Bilibili (B Station) product analysis!

1. Product Overview

1. Experience the environment

Experience model: OPPO R15

Operating system: Android 9

Product version: 6.0.0

Experience time: 2020.4

2. Product Introduction

Bilibili , whose full name is "BILIBILI" and nickname is "Xiaopozhan", was founded on June 26, 2009. In the early days of its establishment, the website was positioned as an ACG barrage video website, and its main target users were 2D enthusiasts; the core function of the platform in the early days was to share videos from third-party platforms while conducting “barrage” comments and exchanges on the videos.

In the 11 years of development, Bilibili has mainly made improvements and optimizations in two aspects: expanding its business areas and deepening its content areas.

On the one hand, it will broaden the boundaries of the community business field and gradually transform it from a video content platform centered on sharing the second dimension into a comprehensive ecological platform that includes video, live broadcast, e-commerce, comics, game agency, self-research, film and television production and other businesses.

On the other hand, we continue to deepen our presence in the content field. As Bilibili continues to grow, its young, open, and inclusive community atmosphere and super high user stickiness have attracted the entry and birth of a large number of high-quality PGC/UGC video UP hosts. The resulting high-quality PGC/UGC videos enrich the original two-dimensional, ghost animal and other fields, while also constantly expanding new segmented content areas. The emergence of three-dimensional mainstream fields such as life, film and television dramas, learning, technology, finance, Vlog, etc. has made Bilibili more full, mature and attractive.

From the development history of Bilibili, it can be seen that Bilibili’s product positioning has gradually changed from a barrage video website serving a niche group of two-dimensional enthusiasts to a content ecological platform that provides comprehensive video services for young people.

3. Product status

As the space for user growth at Bilibili is facing a ceiling, the most core keyword for Bilibili at this stage is "going out of the circle." From the New Year's Eve party at the end of 2019, to signing Feng Timo with a large sum of money, winning the three-year broadcasting rights for the League of Legends finals, to Sony's investment, "Hou Lang" advertisement appearing on CCTV, and being the agent for the "Princess Connect" mobile game, etc., Bilibili has begun its all-out sprint.

With the release of the Q1 2020 financial report, Bilibili has achieved its most dazzling results since its "going viral", with MAU increasing by 70% year-on-year to 172 million; DAU increasing by 69% year-on-year to 51 million; revenue increasing by 69% year-on-year to 2.32 billion; average monthly paying users increasing by 13.4 million year-on-year to 134%; average daily usage time of users increasing by 10 minutes month-on-month... Its intraday market value even exceeded that of iQiyi at one point. Today, Bilibili is no longer just the leader in the field of two-dimensional videos, but has also become a top-level presence in the field of pan-entertainment videos. More importantly, as a community with the largest concentration of young people, it has a bright future.

2. Product Market Analysis

1. Market analysis

The author believes that as a comprehensive video platform, Bilibili’s business scope includes but is not limited to the two-dimensional field. Therefore, the common practice in the market of only showing the market size related to the two-dimensional field is difficult to comprehensively display the market fundamentals currently faced by Bilibili. The author suggests segmenting the corresponding market by analyzing the business areas currently involved by Bilibili, and then showing the size of each market segment.

Broadly speaking, in order to grab users' attention, any entertainment product including short videos, long videos, and games is its competitor. But from a narrow perspective, Bilibili’s current main businesses include four areas: copyrighted content + user-generated videos + games + live broadcasts .

2. Market size

1) Copyright content

In the field of copyright content, Bilibili mainly involves animation, film and television dramas, variety shows, documentaries, etc.

According to data from the China Business Industry Research Institute, the output value of China's animation industry is expected to reach 250 billion in 2020. As the absolute leader in the two-dimensional field, anime series are definitely one of the core sections of Bilibili, and the scale of the animation industry is of great significance to Bilibili.

Bilibili's current business areas in the animation industry include not only the introduction of anime series, the creation of domestic animation, the introduction and original creation of comics, etc., but also the opening up and optimization of the upstream, midstream and downstream industrial chains of the animation industry. We believe that with the further consolidation and standardization of the animation industry chain, Bilibili will still have great potential in its core two-dimensional field.

2) User-generated videos

The user-generated video field of Bilibili actually includes two groups, one is content consumers and the other is content producers. In comparison, content consumers account for the vast majority of Bilibili users, and the large number of content consumers also provide the most fertile soil for the cultivation of content producers. Therefore, Bilibili has been making every effort to attract more content consumers and continue to "break the circle".

According to the "QuestMobile Small Town Youth Consumption Insight Report", the size of the small town youth population reached 207 million at the end of 2019, and the average monthly mobile Internet usage time of small town youth is also longer than that of urban youth (Note: small town youth is defined as people born in the 1990s in third-tier and below cities; urban youth is defined as people born in the 1990s in second-tier and above cities). With the further development of urbanization in China, the number of young people in small towns will certainly have great room for growth and great growth rate.

Whether it is Bilibili or other Internet companies, the most popular concept at present is to strive for the sinking market. The so-called sinking market refers to users in third-tier cities and below. For Bilibili, the original target users of the product are Generation Z (those born in the 1990s and 2000s), and as a cultural community where young people gather, Bilibili has a natural gene to attract young people. Therefore, the vast population of young people in small towns has become the potential target users that Bilibili wants to win over and has the potential to win over. At the same time, the size of this potential group currently seems to be very large.

