example, you can listen to books and music through the car's voice, watch videos at home through a projection device, etc. The future development and popularization of AR/VR will also bring new opportunities to the knowledge payment industry.

Figure 10 Knowledge product carriers and application scenarios Source: iiMedia Data Center

2.1.5 PEST Analysis Summary

From the above explanation, we can find that the rapid development of the knowledge payment industry is inseparable from the changes in the market macro environment.

• In terms of policy, the state's support for cultural industries and new technology industries has provided direct or indirect help to the development of the knowledge payment industry. At the same time, its supervision of intellectual property rights also means that the development environment of the knowledge payment industry will be standardized in the future.
• Economically, the growth of national GDP and per capita disposable income of residents and the decline of Engel's coefficient have given the knowledge payment industry a profit opportunity;
• On the social level, changes in the main social contradictions, the improvement of people's education level and changes in lifestyle have also provided opportunities for the development of the industry. At the same time, people's unremitting pursuit of content quality will also become the mainstream development direction of the knowledge payment industry;
• Finally, in terms of science and technology, the arrival of the 5G era, the cloud era, and the continuous upgrading of electronic equipment will provide the industry with more diversified demand scenarios and development carriers.

2.2 Market Status

2.2.1 Market size

According to iMedia Research research data, the scale of the domestic knowledge payment market has grown year by year since 2017, from 1.59 billion yuan in 2015 to 39.2 billion yuan in 2020. It is predicted that it will exceed the 60 billion mark in 2021, nearly doubling the year-on-year growth. With the continuous development of the Internet, the operating model of the knowledge payment industry has continued to mature. Combined with the continuous upgrading of current technology and hardware facilities, the knowledge payment industry will surely be able to come up with new ways of playing. Overall, the market size will continue to expand.

Figure 11 Market size and forecast of China’s paid knowledge industry from 2015 to 2021 Source: iiMedia Data Center

2.2.2 Industry Structure

At present, domestic knowledge payment platforms are mainly divided into two categories: comprehensive platforms and vertical platforms, and vertical platforms are further subdivided into audio platforms. Representatives of leading comprehensive platform companies: Baidu, Zhihu, Douban, etc.; Representatives of leading vertical platform companies: Get, Fan Deng Reading, Chaos University, etc.; Representatives of leading audio companies: Himalaya, Lizhi, Qingting FM, etc. At the same time, the product positioning, business focus and knowledge coverage of each platform in the same category are also different.

Figure 12 China’s paid knowledge industry in 2020 Source: iiMedia Data Center

2.2.3 User scale and characteristics

According to iMedia data, the scale of paid knowledge users in China continues to expand, and is predicted to exceed 450 million in 2020. Indeed, in the information age, as my country's netizens are getting younger and younger, smart devices are becoming more popular, and people are increasingly accepting the model of obtaining knowledge through online payment, and as the content types become richer and the layout carriers increase, the user groups that can be covered will also expand step by step, indicating that there is definitely room for growth in the scale of knowledge payment users.

Figure 13 Market size and forecast of China’s paid knowledge industry from 2017 to 2021 Source: iiMedia Data Center

Through iMedia data, we can find that the main user groups of knowledge payment are basically concentrated in the age of 25 and above, and their monthly income is concentrated in 10,000 yuan or less. It is worth noting that the higher the income, the greater the demand and consumption of paid knowledge. Instead, we need to think clearly about why these users pay more attention to knowledge payment platforms and generate paying behavior. This may be because in the Internet environment, users need to learn more about the world, enrich themselves, and improve their careers through knowledge payment platforms.

Figure 14 Age and monthly income distribution of paid knowledge users in China in 2020 Source: iiMedia Data Center

3. Competitive Product Analysis

3.1 Comparison of basic product information

Data source: Qimai Data, Huawei App Store

3.1.1 Product Positioning

Through the information obtained from the basic introduction of the products, we can find that Lizhi Micro Class and Qianliao APP were both established in 2016 and are comprehensive knowledge payment platforms. The product slogan of Lizhi Micro Course focuses on "growth" and emphasizes time, which is consistent with people's current lifestyle and the urgent need to achieve growth; Qianliao focuses on "gaining knowledge" and emphasizes audio, highlighting product functions and content diversity; the product positioning of both focuses on personal spiritual gains and meets users' needs to acquire knowledge from various courses.

