Douyu product function analysis

Douyu, which was launched in 2014, has been developing smoothly. When the author first started using the Douyu app in 2015, it had already become a well-known platform in the game live streaming industry. In the subsequent competition with game live streaming platforms such as Huya, Quanmin, Panda, and Zhanqi, Douyu has always maintained its leading position and development momentum because Douyu’s live streaming user experience is excellent.

1. Background Information

According to iResearch Consulting's 2020 "China Game Live Streaming Industry Research Report", China's game live streaming platform market is expanding rapidly, and the market size of independent game live streaming platforms exceeds 20 billion yuan. Among them, Huya Live's total revenue in 2019 increased by 79.6% year-on-year, and Douyu's total revenue increased by 99.3% year-on-year. It is expected that the overall market size will expand to nearly 40 billion yuan in 2021. According to data from iResearch Qianfan, Douyu has 40 million monthly active users.

The listing of Douyu and Huya also reflects the basic formation of the domestic game live streaming industry. However, since games and game live streaming themselves are important content/entertainment industry tracks, major video and live streaming platforms are also actively expanding their game live streaming business, including popular apps such as bilibili, Kuaishou, and Xigua Video.

On the other hand, live streaming platforms such as Douyin and WeChat have gradually spawned live game content. Douyu is currently focusing on developing three major areas: video, community, and live streaming, aiming to become a platform that combines both PGC and UGC, allowing more people to participate in live streaming and games.

2. User Analysis

At present, Douyu mainly focuses on game live streaming (League of Legends, Peace Elite, Dota2, etc.), and also covers entertainment categories such as dance, outdoor, and food. The vast majority of users are male, who like games and occasionally watch good-looking anchors.

According to the "2020 Game Live Streaming Insight Report for Post-95s" released by Douyu on February 19, 2021, male users account for 93%. In terms of user age distribution, those born after 1995 account for 61%, aged between 21 and 25.

Image from Douyu's "2020 Game Live Streaming Insight Report for Post-95s"

In terms of user roles, anchors are content producers who produce content through live broadcasts. The content includes games, music, dance and beauty performances, daily life, the second dimension, chat, etc. It is worth noting that due to Douyu’s unique game live streaming ecosystem, in addition to individual game anchors, there are also some professional players from e-sports clubs who are broadcasting live, as well as event live streaming content provided by major event organizers.

Through the cooperation among sponsors, brokerage companies, and live broadcast platforms, the platform can provide sufficient resources for the development of top anchors, meet the daily income needs of ordinary professional anchors, and maintain the normal operation of the platform. At the same time, some celebrities and stars also increase their traffic and enhance interaction with fans by live streaming on the Douyu platform. Viewers search for live broadcast content of interest on the platform and watch it.

Table: User roles and their requirements

The audience is mainly composed of students and young office workers, most of whom have the time, energy and spending power to invest in their favorite games.

On the one hand, they appreciate the host's skills/performance, and on the other hand, they also love to interact with the host and the "water friends" in the live broadcast room, and even communicate with real friends about the "memes" in the live broadcast room, thereby satisfying their "social needs." Some "tycoons" give expensive gifts in the live broadcast room in order to satisfy their "need for respect", and part of the platform's income comes from users who buy gifts.

The spread of platform content and brands also comes from the secondary dissemination of live broadcast content by users on major video platforms and social platforms. These contents also contribute to the "culture" of each community.

Personally, I think Douyu already has a large enough user base now. The purpose of building a platform community is to introduce the topics generated in the live broadcast room into the community within the platform, allowing the content to circulate within the platform, increasing users' usage time and dependence on the platform. Douyu has also launched gaming functions, which shows that the platform is also actively exploring its positioning in the gaming industry.

According to Baidu Index data, the number of searches for the term "Douyu" was approximately 220,000 per day between March and April 2021.

The demographic profile shows that Guangdong, Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces have the most users, while it also includes provinces with large populations and gaming potential in the mainland, such as Sichuan, Hubei, Henan, Shandong, etc. The “Crowd Attributes” function shows that 77.4% of searchers are in the 20-29 age group.

iResearch Consulting's 2020 "China Game Live Streaming Industry Research Report" also shows that Guangdong and Jiangsu have the highest proportion of users, and nearly half of the platform's users have an average monthly personal income of 3,000-8,000 yuan. The author constructed a user portrait based on this.