3) Games

According to QuestMobile's "2019 China Mobile Game Industry Half-Year Insight Report", since the game license approval was resumed in December last year, the industry has been boosted and is continuing to recover. The growth rate of mobile game revenue has expanded in the first half of the year, and the scale of active users has also shown a sustained positive trend.

Although the 2020 mobile game industry semi-annual report has not been released so far, it can be seen from the Q1 quarterly financial reports of companies involved in mobile game business such as Tencent, NetEase, and Bilibili that the epidemic has further promoted the explosive growth of the mobile game industry, which was already growing very fast. It is foreseeable that the mobile game industry will have a large room for growth in the next few years.

According to QuestMobile's "2019 China Mobile Game Industry Half-Year Insight Report", it can be seen that the consumption capacity of the two-dimensional group for two-dimensional mobile games is further enhanced, and the games that Bilibili currently exclusively represents and will develop in the future are also likely to be rooted in the two-dimensional background. This means that if Bilibili can attract more people born in the 90s and 00s to enter Bilibili and download Bilibili games in the future, then the scale of the game business will have a lot of room for growth.

4) Live broadcast

According to QuestMobile's "2019 Live Broadcast + X Insight Report", as of June 2019, 430 million netizens have watched live broadcasts. The monthly active user scale of the game live streaming industry has reached 80 million, and the monthly active user scale of the entertainment live streaming industry has reached 100 million.

Although the 2020 mid-year report for the live streaming industry has not yet been released, according to the Q1 quarterly financial reports of live streaming industry giants, Douyu and Huya, it can be seen that the current development momentum of the live streaming industry remains strong (Douyu’s total revenue increased by 53% year-on-year; gross profit increased by 139.2% year-on-year; net profit increased by 741.7% year-on-year; and paying users increased by 26.2% year-on-year).

As various industries continue to explore the live broadcast + X model, it is a general trend to integrate fragmentation and instant interaction, share user traffic, and achieve complementary advantages.

At present, Bilibili's market share in the live broadcasting field is still relatively low. With the purchase of the three-year broadcasting rights of the League of Legends events, the signing of Feng Timo for a large sum of money and a series of other investments in the live broadcasting business, the status of the live broadcasting business in Bilibili will become more and more important.

Another point that needs to be added is that Bilibili naturally has relative comparative advantages in the fields of gaming and entertainment (singing and dancing, etc.), which is also conducive to the development of Bilibili's live broadcast business.

3. Product User Analysis

1. User Persona Map

2. User attributes

1) User age analysis

From the age distribution chart of Bilibili users from Baidu Index, we can see that users aged 19 and below account for nearly 25%; users aged 20-29 account for nearly 60%; users aged 30-39 account for nearly 13%; and users aged 40 and above account for 2%. In addition, it is very important to note that compared with the age distribution of users on the entire Internet, Bilibili users are obviously younger.

From the above data, we can see that the age of Bilibili users is mainly concentrated under 29 years old, and they are mainly students and newcomers to the workplace, which is very consistent with the target user group positioned by Bilibili.

As typical post-90s and post-00s, this group of young people have grown up with the rapid development of two-dimensional culture and the Internet. They have generally received a complete education and have a relatively superior family environment. All these factors directly lead to the fact that this group of people have higher overall quality, are able to accept new things, love to share and communicate, and place more emphasis on personalized expression and diversified development.

Therefore, this type of users can better adapt to the diverse and comprehensive community culture and values conveyed by Bilibili, and at the same time develop a sense of belonging and regard Bilibili as their "home."

On the other hand, users over the age of 40 lack the influence of two-dimensional culture and pan-entertainment culture during their growth process. Naturally, they do not match the community tone conveyed by Bilibili. Secondly, this group of people have either become the backbone of the workplace, or are suffering from family pressure, or are too old to accept the Internet. These reasons have resulted in this group of people having no time, energy, or interest to actively learn about Bilibili.

However, it must be mentioned that with the broadcast of the "Houlang" advertisement on CCTV, more and more "Houlang" have begun to take an interest in Bilibili. At the same time, Bilibili also recently issued a notice to recruit the silver-haired generation (those born in the 50s and 60s who love the Internet), which clearly conveys that Bilibili wants to try to attract the attention of more older users and achieve all-round "breaking the circle".

2) User gender analysis

It can be seen from the gender distribution chart of Bilibili users in Baidu Index that there are more male than female users of Bilibili. The author believes the possible reasons are:

Among those who like the ACG culture, there are relatively more men;
Some of Bilibili’s main business areas, such as games, live broadcasting, technology, finance, etc., are relatively more interesting to men, and their participation is relatively high;
Fields such as beauty, entertainment, and celebrities, which are relatively interesting to women and have a large number of fans, are still relatively weak in B Station, or are developing rapidly. For example, the entry of more and more celebrities will inevitably bring more female fans.