In terms of application descriptions, the knowledge content and basic functions of the two are very similar, but with regard to the product function positioning of knowledge sharers and courses, Lizhi Micro Class emphasizes "a public knowledge sharing platform where everyone can start classes and share anytime and anywhere", while Qianliao has developed a separate APP for lecturers, making the lecturer's operation path and lecturer-side functions more professional and refined. It can be seen that there are certain differences in the product positioning of the two for lecturer-type users. Lizhi Micro Class tends to be popular, while Qianliao focuses on professionalism.

3.1.2 Product Development from the Perspective of Search Index

According to the keyword search trends released by Baidu, it can be found that from the launch of the first version of the APP in 2016 to July and August 2017, it was a period of rapid growth in the user awareness population; from the second half of 2017 to February 2020, it remained basically stable. However, due to the outbreak of the epidemic, after the Spring Festival in 2020, the explosive increase in user searches for the platform was enough to illustrate the impact of the epidemic on the popularity of knowledge payment and live broadcast online platforms. As the epidemic stabilizes, the search trend slows down, and the product continues to be in a mature and stable development stage.

It is worth noting that from the time Qianliao was founded to mid-2017, the search volume grew rapidly within a year, especially in January 2017, when it began to experience a linear explosive growth trend, which has been maintained ever since. However, it took about two years for Lizhi Microclass to maintain a stable search volume from its creation. Looking at the version records, we can find that Qianliao focused on the instructor experience in the early research and development, developed different live broadcast modes, and attracted many knowledge celebrities in January. The early research and development focus of Lizhi Micro Class was on the live broadcast room and general user experience, and then gradually iterated the instructor side and course mode. This may be the reason for the inconsistency in the development stages of the two.

In addition, from 2016 to July and August 2020, the search volume of Qianliao APP was generally higher than that of Lizhi Microclass, which shows that Qianliao was slightly better in terms of platform usage, popularity, exposure, etc. After the epidemic gradually stabilized in 2020, the search trend of Lizhi Micro Class was higher than Qianliao. Through version records, it was found that during this period, Lizhi Micro Class made a lot of optimizations and functional iterations on live broadcast, lectures, recordings, videos, etc., and fixed bugs to ensure smooth use. These functions are exactly the key functions used by users during the epidemic, which greatly improved the user experience, and may therefore increase the platform's exposure and usage; Qianliao spent more time on the audiobook function module during this stage. Of course, the reason for the difference may also be the adjustment of operational strategies. However, judging from the current situation, the search volumes of the two are slowly becoming equal, and the number of users is getting closer.

Figure 15 2016-2021 Lizhi Micro Class and Qianliao search trend curve chart Source: Baidu Index

3.2 User Positioning Analysis

3.2.1 User Characteristics Analysis

According to the Baidu Index's regional distribution map of the two platforms, we can see that the main user distribution areas of Lizhi Micro Class and Qianliao are basically the same. Most users come from first-tier cities, especially coastal areas. Guangdong, as the birthplace of the two platforms, has the highest user search index. This also shows that in the field of knowledge payment, economically more developed regions have a greater demand for knowledge acquisition.

Figure 16 Regional distribution of Lizhi Micro Class and Qianliao search users Source: Baidu Index

As for the characteristics of search users, the main users of Lizhi Micro Course and Qianliao are consistent with the overall trend of the industry. Their ages are mainly concentrated between 20 and 40 years old, and most of these users have already entered the workplace. In addition, the proportion of male search users is higher than that of female users. The male-female ratio of Lizhi Micro Course is 41.91% and 58.09 respectively; the male-female ratio of Qianliao is 42.64% and 57.36% respectively.

Figure 17 Age distribution of Lizhi Micro Class and Qianliao search users Source: Baidu Index

Figure 18 Gender distribution of Lizhi Micro Class and Qianliao search users Source: Baidu Index

3.2.2 User Positioning Summary

Based on the above analysis, it can be concluded that the main users of Lizhi Micro Class and Qianliao are young and middle-aged users between the ages of 20 and 40, mainly concentrated in first-tier cities. Most of these people are professionals who pay more attention to knowledge acquisition, self-improvement, etc., and have a certain economic payment ability.

