Station B Operation: Detailed analysis of Station B’s membership system!

On October 10, 2016, Bilibili launched the B-station VIP membership service for the first time, which became another commercialization method after game agency, advertising, peripheral sales, and offline theme activities. From the initial half-gift and half-push of premium membership, which netizens jokingly called "recharging for love and faith", to the current over 7.95 million premium members, we can see that the system of Bilibili has been gradually improving. This article compares and analyzes Bilibili with the common membership system and explores possible future development paths.

1. Common ways to play the membership system

From a domestic perspective, generally speaking, the membership system of video platforms consists of two major systems: ordinary membership and paid membership. The ordinary membership system is generally divided into levels according to the points obtained by completing tasks, and different permissions are unlocked, while the paid membership system is generally divided into levels according to payment continuity and user activity, and different levels of treatment are enjoyed.

1. General membership system

Ordinary membership is generally achieved through a daily small task + real-time feedback incentive system . Task setting has the characteristics of simple operation, low daily investment, and long-term repeatability. Tasks are generally set around the core business of the product, mainly including tasks such as logging in, watching videos, sharing videos, and interacting, in order to encourage users to develop product usage habits and increase the average usage time. The real-time feedback incentive system mainly uses a point progress bar to hint at the user's goal achievability, and regularly displays incentive prizes to generate long-term incentives for users.

Table 1 Comparison of ordinary member points system

2. Paid Membership

In medium and long video websites, paid membership levels are generally accumulated according to member recharge behavior and activity. The higher the level, the more privileges one can enjoy. Generally speaking, content privileges and identity privileges are the basic rights of entry-level members, which mainly meet the basic needs of users for video websites; while high-level privileges such as live broadcast privileges and life privileges are mainly to create a sense of service premium, exceeding the user's psychological account expectations and thus playing a role in motivating users to continue paying for the experience.

The following figure shows the rights and interests system of paid members of current mainstream websites and the rights and interests corresponding to level upgrades:

Figure 1 Paid membership benefits (orange indicates high-level membership privileges)

It can be seen that currently Bilibili only has annual membership and monthly and quarterly membership, while comprehensive video platforms such as iQiyi and Tencent Video have growth mechanisms for paid members, and will provide extended services such as life gift packages and game gift packages. The measurement of growth points mainly includes two dimensions: whether the payment behavior continues and the level of platform activity.

The following table shows the main points calculation formulas of the two platforms:

Table 2 Member points methods of major platforms

2. Detailed Analysis of B Station Membership System

1. Differences from other platforms

(1) Differences in the general membership system

Similar to other video sites, Bilibili links user behaviors such as watching videos and interacting with videos with level points. However, in terms of level incentives, unlike other video platforms' incentive method of exchanging points for gift certificates, Bilibili's incentives are mainly reflected in the opening of barrage and interaction permissions - barrage color settings, advanced barrage, private message comments to UP hosts, and other operations.

Gradually opening up user permissions is, on the one hand, to help users develop product usage habits through daily check-ins, and on the other hand, to increase users' sense of value realization and product investment costs by delaying the satisfaction of some needs.

Figure 2 Privileges of each level

In addition, a test and assessment entry threshold is set up in the points membership system. Users can only send barrages, comments, etc. after becoming formal members. According to Bilibili's Q3 2019 financial report, 62 million people have become official members by answering exams, 640 million interactions of various forms occur every month, and the twelfth-month retention rate remains over 80%.

The assessment test consists of 50% questions related to barrage and community etiquette + 50% optional questions . The page displays the answer progress bar and real-time scores. If users make mistakes on questions related to community norms, they will be asked to make the choice again, in order to explain the barrage rules of Bilibili to them in an infiltrative way.

In the self-selected part, users can select topics of their interest to generate personalized questions. This part is mostly based on tricky questions and common knowledge of classic works in the circle. The correctness of the choice will not be directly displayed. It is more about creating an interesting way of answering questions, which has triggered users' complaints and secondary dissemination.

Table 3 B station membership test module

(2) Differences in paid membership systems

In terms of paid membership, mainstream comprehensive video websites such as Tencent and iQiyi initially developed a series of value-added services centered around VIPs' privilege of enjoying ad-free services, while Bilibili, which does not have any interstitial ads, developed its services around VIPs' privilege of being the first to watch exclusive anime, documentaries, and other film and television dramas. The two had different starting points from the very beginning.