3) User region analysis

It can be seen from the geographical distribution map of Bilibili users in Baidu Index that Bilibili users are obviously more concentrated in the eastern coastal provinces and first-tier cities with relatively developed economies.

The author believes that the reasons for this phenomenon are:

Economically developed regions generally have higher education levels, and young people have higher overall quality, are more trendy, can accept new things more quickly, and have been influenced by the two-dimensional culture since childhood;
Because of their higher purchasing power, a large number of offline ACG activities are held in these areas, and young people in these areas have more opportunities to be exposed to ACG culture;
According to the author's investigation, mutual recommendations among acquaintances are an important way for Bilibili to increase its user base. Because there are more ACG groups in economically developed areas, these areas have a larger recommendation base, so there are more opportunities to come into contact with and learn about Bilibili in these areas.

3. User portrait

(1) Target users

Bilibili’s target users should be divided into two categories: content consumers and content producers.

For content consumers:

ACG users: Enthusiastic fans of animation dramas, domestic creations, and comics. They hope to watch the dramas they are interested in as comprehensively and timely as possible, but at the same time do not want to watch advertisements. They emphasize user experience and hope to have more ACG users to exchange and communicate in a timely manner.
Users with diverse interests: They have a wide range of interests and often browse videos in related fields of interest in their spare time. They can understand the barrage culture and are eager to communicate and share.
Users who want to improve themselves: have a strong desire for self-improvement, which includes course learning, science popularization, vision improvement, etc., love communication, and value user experience.
2D game enthusiasts: users who like 2D games and hope to communicate and share with many similar users.
Live broadcast users: users who love watching live broadcasts.

For content producers:

Medium- and long-duration UGC/PGC producers: UGC/PGC producers who produce videos with a duration of more than 3 minutes, and who also attach importance to user experience and video exposure.
New UGC producers: New UP hosts who have no fan base, focus on video exposure, the accumulation of early fans, and related feedback such as likes and comments.
PGC producers: focus on the initial accumulation of young fans, video exposure, monetization efficiency, and building word-of-mouth.

(2) User scenario analysis

Scene 1: A, male, 20 years old, college student. A heavy fan of the two-dimensional world, he usually likes to chase dramas and series, has a strong desire to watch popular new series, and wants to watch them as soon as possible. While watching anime, people are also willing to communicate with other 2D partners. Because a friend recommended B Station to him, after using it for a period of time, he found that B Station has the copyrights of many new anime and has gathered a group of friends who truly love the two-dimensional culture, so he gradually became a heavy user of B Station.

Scene 2: B, female, 24 years old, office worker. I have a wide range of interests and hobbies, and I am willing to browse videos casually in my spare time. Recently, because of fitness, she prefers to watch food broadcasts and fitness videos. After searching, she found that there are many food broadcasts and fitness UP hosts on Bilibili. In addition, there are many new UP hosts on Bilibili who insist on posting their fitness videos. B felt that there were many friends like her on Bilibili, so she also became a loyal user of Bilibili.

Scenario 3: C, male, 27 years old, newcomer to the workplace. In order to quickly improve his professional skills at work, C has recently been searching for Axure learning materials on the Internet. Through the recommendation of some related QQ groups, C found a lot of free high-quality learning resources on Bilibili. These learning resources are not only continuously updated, but the UP hosts also uploaded corresponding courseware, homework, answers and other related materials. When C encountered problems during the learning process, he would communicate directly with users who were studying at the same time and could receive replies quickly. Gradually, the content and fields of C's studies on Bilibili became wider and wider, and he could no longer do without Bilibili.

Scene 4: D, female, 21 years old, college student. I love life and love sharing. I like traveling and shooting VLOGs with my mobile phone. In order to look good on camera, I often buy cosmetics and watch some beauty review videos. Because all her good friends were using Bilibili, D also tried to use it. During the use, she found that Bilibili not only has many professional beauty review videos, but also many life and travel Vlog videos. D not only appreciated the beautiful scenery from all over the world, but also planted many ideas for places she will visit in the future. She wants to try to become a UP host and share her life on Bilibili.

Scene 5: E, male, 30 years old, office worker. D was originally a game enthusiast, but as work pressure increased, he no longer had time to play games and could only watch games and live broadcasts of game competitions. After learning that Bilibili had purchased the rights to broadcast League of Legends matches, E visited Bilibili for the first time to watch the live broadcast. E found that the live broadcast content of Bilibili is diverse. In addition to games, there are singing, dancing, and even virtual anchors. E feels that all his needs for watching live broadcasts can be met on Bilibili, and Bilibili has become his first choice for watching live broadcasts.

Scene 6: F, female, 24 years old, graduate student. After passing the re-examination, F had two months of free time. Because she had a lot of insights into the postgraduate entrance examination process, she wanted to become a UP host and convey her insights and experiences to her younger classmates who needed them by recording videos. So she posted a few videos on Bilibili, which quickly received likes, comments, and collections from her junior classmates. She gained a great sense of accomplishment and recognition from them. She hopes to continue to produce high-quality videos, recording her own journey while benefiting more people who come after her.