In addition, both are divided into two categories in terms of user identity: one is the knowledge acquirer and the other is the knowledge sharer. The identity definition threshold of Lizhi Micro Course is lower, and knowledge acquirers can share their knowledge anytime and anywhere, which is more inclusive; Qianliao has higher requirements for the professionalism of knowledge sharers, so there will be more obvious differences between knowledge acquirers and sharers.

3.2.3 Business Model Analysis

Through understanding, we can find that the current commercial profit models of Lizhi Micro Class and Qianliao are similar but there are also differences.

First of all, both companies make profits through the virtual product fee service model. That is, the company signs tutors, builds its own teaching and research team, produces high-quality courses and puts them on the platform. Users need to pay a certain amount of money to watch the courses, thereby realizing product profits.

In addition, the two platforms can also share commissions. For example, when an institution or a lecturer is broadcasting live, the users give corresponding rewards, and the lecturer directly sells combination courses on the platform and earns income. The platform can obtain a certain commission in this way; when the lecturer uploads paid courses to the account, and the user purchases the courses, the platform obtains a commission.

However, Qianliao APP also has a value-added service profit model - VIP recharge. VIP users can obtain more services or privileges. For example, some courses are paid, but through paid membership, they can also become VIP free products, which can be obtained if you are a VIP. Users who have not activated their membership will generally receive a short membership trial period for free. After the trial period, users will feel the difference between the non-member experience and the member experience, which may lead to membership purchase/repurchase and other behaviors.

3.3 Product architecture and function analysis

3.3.1 Product Information Structure

Litchi Micro Class:

As shown in the figure, the product structure of Lizhi Micro Course is mainly composed of [Discover], [Start Learning], [One-click Live Broadcast] and [Personal Center]. This is consistent with the product positioning concept of "Growing at Every Moment". Through "Discovery", users can efficiently find high-quality courses, and through "Start Learning", they can focus on the user's learning process, making it easy for users to quickly view and enter the courses they are about to learn/are currently learning. At the same time, the "one-click live broadcast" function is used as one of the bottom navigations, and knowledge sharing is regarded as a universal need. Finally, in the "Personal Center", users can check the status of the courses they purchased, the course opening status, and other operations.

Qianliao APP:

The product structure of Qianliao APP is mainly composed of [Home], [Membership], [Player], [Learning], and [My]. In line with the product slogan "Audio classroom for knowledge", Qianliao also focuses on helping users find all kinds of knowledge on its homepage and classifies various courses in a refined manner; membership service is one of Qianliao's business models and one of the key contents of the product, providing members with high-quality content and good user experience;

In addition, the player button serves as the main navigation of Qianliao, which echoes the "audio". After clicking to enter, different operations can be performed according to the course format selected by the user, which is very considerate; the learning section is mainly for users' recently studied and purchased courses, which is easy to find; my section mainly provides users with live broadcast room operations, order viewing, and follow the dynamics of the live broadcast room and other functions.

3.3.2 Product Function Comparison

According to the product function structure diagram of Lizhi Micro Class and Qianliao, it can be found that the two platforms have similarities and differences. A comparative analysis is made from the perspective of each function point of the information structure:

Lizhi Micro Class [Discover] VS Qianliao [Home Page]: The basic functions are similar, both are designed to meet the user's primary need - finding the course content they want to learn, and corresponding horizontal navigation categories are set for the diversified content. Compared with the large categories of Lizhi Microclass, Qianliao is obviously more refined, and the navigation order also shows users the possible different directions of the product. Lizhi Microclass puts beauty courses first, and Qianliao puts health first and beauty second in this version iteration. This shows that the emphasis of Lizhi Microclass and Qianliao on female users has begun to differ. Lizhi's main users may still be female, while Qianliao is slowly beginning to approach and try to balance between men and women.