Table: User portraits and usage scenarios

3. Product Function Analysis

Product functional architecture diagram

The main ways to enter the live broadcast room on the Douyu platform are:

1. Open the Douyu app->select the live broadcast room you are interested in on the recommendation page;
2. Open the Douyu app -> enter the live broadcast category of interest -> select the live broadcast room of interest;
3. Open the Douyu app -> go to the Follow tab -> select the live broadcast room you are interested in;
4. Open the Douyu app->search for the live broadcast room->enter the live broadcast room;
5. In a live broadcast room, long press the screen or select from the drop-down menu to enter other live broadcast rooms.

In the entire operation process, the recommendations on the first screen are aimed at users without specific purposes. The search function and follow function meet the needs of users with specific goals to find a certain game section or live broadcast room, and the function of long pressing in the live broadcast room to display other live broadcast rooms meets the above two needs at the same time. Since the home screen and search module carry important navigation functions of the Douyu app, and the live broadcast room is the core function of the Douyu app, this article will discuss these aspects.

In addition, since the new version of Douyu is also exploring the development methods of the two modules of community and video, this article will also conduct some analysis on this.

4. First screen analysis

The presentation of the live broadcast room on the homepage (recommended) is misplaced. It is speculated that this is because the audience browsing the homepage does not have a specific goal.

This design may be to make it easier for viewers to distinguish between live broadcast rooms in different categories, increase viewers' attention to the videos on the left and right sides, and thus increase the opening rate. However, it may go against the visual habits that users have developed when using apps on the market, affecting the experience. The design grid of the homepage is clear, and the top and bottom are well laid out.

The navigation button in the lower right corner of the live broadcast and community tabs greatly reduces the cost for users to start broadcasting/publish information. At the same time, the consistency of the design with the overall product style does not damage the product appearance.

The button on the live broadcast tab will automatically disappear as the user slides, so that the user will not have negative feelings due to accidentally clicking the button. The button on the community tab will not disappear as the user slides. The purpose is to guide users to post updates and increase the activity and content of the Douyu community.

And because the arrangement of community posts allows users to see at a glance during the browsing process, the navigation button does not block the display of effective information like the buttons on the live broadcast tab, so the design of the live broadcast and community tabs is very reasonable and convenient.

Douyu live recommendation

Douyu Community Recommendation Page

Douyu is navigated by tags as a whole. There are three tags at the top of the recommended homepage: "Video", "Live Broadcast" and "Community", and five tags at the bottom. This may be to highlight Douyu's current positioning as a video, live broadcast platform, and game community platform.

There is no clear weight between video, live broadcast and dynamics. This distinction makes the audience feel like they are switching back and forth between three products with different positioning. My personal opinion is to create a secondary entrance on the recommendation page (with a "video" module and a "dynamic" module). This will better highlight the core positioning of Douyu Game Live and make the product more concise.

Douyin also uses the three labels at the top (Same City, Following, Recommended) and the five labels at the bottom (Home, Friends, Release, Message, Me) for navigation. However, the label design of Douyin is centered around the core positioning of short videos.

Douyu is navigated by tags as a whole. There are three tags at the top of the recommended homepage: "Video", "Live Broadcast" and "Community", and five tags at the bottom. This may be to highlight Douyu's current positioning as a video, live broadcast platform, and game community platform. There is no clear weight between video, live broadcast and dynamics. This distinction makes the audience feel like they are switching back and forth between three products with different positioning.

My personal opinion is to create a secondary entrance on the recommendation page (with a "video" module and a "dynamic" module). This will better highlight the core positioning of Douyu Game Live and make the product more concise. Douyin also uses the three labels at the top (Same City, Following, Recommended) and the five labels at the bottom (Home, Friends, Release, Message, Me) for navigation. However, the label design of Douyin is centered around the core positioning of short videos.

Tik Tok recommended home page

5. Search module analysis

The search box combines search, history, hot search list and selected category functions. The core search process is shown in the figure below.