Scene 7: G, male, 35 years old, senior media professional. G, who has worked in the media for many years, has excellent writing skills and can always interpret current hot issues from a novel perspective. Although the articles on his official account are of high quality, his exposure rate is very low, and he has accumulated very few fans over the years. Therefore, he decided to try to be a UP host, and he hoped that his unique perspectives could be accepted by these young groups. Unexpectedly, his first video went viral on Bilibili and even attracted the attention of the entire network. Overnight, he accumulated hundreds of thousands of fans, and this group of fans actively interacted with him, urging him to update the videos. He was surprised and continued to update the videos. He has now become a UP host with millions of fans.

(3) User needs

Analysis of user needs also requires distinguishing between content consumers and content producers.

For content consumers:

Basic needs: Search for videos in areas of interest to users, including but not limited to TV series, animation, film and television dramas, learning, technology, life, etc.; continuously launch high-quality games; provide high-quality user experience and community atmosphere and environment;
Expected needs: Continuously optimize user experience; continue to purify the community environment; efficient and enthusiastic customer service; user-centric business strategies (such as insisting on not adding interstitial ads to animation series); further expand the content field;
Exciting needs: user-centered and considerate design (e.g. 2233 girl closes her eyes when the user enters the password, official emoji reminder, etc.); online/offline activities for users;

For content producers:

Basic requirements: convenient video production and uploading channels; fast review; high exposure and recommendation rate;
Expected needs: official video production tools; efficient and enthusiastic customer service; transparent, standardized, and efficient commercialization methods and efficiency; rich platform activities and topics; official joint activities;
Excitement-type needs: 100 UP Celebrations;

4. Product Function Experience and Optimization

1. Product function structure diagram

2>. User research on product features

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3. Analysis and summary of survey results

A total of 20 users participated in this survey, including 11 boys and 9 girls, of whom 2 were aged between 18 and 24, and 18 were aged between 24 and 30; there were 6 students, 9 company employees, 1 private professional, and 4 others.

Among the 20 participants, 11 participants frequently used Bilibili, 7 used it occasionally, and 2 did not use it at all. Two of the participants who do not use Bilibili are located in fourth- and fifth-tier small cities, while the participants who use Bilibili are basically located in first- and second-tier cities. This is basically consistent with the population distribution of Bilibili users, which is mainly concentrated in young people in first- and second-tier cities.

70% of the 20 participants learned about Bilibili through recommendations from friends, 15% learned about it through online/offline advertising, 10% learned about it through Bilibili’s online/offline activities, and 25% learned about it through traffic from other platforms.

This result shows that most users know and understand Bilibili through recommendations from friends. There are many users of Bilibili in first- and second-tier cities, so there is naturally a larger dissemination base and more opportunities to learn about Bilibili. On the contrary, "small town youth" outside of first- and second-tier cities have a smaller user base of Bilibili around them, so their chances of coming into contact with Bilibili are also reduced.

Therefore, compared with secondary communication channels such as recommendations from friends, primary communication channels such as diversion through advertisements, activities, and other platforms are more inspiring. Bilibili is now facing the more severe problem of how to further increase daily active users, increase the number of users, and achieve "breaking the circle" as its audience of young people in first- and second-tier cities has been relatively fully tapped. The traditional path of sharing among friends cannot effectively achieve cross-regional dissemination, so further paying attention to the primary dissemination path has become an inevitable way for Bilibili to solve the problem of going out of the circle.

The New Year's Eve party hosted by Bilibili, the 800 million yuan acquisition of the three-year broadcasting rights for League of Legends, the "Houlang" advertisement on May 4th Youth Day, etc., have all brought Bilibili attention and popularity from the perspective of online advertising and online activities.

In addition, Bilibili should also consider increasing its promotion through online channels, making rational use of offline activities (for example: holding animation festivals in universities outside the first- and second-tier cities, sponsoring e-sports competitions, co-hosting or sponsoring activities with universities, etc.), or cooperating with cross-field platforms to further promote Bilibili, cultivate Bilibili's source users in regions outside the first- and second-tier cities, and then add recommendation channels among users to accelerate Bilibili's expansion.

Among the 20 participants, the vast majority of them use Bilibili in their spare time and when they have needs, and only a small number of them have formed a fixed usage time; among the users who use Bilibili, the number of users who watch anime series, film and television dramas, funny and ghost animal videos, science and technology and financial evaluation, learning, and life videos all account for about 35%, which shows that the degree of attention paid by users to these contents is not much different.

Combining the above two survey results, it can be seen that most users still use Bilibili in their spare time, and in terms of the types of videos they watch, the types of videos are similar. Therefore, when recommending videos, Bilibili should take into account the fragmented time of users and try to push videos with relatively short duration. At the same time, considering that users cannot watch longer videos that they are more interested in during their fragmented time, the watch later function should be further optimized. This function optimization will be further elaborated in the next section.

In the process of collating and summarizing the survey results, the author found that 65% of users pay attention to how their colleagues or friends use Bilibili; 65% of users are willing to add their colleagues, friends or netizens as their Bilibili friends; 75% of users have recommended or shared Bilibili videos/up hosts to their friends; and 70% of users are more or less willing to communicate with their friends/up hosts at Bilibili.