In terms of other value-added services, Tencent and iQiyi members are connected to more offline scenarios and have more life privileges such as points mall, movie ticket discounts, birthday gift packages, etc., while Bilibili mainly connects privileged services in modules such as games and live broadcasts.

As far as the growth system for paid members is concerned, Bilibili currently has no design in this regard. It is mainly divided into two categories: annual members and ordinary members. Compared with ordinary members, annual members can also enjoy preferential services and exclusive identity identification in other modules of Bilibili such as games, live broadcasts, comics, etc.

2. Reasons for differences in membership systems

(1) The target group is younger and more personalized

From the perspective of age, the main user group of Bilibili is people under 30 years old, accounting for about 78.4%, of which users under 20 years old account for 31.2%, and users aged 25 to 30 account for 37.2%. The number of users continues to increase with the increase of age. From the age group of users, we can judge that most of the users are students and newcomers to the workplace who have just entered the society.

In terms of age, there are slightly more male users than female users; users are mainly distributed in the economically developed eastern coastal areas and central and western regions, and the current user population also has a tendency to sink. (Data source: public data at the beginning of 2019)

Figure 3 Proportion of B station users in different age groups (cr.Talkingdata 2019 data)

Figure 4 Regional distribution of B station users (cr.Talkingdata 2019 data)

From the user data, we can see that the overall user group of Bilibili, which started out as a two-dimensional platform, tends to be younger, with Generation Z (Internet natives born after 1995) becoming the main force . Their collective characteristics that are different from the original ones are an important reason for the differentiation of Bilibili's membership design.

1) Generation Z is more interested in emotional pursuits and self-realization, and their social circles are clearly divided

As a generation profoundly affected by family planning, most members of Generation Z are only children. On the one hand, they are cared for and loved by the whole family, and their material life is mostly sufficient. They pay more attention to spiritual pursuits such as the expression of sense of value and social needs. On the other hand, the reduction in the company of their peers has prompted them to seek more attention on the Internet, and on this basis, a huge social circle linked by interests has been formed, such as fan circles for chasing stars, anime circles, Lolita, etc.

As the main gathering place for 2D enthusiasts, Bilibili is not only a platform for watching anime videos but also an interest community. The membership system that introduces circle identities such as personalized dynamic costumes and cards for games and domestic creations into social networking is designed in combination with circle social networking.

2) They are highly receptive to new things, and personalization, novelty and fun are their main preferences

Generation Z, who grew up in a rapidly developing society, is much more receptive to emerging things than other age groups. At the same time, seeing the wider world makes them more picky about products, and they pay more attention to personalized experience and novelty and fun. For example, the TGI (penetration rate) of NetEase Cloud Music, which focuses on personalized recommendations, reached 184.6%, and the TGI of B612, which focuses on cute shots and beauty, reached 185.5.

Therefore, whether or not Generation Z users can feel personalized and interesting becomes a key factor in retaining this group. The identity privileges of Bilibili members and the member emoticons in comment interactions can better meet their social and personalized needs.

(2) Product positioning as a video cultural exchange community

Known as the "Z Generation Paradise" and "a cultural community where Chinese young people gather", Bilibili's product positioning is a pan-two-dimensional cultural and entertainment community with young people as the main users. One part is a platform for watching anime and discussing mainly for 2D fans, and the other part is a comprehensive video barrage video community mainly based on UCG+PUCG.

From the original BILIBILI barrage network to the now gradually expanding out of the circle to the general public B station, barrage is one of the main discussion forms of the platform and is also the key to maintaining the orderly and healthy development of the video community. How to regulate user barrage behavior is what B station needs to focus on.

Becoming an official member by taking a test may also be designed for this reason. It subverts the traditional user agreement and user instructions for user education. Bilibili adopts a challenging and interesting question-answering format to allow the relatively boring clauses such as barrage etiquette and community civilization norms to be better subtly infiltrated into the user's cognitive system, completing the first wave of user education, thereby maintaining the community's civilization norms to a certain extent.

On the other hand, completing questions on Bilibili that are of a certain degree of difficulty satisfies users' sense of accomplishment and desire to share to a certain extent.

(3) Resource advantages that are different from comprehensive video platforms

In terms of copyright resources, the well-funded Tencent Video and iQiyi Video have rich copyrights of film and television works and celebrity variety shows. Members can enjoy privileges such as on-demand cinema movies and early access to variety shows. Bilibili, known as the "fan buying demon", owns relatively rich copyrights of anime series. The platform currently has 517 exclusive series (including domestic ones). Moreover, through a series of actions in recent years such as investing in Japanese comic companies and supporting domestic animation studios, Bilibili has more exclusive resources, such as popular TV series such as "A Certain Scientific Railgun T", "Please Eat Red Beans", and "The Immortal King's Daily Life". Therefore, the membership system can set up privileges such as members' early viewing and members' high-definition picture quality.