In addition, if you click "Search" on the keyboard without entering any content in the search box, you will be navigated to the live broadcast room recommended by Douyu (see "Search Box Page"). Judging from the content displayed in the search box, the search module planned by Douyu is endowed with the function of diversion, which navigates users to recommended live broadcast rooms or sections through word blocks, hot searches/rankings, and selected categories.

Personally, I think the number of hot searches directly displayed on the hot search list can be reduced to 5, and the selected classification function below can be displayed together with the hot search list and historical records, and the "Expand" button can be made more obvious and more attractive to click. This will give users a clearer interface. New users don't have to guess what they will see when they scroll down the page, and they can make decisions (search, click on the recommended word block, view the list, view the category, cancel the search) in less time and energy.

Core search process

Search box page

When the user enters content, Douyu's search function will dynamically display the search results, including game partitions and live broadcast rooms. The first three search items will display pictures, live broadcast room/partition names, popularity and other information. There will be a dynamic "signal" icon in the live broadcast room, which makes the entire search interface lively.

In the search function, if the search text is not accurate, the search box will not disappear, but the displayed search results will continue to change according to the user's search content.

Users can directly click to enter the live broadcast room based on the search results. If the search content is relatively accurate and the user clicks to search instead of clicking to enter the live broadcast room, they will enter the comprehensive page and the search box will automatically disappear (see the "Comprehensive page after clicking search" figure).

Search page after entering content

Click on the comprehensive page after searching

If you click to enter a partition, you will automatically navigate to the comprehensive page. The functions of this page include: adding the partition to the homepage, entering the partition, live broadcast, video, following the anchor and fish bar dynamics. There is a search feedback function in the lower right corner, allowing users to fill in which content they think makes them uncomfortable and why.

Personally, I think that there is too much content and too much information when searching, which is dazzling. I need to spend relatively more energy to distinguish which are live broadcast rooms, which are videos, and which are community dynamics. Douyu can try to differentiate different types of content by using dividing lines or titles, which can effectively reduce users' decision-making costs.

At the same time, you can consider using the pre-filtering method (see the "Pre-filtering search" figure), and select "comprehensive" search by default. In this way, users who do not want to watch comprehensive content can choose to search only for "live" content (and in the future, when opening the search function of the app, "live" will be selected by default). This will give users more choices.

Click on the search page after partition

Pre-filter search

6. Live broadcast room function experience

In vertical screen mode, there are 6 tabs at the bottom of the live broadcast room screen, namely video, chat, anchor, community, ranking, and nobility.

At the bottom there are functions such as barrage, interaction, and fish pond. I guess Douyu wants to increase users' usage time, frequency and payment level by enhancing the interaction between viewers (bullet screen, rankings, community and even videos), audience and anchors (bullet screen, fish pond, community, rankings), and audience and platform (interaction, fish pond).

Douyu has made detailed designs for the layout of these functions. However, compared with Huya’s relatively simple live broadcast room screen, too many functions will still affect the user’s experience of watching live broadcasts to a certain extent.

Douyu live vertical screen status

Huya live broadcast vertical screen status

As shown in the text annotations in the above picture, Douyu’s video tab divides the video content into “Comprehensive”, “Anchor Contributions”, and “Live Replay”. However, “Comprehensive” already includes the content contributed by the anchors, so there is duplication of content in the two categories. On the other hand, the “Anchor” tab also has videos contributed by the anchors.

Personally, I think the video module can remove the "anchor contribution" category or merge it with "live broadcast replay" into the "anchor contribution" label. Currently, most videos are uploaded by anchors themselves, and there are few community users participating in them. You can consider canceling the content classification, as shown in the following figure:

You can view content by category through the category button in the upper right corner. Based on the focus of community development, you can choose to highlight the content uploaded by viewers to motivate users, or choose to highlight the content uploaded by anchors to make it easier for users to find their videos.

Video module diagram (modified style)

The community page highlights the social function of the Douyu platform, encouraging users to become community members through a dynamic "Join" button. Clicking the "Most Popular Fish Bar" button below the chat can navigate to the Fish Bar rankings:

On the one hand, rankings are used to motivate users and anchors to maintain the activity of the community. On the other hand, they are also used to navigate the audience in the live broadcast room, directing them to various popular fish bars and discovering higher-quality content, thereby improving the user experience when browsing the community. Users can also click to switch to the corresponding game section to view posts and publish updates.