The above questions show that Bilibili users have a need for social interaction among acquaintances, that is, the need to add friends and communicate with friends. However, the fact is that 65% of the participants have never added friends, and 20% of the participants do not know that Bilibili can add friends. The author believes that it is necessary to optimize the social function for acquaintances, and the specific optimization measures will be further elaborated in the next section.

Among the 20 participants, only 4 purchased B station premium membership, and the reason for the purchase was mainly to watch TV series. This situation is also in line with the current status of B station's premium membership recharges. Compared with the average monthly active users of 130 million in Q4 2019, the average monthly paying users in Q4 were only 8.8 million.

The core of the membership system lies in member rights. If you want to increase the number of members, you must provide sufficient attractiveness for member rights, such as: exclusive animation series, comics, film and television drama copyrights, better member viewing experience, no advertisements, high definition, etc. Compared with iQiyi, Youku and Tencent Video, which have a typical membership system, Bilibili lacks advantages in copyright, member viewing experience (iQiyi, Youku and Tencent Video members can enjoy Blu-ray, 4K, Dolby sound and other benefits), and ad-free (Bilibili promises not to add interstitial ads, so users don't need to watch ads and therefore don't need membership). Therefore, the recharge rate of Bilibili members is much lower than that of iQiyi, Youku and Tencent Video.

Currently, Bilibili is actively accumulating exclusive copyrights in the fields of anime, Chinese comics, documentaries, etc., and has launched a 4K resolution option for members. If Bilibili's membership rights can cross-border and connect to other fields or be bundled with membership rights of other platforms, it may be possible to further increase Bilibili's membership recharge rate.

In the process of collating and summarizing the survey results, the author found that users mainly search/watch videos through three main paths: homepage recommendations, partitions, and searches. This actually indirectly reflects that the purpose of Bilibili’s recent major changes to channel functions has not been achieved. It is necessary to further optimize the channel function. Further optimization is described in the next section.

Among the 20 users who participated in the survey, half of them were not very satisfied with the videos recommended on the homepage, which was reflected in the fact that they rarely clicked on the videos recommended on the homepage; the main reference for users to choose videos was their interest in the video content, followed by the number of views, the number of up-loaders and the number of likes.

From the above two questions, we can see that the videos recommended on the homepage should first consider the user's interests, and then consider the number of views, likes, etc. However, since 50% of users are still not very satisfied with the videos recommended on the homepage, the homepage recommendation function needs to be further optimized. See the next section for specific optimization details.

Among users who frequently use the homepage recommendation page, no one knows that they must browse the sections when entering the site. This shows that the overly long and hidden path hinders user usage. However, the "must-see" section upon entering the site brings together the most representative, most played, and most liked treasure videos among B station's UGC videos, and should be known to the majority of B station users, especially new users who are attracted as the circle continues to break out. The content in the must-have section for entry may be the most effective means to stimulate user interest and understand the cultural atmosphere of Bilibili, so this section needs to be optimized. See the next section for specific optimization details.

The author found that among the 20 participants, 80% had paid for knowledge; 60% studied on Bilibili, half of whom believed that the learning effect on Bilibili was very good and could be persisted in for a long time, while the other half believed that the learning effect was average and could only be persisted in for a short time, and 80% were willing to study on Bilibili for a long time.

Participants who study at Bilibili believe that the main reason for studying at Bilibili is that Bilibili has abundant learning resources, they are free and the learning atmosphere is good. Combining the answers to the above questions, we can roughly see that young people have a strong willingness and ability to pay for knowledge, and most of them are willing to study on Bilibili for a long time, so it is necessary to open a separate section for the learning area for users to use.

90% of the 20 participants watched the live broadcast, but the vast majority of users who watched the live broadcast had not watched it on Bilibili; among the users who watched the live broadcast, the vast majority mainly watched game and game event broadcasts.

The above results show that the main content of live broadcasts watched by users is related broadcasts of games and game events. After the war of thousands of live broadcasts in the past few years, the surviving live broadcast apps such as Douyu and Huya basically divided up the top game anchors, and thus established the viewing habits of most users who watch live broadcasts. It is difficult for these users to come to Bilibili to watch live broadcasts.

Bilibili's current focus in the live broadcast field is on game event broadcasts. This focus is more efficient and feasible than poaching anchors at high prices. However, it should be pointed out that only exclusive event broadcasting rights can change users' habits of watching live broadcasts, and this will undoubtedly cost a huge amount of money.

Live streaming is one of the important directions for the future development of video apps and an important part of the B-station ecosystem. While increasing the number of viewers of live streaming and improving the content coverage and quality, it is also very important to further optimize the content distribution structure of the live streaming section.

During the research, the author found that 85% of the participants had never used the report/blacklist function. The reasons for not reporting were that there was nothing to report, they just took a wait-and-see attitude, and they automatically ignored certain bad comments.

The above survey shows that most of the current barrage, comments and video content on Bilibili are relatively good. However, as Bilibili continues to break out of its circle, the community atmosphere that Bilibili is most proud of will inevitably deteriorate due to the increase in users. Therefore, it becomes particularly important to efficiently block and deal with some bad remarks, barrage and videos.