Figure 5 Introduction of TV series in August 2019

On the other hand, compared with the comprehensive video platform, the advantage of rich celebrity resources allows high-level members to enjoy the benefits of related celebrity meet-and-greets, variety shows, concert tickets and other privileges; and Bilibili has rich game copyright resources and a developing live broadcast module, so it can provide linkage privileges of the three major modules of video, game, and live broadcast through membership services, such as game discount packages, exchange of live broadcast gold melon seeds, etc., to bring users a super value experience.

3. Future Development Trends

The membership system, after all, is to provide members with a value-added service experience that is different from that of other ordinary users and other platforms, thereby attracting users to be willing to pay for it. Judging from the membership system currently provided by domestic video platforms, the audio-visual experience, platform interactivity and other linkage services brought by the membership service can prompt some users to abandon piracy and pay for copyrights. However, the domestic membership system still has a long way to go in terms of how to increase ARPU and make membership business a real pillar of income for video platforms.

1. Fully explore the advantages of up masters and create exclusive audio-visual resources

In essence, the film and television experience is the most fundamental part of video VIP, and all other membership services are its derivatives. Therefore, the richness of copyright determines the user's stay or departure to a certain extent.

Unlike other platforms that have many celebrity resources, Bilibili has the advantage of UP resources that have grown from UGC creations. They are well-known by Bilibili users for their specific expertise and have a more vertical and loyal fan base. The Bilibili Macro Link (a themed offline gathering, mainly for special performances by domestic and foreign and virtual Bilibili UP hosts) has attracted tens of thousands of people for a single performance, which shows the appeal of Bilibili UP hosts and the activeness of their fans.

Figure 6 2018 BWL site

The "Let's Go!" launched by Bilibili and UP host. The single-episode playback volume of "Transformers" and "The Travels of a Poor Man" has reached millions, and the hundreds of thousands of barrage comments have further verified the feasibility of UP's joint official production. Therefore, fully exploring the advantages of UP masters and creating exclusive audio-visual resources is a way for B station to make up for its copyright weaknesses in TV dramas, variety shows, etc. and increase the member experience.

Figure 7 "Let's go!" Stills from Transformers

2. Strengthen the advantages of sector linkage and improve the membership level system

The most outstanding feature of Bilibili compared to other video websites is that it owns more popular game copyrights and a more mature live broadcast section. Therefore, it can provide more linked value-added services in this regard, such as member special effects interaction in the live broadcast room, props gift packs and other privileges, and points gift packs in the game section.

On the other hand, as the main battlefield for young people to create secondary videos, Bilibili has 1.1 million monthly active UP hosts and an average monthly number of submissions exceeding 3.1 million. The huge number of submissions has also slowed down the review process at Bilibili. During periods of high traffic, the review cycle is often too long and there is review congestion. The timely release of videos to grab user attention is a pressing need for many UP hosts. Therefore, Bilibili can consider addressing user needs by launching corresponding member review priority channels, member review accelerators and other privileges, thereby increasing UP hosts' willingness to pay.

In addition, designing a paid membership tier system is also a direction that Bilibili can consider in the future. From the membership purchase data of Bilibili, it can be seen that Bilibili peripherals are very attractive to users. Therefore, referring to the iQiyi membership system to design corresponding membership points and exchanging them for peripheral coupons is also a good incentive for users.

Figure 8: The surrounding area of ​​Station B

But from another perspective, if iQiyi's membership points system is too complicated and too many complicated membership items are more likely to lead to information overload , users will not be able to clearly understand the benefits of upgrading for themselves, and their perception of incentives will be reduced. Therefore, how to deliver membership level incentives to users more effectively is an issue that needs to be focused on in the design of the membership points system.

3. Explore more forms of paid membership

The joint membership system has become a common way of playing in the industry, which can achieve the effect of mutual traffic diversion. Bilibili has also begun to try to produce joint membership cards with platforms such as QQ Music. In addition to this, Bilibili can explore more payment methods, such as exclusive anime paid on-demand, Bilibili music packages, etc., and develop a diversified membership system.

Author: Dun Dun Chong Chong

Source: Dun Dun Chong Chong