Secondly, based on the social classification of users, knowledge is also classified into parenting classes, workplace, examinations, social sciences and humanities. Courses required by users at different stages and with different identities are navigated and sorted according to their current user characteristics. Lizhi Micro Class pays more attention to the user's identity in the family, separating out marriage and emotions, parent-child education, etc. From this, it can be seen that at the user level, Qianliao is paying more and more attention to expanding the user base of all ages, while Lizhi Micro Class prefers users from families/slightly older ages, and based on most courses, it can be said that it is more targeted at female users among this type of users. In addition, the two have the same idea about making money, managing finances and personal advancement as a guide, which may be very relevant to the current social situation and what people are concerned about.

Third, currently, when users of Lizhi Micro Courses are actually screening courses, they can only select through navigation and secondary classification. There is no other screening method, and the only course type is video courses. During the iteration of the last version, Qianliao optimized the filtering items. Users can now filter based on course popularity, fees, format, etc. Qianliao is also developing its audiobook business recently. Users can also filter for audiobook-type courses. In terms of user experience, Qianliao is superior.

In addition, in terms of the detailed content of the courses, Qianliao has corresponding rating and comment functions for the courses, which can be used as a good reference when users consider whether the courses are suitable; Lizhi Micro Class also has corresponding user experience written after watching the courses, and can like, interact and share, but there are no corresponding ratings and key situation ratings, so users will inevitably have to spend more time in the consideration process.

Lizhi Micro Class [Start Learning] VS Qianliao [Learning]: The functions are similar. Both are designed to meet the needs of users to view the status of the courses they are learning/have learned. Lizhi Micro Class pays more attention to the learning outcomes of users. Users gain satisfaction by viewing the results data and can share it to satisfy their desire to show off. In terms of course status navigation, Lizhi Micro Class places "Purchased Courses" in the first-level navigation of the page, while Qianliao helps with filtering by adding paid filtering items in "My Courses" and classifies courses according to their form. When a user has many courses, it can help users find courses more quickly.

Lizhi Micro Class [Personal Center] VS Qianliao [My]: Meet users' basic operations, such as viewing orders, collection records, coupons, etc., and can enter the live broadcast room to make relevant settings. Compared with Qianliao, Lizhi Micro Class provides the "My Notebook" function, which allows users to view the notes added by users during the learning process, giving users a good and distinctive immersive learning experience; while Qianliao provides "Latest Updates", allowing users to see the latest content released by the users/live broadcast rooms they follow, creating a content community-style service and experience.

Lizhi Micro Class [One-click Live Broadcast], the one-click live broadcast function of Lizhi Micro Class is mainly to help users quickly open the video live broadcast function. The corresponding live broadcast method settings and instructor settings are also in the personal center. Whether it is the creation of the live broadcast room or the related settings content, service provision, etc., it is relatively simple. Qianliao directly places related operations such as applying to create a live broadcast room in my navigation bar. When users use the live broadcast room, they need to choose the live broadcast format and make corresponding live broadcast settings. The functional design of its live broadcast section is very deep, even reaching 5 levels. In addition, professional-level services and other ports are provided for lecturers and enterprises to ensure the live broadcast needs of users.

3.3.3 Operation Flowchart

Litchi Micro Class:

Thousands of chats:

By using Lizhi Micro Class and Qianliao APP to experience the products, and mainly operating the products from two perspectives, it was found that the business processes of the two in terms of purchasing courses, creating live broadcasts, etc. are basically similar. However, there are still significant differences in some details:

The free courses of Lizhi Micro Course are displayed separately in the free area, so when searching for courses, you can directly find free courses in the free area. The courses under other navigation bars are all paid courses. For users, the channels for finding free courses on Lizhi Micro Class are relatively single, and it is not easy to contrast with paid courses, making it difficult to convert users into paying users; Qianliao's free or paid courses can be found in the free area, and free courses can also be directly filtered under each navigation bar. On the basis of satisfying user experience, Qianliao's paid and free course quality can be seen in sharp contrast under the same navigation, making it easier to convert users.

Lizhi Micro Class does not have a membership model. When faced with paid courses, you can only purchase the courses directly. However, Qianliao binds members with courses, so members can enjoy some paid courses for free. In response to such situations, Qianliao users can choose to become members or directly purchase courses. Users who choose to become members tend to have a higher chance of using the platform, which can help the platform improve its retention rate while allowing users to gain benefits.