In the process of dealing with bad comments, barrages and videos, in addition to the efforts of B station staff, the most efficient purification behavior is for users to spontaneously report/blacklist bad content, so these two functions need to be continuously optimized to cultivate users' habits of purifying the B station community atmosphere and protect the small broken station from the users' own perspective.

4. Functional analysis and optimization plan

After summarizing and analyzing the user survey questions, B Station's product optimization suggestions are mainly based on the following detailed functional points:

We will look at the optimization of the function later
Home page feedback function
Optimization of the must-check sections when entering the site
Channel section optimization
Acquaintance social function

(1) Optimization of the “Watch Later” function

1) Demand background

The results of user surveys show that most users use Bilibili to watch videos in their spare time. Since the lengths of videos on Bilibili are often uneven, many high-quality videos are too long, so users are required to put them in the watch later function and watch them when they have time. In summary, the "Watch Later" function plays a very important role, but when I used this function in the current version 6.0, I found some problems in the use of this function.

2) Current status and optimization suggestions of the “Watch later” function

For each video on Bilibili, you can choose whether to add it to the watch later function, but the videos are located in different positions, so there are a total of five scenarios for adding them to the watch later function.

The video is in the homepage recommendation. The "Watch Later" function is located in the button at the bottom right of the video, as shown in the following figure:

The problems are:

The button on the lower right is very small and the color is not clearly distinguished, making it difficult for users to identify and may not be able to click the button accurately.
Long pressing the video will also bring up the selection interface shown in the right picture. That is, long pressing the video has the same function as the button at the bottom right of the video, and compared to pressing the button, long pressing the video is easier to operate and is more in line with user operating habits.

Optimization suggestion : Completely replace the function of the lower right button with long pressing the video, and change the lower right button to have the only option of adding it to watch later.

The effect is as follows:

Such changes:

The function of watching later is more prominent, and the operation steps and difficulty of users choosing to watch later are simplified.
Standardize and unify the operating habits of the "Watch Later" function in different locations.
Because long pressing the video can completely cover the original function of the lower right button, the optimized interface is convenient for users without losing the original functions.

The problem caused by such a change may be that users who are accustomed to clicking the lower right corner of the video for video feedback do not know where these optimized functions have gone. At this time, corresponding revised optimization prompts are needed to inform users that the original function has been replaced by long pressing the video.

The video is on the playback page, and the Watch Later function is located in the upper right button of the video, as shown in the following figure:

At this point, because the user has already clicked on the video to watch it, it means that the user does not need to add the video to the Watch Later option right away. The Watch Later option may not be a frequently used option for users in this interface, so in this interface, there is no need to change the Watch Later button.

When the video is located in the associated video playback area at the bottom of the video playback page and when searching for videos through the partition section, the function of adding the video to watch later is located at the bottom right of the video. As shown in the following figure:

The problem is that the button on the lower right has only one function: watch it later, and the button itself is small and the color is not obvious.

Optimization suggestion: As in case ①, directly replace the button with a Watch Later button.

The effect is shown in the figure below:

When the video is in the feed, the Watch Later option is now in the top right combo button.

As shown in the following figure:

At this time, because the video in the dynamic is posted by the up-master that the user has already followed, even if there is no watch later function, the user will not miss the video because of not adding the video to watch later. Therefore, at this time, the importance of the watch later option does not need to be increased. In this case, the watch later function can maintain the status quo.

(2) Optimization of the “Feedback” and recommendation functions on the homepage

1) Demand background

The results of user surveys show that half of the users are not satisfied with the videos recommended on the homepage, which shows that there are currently problems with the video recommendations on the homepage. To improve user satisfaction with the recommended videos on the homepage, on the one hand, we can optimize the recommendation algorithm, and on the other hand, we can actively collect user feedback and adjust the content of the recommended videos on the homepage based on the results of user feedback.

2) Current status and optimization suggestions of the “Feedback” function on the homepage

Currently, the "Feedback" function on the homepage can be triggered by long pressing the homepage video or clicking the button at the bottom right of the homepage video. As shown below:

Currently, users’ feedback on video content can be divided into two aspects. One aspect is “Feedback”. Under “Feedback”, users can choose whether the video content is horrific and bloody, pornographic and vulgar, clickbait, etc. This function is more like reporting.

Another aspect is "Not Interested". Under "Not Interested", users can choose which specific aspect of the video they are not interested in, which can be the up-host, partition, channel or not interested in the content.

These two aspects have different entry points, but both help users provide feedback on their preferences for watching videos. The more actively users use this function, the more accurately the platform can recommend personalized videos to users.

3) Current problems :

Whether it is "Feedback" or "Not Interested", there are too few reason options provided, and the few reasons may be due to the limitation of page length and content.
The usage logic of the "Feedback" option is similar to that of reporting. It should be used for users to provide feedback on the content after watching the video, and it should not be set on the video cover.

4) Optimization suggestions :

The "Feedback" function is similar to reporting, and its usage logic should be after the user watches the video, so the function should be placed on the video playback page. In order to emphasize the importance of the "Feedback" function and guide users to provide positive feedback, the "Feedback" button should be placed in a more conspicuous place.