Screenshot of the live broadcast room (Community tab)

In the picture of the vertical screen status of Douyu's live broadcast room (pull down to display the menu), in order to allow viewers to browse the situation of other live broadcast rooms while watching the live broadcast, Douyu has launched the function of pulling down (red circle in the picture) and long pressing the live broadcast area of ​​the screen to display information of other live broadcast rooms.

Huya also has a corresponding click arrow (red circle in the picture) to display the page with information of other live broadcast rooms. Relatively speaking, Huya’s "arrow" button is clearer and easier to understand. On the display page, Douyu’s three tab options of Recommendations, My Interests, and My Footprints are more reasonable, and the text size and color are more beautiful. The shark image in the background highlights the platform’s features.

Douyu Live Room vertical screen status (pull down to display menu)

Huya live studio vertical screen status (click the arrow to display the menu)

Douyu places a separate gift button next to the barrage box. The gift sending process is shown in the figure below. The entire process from recharge to sending gifts has only 4 steps: click the gift button - select and send - recharge amount - send gift.

After sending a gift, an animation effect will be displayed in the public chat box. Douyu also provides interactive functions for sending gifts, such as sending "likes". By repeatedly pressing the send button, the number of gifts will continue to increase, which not only satisfies the "vanity" psychology of the gift giver, but also makes the process more interesting.

Gift sending process

In landscape mode, Huya displays the live broadcast room title and anchor name, while Douyu only displays the live broadcast room name. Huya does not have a video function. There is a pentagonal button next to Huya's ultra-clear button, which combines screen display, screen projection, and reporting functions. However, users cannot tell what this function is from the appearance.

Overall, the proportions of the elements in Huya’s live broadcast room are not very reasonable, and some aspects have affected the audience’s viewing experience of the live broadcast. Douyu’s larger barrage box can guide viewers to send barrage interactions while watching live broadcasts. Douyu’s color matching is stronger, giving people a stronger sensory impact. During its iteration process, it has always insisted on using similar color matching, cultivating users’ brand awareness of Douyu.

Douyu live broadcast horizontal screen status

Huya live broadcast horizontal screen status

Note: Douyu also has another full-screen live broadcast format in the dating category. Since it is not the focus of this article, it will not be analyzed here.

VII. Conclusion

In general, Douyu has maintained its product tone during iterations. During the updates over the past few years, the appearance of Douyu's live broadcast room has not changed much in horizontal screen mode, but many new interactive functions have been added in vertical mode. Overall, the changes to these functions are relatively restrained.

Based on the previous discussion, in order to more conveniently guide users into the live broadcast room, Douyu has adopted a design of staggered placement of the live broadcast rooms on the recommendation page. The search module displays recommended word blocks, historical records, hot searches/rankings, and dynamic associations during the search process. The design of long pressing or pulling down in the live broadcast room to navigate to other live broadcast rooms allows users to smoothly enter the live broadcast room of interest, improving the user experience.

In addition, Douyu continues to focus on community and video functions, enriching the content of the community by encouraging users and anchors to post videos/community updates, and continuing to divert traffic by presenting the content of these two modules in search and live broadcast rooms, optimizing various details and trying not to disturb users by too many functions. However, judging from the community's activity and popularity, Douyu may still have a long way to go.

In the process of promoting retention and improving user activity and stickiness, Douyu can also pay attention to making the app's interactive logic simpler and clearer, reducing or merging some duplicate entrances, and giving users a better experience.

Douyu was born when the mobile Internet wave emerged. It won the position of the leading game live streaming platform in China in various rounds of competition. With the passage of time, the popularity of games such as League of Legends and PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds is declining, and new hit games have not yet appeared.

At the same time, concepts such as cloud gaming, live streaming with goods, and paid live streaming are also gradually developing and extending. Where will the Douyu platform stand in the new round of competition? I am looking forward to seeing the answer given by the new version of the Douyu app.

Author: Xiaocai Xiaocai

Source: Xiaocai Xiaocai