3.4 Interface Design and Interactive Experience

From the perspective of home page design, the upper half of the Lizhi Micro Class and Qianliao pages have a relatively high degree of similarity: top search box - horizontal navigation - banner - function icon. The lower part begins to show some differences. Lizhi Micro Class puts the red envelope activity in a prominent position in the middle, focusing on users clicking in and quickly placing orders through the activity, with a stronger sense of marketing; while Qianliao takes free courses as the main focus, attracting users to participate in free courses, gaining user favor, activating users, and allowing users to prepare to watch classes according to course time, improving user retention and then slowly converting through other means. Its main focus is still on obtaining courses and retention. Lizhi Micro Class also recommends this week's courses, but the design lacks a sense of ritual and urgency compared to Qianliao. The play button on the course is basically in the same position as the appointment button on Qianliao, which is convenient for users to operate with one hand.

When it comes to the quick play buttons for users watching courses, there are significant differences between Lizhi Micro Class and Qianliao. Qianliao's play button is fixed on the bottom bar. Users can click to view and operate the course no matter what state it is in. Lizhi Micro Class's quick play button will only pop up after the user has watched the course. The banner setting takes up a relatively large space. After clicking the cross, users need to go to the start learning navigation to set it up in order to find the courses they have watched. In addition, this design is average in terms of user experience. Since it takes up a large space, it creates a certain obstacle for users to view other content. The cross symbol also has a guiding meaning in the user's psychology, and users are likely to close it.

In terms of interface design color, Lizhi Micro Class uses red, which is a color more preferred by women, while Qianliao uses white, which is not restricted by gender preference.

IV. SWOT Analysis Summary

Through the above market industry analysis and corresponding product comparison, we can roughly summarize the current advantages and disadvantages of Litchi Micro Class, the opportunities and threats it faces, and put forward certain development suggestions.

5. Suggestions on product iteration direction

5.1 Accurate user positioning and improved recommendation algorithms

At present, Lizhi Micro Class mainly tends to target female users between 20 and 40 in terms of product content and product experience. It is necessary to make a more precise division of this type of users. From the perspective of course content, the platform does not make a clear distinction between women with family identities and women with workplace identities, but in fact, there are significant differences in the needs of the two identities. suggestion:

When new users download the APP and log in to their account, they select their gender and interests before entering the official page.

The navigation of the discovery page has been reorganized to divide the content according to the different roles that individuals play in society, and a vocational education section has been added

The recommendation section adds a "Guess You Like" column, which makes recommendations by observing the course content that users frequently watch, thereby improving user satisfaction.

5.2 Free courses are added to each navigation, and filtering function is added

Free courses can be viewed under each navigation column for comparison. And they are screened by course format, payment method, refined classification, popularity, etc.

In addition, courses in the free area are classified and differentiated, and filtering functions are provided.

5.3 Add membership recharge, live broadcast community, improve course comments, ratings and other functions

Confirm the membership recharge rules, such as course discounts, free access to special areas for members, etc. This feature requires consideration of communication with the knowledge sharing community.

Create a live broadcast community. Currently, live broadcasting is still very popular in China. Many knowledge payment platforms have also introduced live broadcast communities. Users can watch the live courses they want at any time and make profits by selling courses/physical courses through live broadcasts.

After attending a class, users can rate and comment on the course accordingly, and the comments will be displayed in the course introduction section, allowing users to make choices more intuitively and quickly.

5.4 Player shortcut key optimization

Change the floating horizontal bar here to a floating play button on the right to reduce viewing obstacles and accommodate users' one-handed operation. The user can directly open and play the course the next time they watch/listen to it.

VI. Conclusion

Nowadays, the knowledge payment industry is already in a very competitive moment. As a pioneer in knowledge payment courses, Lizhi Micro Class needs to speed up its pace to find the core focus for iterative optimization in the fast-paced Internet era, so as to create a good user experience based on meeting user needs.

Through comparative analysis of the industry and its direct competitor Qianliao, this article has made some analysis of the current situation of Lizhi Micro Course and provided some iterative suggestions. It is hoped that in the future, Lizhi Micro Course will continue to be based on users, control the quality of course content, improve product experience, and go further and further!

Author: Wangzai4562

Source: Wangzai4562