The current video playback page is as follows:

As can be seen from the figure, the obvious and important positions are located in the red box. The buttons in the red box are Like, Dislike, Coin, Favorite, and Share. Among these five buttons, only the "Dislike" button, like feedback, expresses negative emotions, and the "Dislike" button does not show the number of times the video has been clicked "Dislike".

Therefore, the significance of its existence is, on the one hand, to give users feedback on their personal preferences, and on the other hand, to let the platform and up-master know the user feedback the video has received. For the platform, it can reduce the recommendation of the video to those who dislike it based on the number of dislike clicks, and for the up-host, it can better understand the user's taste. However, the negative feedback reflected by the "Don't Like" button is very general. The platform can only know that the user does not like it, but cannot know the reason. However, this "feedback" function can be perfectly displayed.

In summary, the "feedback" function can perfectly cover the "Don't Like" button function, and thus obtain more refined reasons for users' dislike videos. Therefore, the author recommends using the "feedback" button instead of the "Don't Like" button.

The effect diagram is as follows:

In addition, clicking the "Feedback" button will show the same pop-up window as before, but the content of the pop-up window has changed, so you can preset more feedback reasons.

The effect is as follows:

After placing the feedback function on the video playback page, the "Not Interested" function under the original recommendation page button can be further improved. Due to the preset reasons under the "Not Interested" function before it was changed, due to the page length, only four reasons can be displayed for users to choose. After optimization, the selection of the "Not Interested" reason can be greatly increased, so that the platform can understand the user's interests more refined, thereby providing more personalized data support for the homepage video recommendation algorithm.

The effect diagram is as follows:

(3) Optimization of the required sector inbound

1) Requirement background

When sorting out the research results, the author found that all users participating in the questionnaire did not know that the must-winning sections of the inbound site do not know that the must-winning sections of the inbound site actually have an important role and significance. On the one hand, the must-winning sections of the inbound site have condensed the most core video products of ACG culture in B station over the years, and are the fruits that can best reflect the ACG culture of B station. This section contains almost 55 most popular treasure-level videos of B station, and each video has almost tens of millions of views, likes and barrage.

On the other hand, as B station continues to break through the circle, more and more new users who do not like or do not understand ACG culture will join B station. Before the viewing habits and viewing interests of these new users have been formed, if they can see the most representative videos of B station among the must-win sections in the inbound market, it may more efficiently stimulate new users' interest in B station, and also enable these users to better and more practically feel the ACG cultural atmosphere.

In addition, videos with the number of views, barrage and likes reaching tens of millions can also quickly show the unique barrage culture of B station and the loving and harmonious and young community atmosphere to new users. In addition to having a great guiding and interest-stimulating role for new users, the must-win sector in the inbound market can also bring surprises to ordinary or old users who have never seen this sector.

2) Current status and problems of the inbound sectors

Currently, the must-win section for inbound operations is hidden in the "popular" navigation bar in the "Homepage". The hidden path of this section and the lack of on-site publicity should be the root cause of its unknown. As shown below:

3) Optimization suggestions:

In order to improve the position of the must-win sector in the inbound market, the author recommends that the sector be proposed from the "popular" option and place it behind the "popular" option, and be the same as the options such as "live broadcast", "recommended", and "popular" as the same level of options. The advantage of this is that it directly improves the status of the inbound must-win sector, making its viewing path shorter, not as hidden as before, and is closer to the position before the change, and will not cause too much trouble to users who are already accustomed to the original operation.

The optimization effect is as follows:

In addition to making adjustments on the homepage, given that new people may find videos they are interested in through channel and partition functions, it is necessary to highlight the necessity of inbound must-win sections in channels and partitions.

Since the videos in the inbound must-winning section are mainly concentrated in several fields such as games, ghost animals, secondary creation, etc., and the more detailed and targeted channel functions have actually covered these fields, and these treasure videos have basically been covered in the selected videos of each sub-channel. Therefore, there is no need to repetitively highlight the importance of inbound must-winning in the channel, and only highlight them in the partition.

The effect is as follows:

To add one thing, in order to enable the inbound must-winning sector to perform its due functions, we cannot rely solely on the change in the location of the function. The change in location is only one aspect of guiding users to use, and it should also be coordinated with some special effects prompts within the platform.

For example: Similar to the 6.0 Android version update, when a new user uses Bilibili for the first time, some animation effects are used to inform the new user that the section that collects Bilibili’s treasure videos is a must-watch upon entering the site, guiding the new user to watch them. In this way, the two measures can be combined to maximize the role of the must-swipe section when entering the site.

(4) Channel section optimization

1) Requirement background

Station B made major changes to the channel sector a few months ago, reconstructing the positioning and functions of the channel sector, and trying to bring users a better experience. However, during the author's investigation, it was found that the user's understanding rate and usage rate of the channel did not reach the ideal situation. After that, the author carefully experienced the adjusted channel section and found that there are many problems in the channel section at present, which may affect the user's experience.

2) Current status of the channel sector

The author believes that the significance of the channel sector after adjustment is:

a. Further enrich the channels for users to choose videos. The platform subdivides all videos into different channels. Users can first subscribe to their favorite channels and then watch the corresponding videos in the channels they are interested in. The revised channel function actually first gives users the right to actively choose. The user first selects the field of interest, and then the platform recommends relevant videos to users under this field.

Such changes can actually further stimulate users' interest in viewing, and can also make the platform's videos more targeted to users, and users can also watch videos more efficiently, reducing the waste of time to search for videos.

b. Refine the tag function to facilitate more accurate data of users' viewing habits and optimize the homepage recommendation algorithm. The channel is actually a more detailed label. When the up owner publishes a video, he can choose multiple labels that are more suitable for the video and paste them under the video.

On the one hand, the tags selected by the up owner may greatly increase the chances of recommending videos due to different recommendation weights. On the other hand, when users watch videos, their interest orientation can be obtained by the platform's big data through the more detailed channel tag classification below the video, so as to recommend videos to users more accurately.

c. Increase the chance of playing long-tail videos. When users choose to watch videos in the channel they are interested in, they actually actively reduce the range and number of videos recommended by the platform. In this way, more videos that were not originally recommended or less likely to be recommended by the platform may increase the chance of recommendation, which is conducive to the exposure of more users and up owners.

d. Added ways to monetize commercially. More precise channel divisions may lead to more commercial monetization channels. For example: mobile phone manufacturers can place advertisements in mobile channels. More precise advertising delivery is actually beneficial to advertisers' delivery efficiency, and it is also conducive to Bilibili's relatively weak advertising revenue base.

3) Current problems in the channel sector

a. Inside a single subchannel, the functions are duplicated and the logic is unclear.

The details are as follows:

b. The page layout of the channel section is relatively chaotic and the overall logic is not clear.

The problem is as follows:

4) Optimization suggestions

For internal optimizations of a single channel:

A. Optimization for comprehensive zones

B. Optimize for selected areas

C. Optimize the topic area

Optimization for channel:

In addition to the above optimizations on the channel internally, the channels should also be expanded. Currently, there are two ways to enter the channel. One is the channel partition itself, and the other is the topic function at the top of the dynamic area, so a new channel to enter the channel should be added to the homepage.

In fact, in the homepage, the channel can be searched in the search function, but according to the author's test, only some keywords can search for the corresponding channel, and many keywords cannot search for the corresponding channel, so the author suggests that optimization should be carried out here to ensure that most keywords can search for the corresponding channel.

(5) Friend function optimization

1) Requirement background

During the survey, the author found that 65% of users were willing to add friends on B station; 75% of users recommended or shared B station video/up hosts to friends; 70% of users were more or less willing to communicate with B station friends/up hosts.

The above questions show that users of B station have the need to socialize with acquaintances, that is, the need to add friends and communicate with friends. However, in fact, 65% of participants have never added friends, and 20% of participants do not know that B station can add friends.

2) Current status and problems of friend functions

Current Situation: My Friends function includes two parts: My Followers and My Fans. My followers are the users or up hosts I follow; my fans are the users who follow me.

question:

Whether it is my followers or my fans, it is not the same as my friends or the meaning of not being able to completely cover my friends. Following and fans are more suitable for one party to understand the situation of the other party, but if friends want to add friends on B station, following alone may not be appropriate to follow and fans.
Because there is no clear friend option, some users who want to add friends to each other do not know where to add friends.

3) Optimization of friend functions

The author believes that the benefits of adding a friend function are:

Users are encouraged to import acquaintance relationship chains into B station to create acquaintance social scenes. Once the social scene of acquaintances is established, it will be more conducive to the social atmosphere becoming stronger and will be conducive to promoting user activity, retention rate, and increasing user migration costs.
The establishment of a friend relationship may increase users' enthusiasm for sharing and commenting on videos on B site, rather than sharing the videos through WeChat, QQ, Moments, etc. and interacting outside the site, as in the current situation.
Further stimulate users' activity in the site, it will be more conducive to increasing users' usage time on the platform, thereby optimizing existing commercialization channels and expanding more commercialization possibilities.
The establishment of a friend relationship may increase the possibility of users pulling their off-site friends into the site, assisting B station's request to break the circle.
Because of the current privacy protection policy of B.com, even after adding friends, the user's own viewing preferences and videos they watch will not be obtained by friends, so the resistance in privacy protection is relatively limited.

The specific optimization plan is as follows:

After adding a friend option, when a user wants to add a user as his friend, he can add it by directly clicking on following, scanning the QR code, and searching for the user. After clicking on following, the option of adding the other party to my follower or my friend will pop up. After choosing to add the other party to my follower, you can also choose to add the other party to the default group or to follow it in detail. No matter which one you choose, the user will belong to my follower. If you choose Add as my friend, the user will enter my friend. When users and their fans achieve mutual followers, they should automatically convert each other into my friends.

VI. Conclusion

Since its establishment in 2009, B station has always maintained its solid and steady growth rhythm. Its positioning has gradually developed from a two-dimensional vertical community to a cultural community serving all young people, and its business boundaries have gradually expanded to multiple fields such as content communities, live broadcasts, games, e-commerce, and knowledge payment.

Facing a series of unfavorable factors such as Rui Zong's 10 billion market value, user growth faces a series of unfavorable factors such as ceiling, capital pressure, and intensified industry competition pressure, Bilibili has also entered the fast lane of strong operations and seeking to "break the circle".

From the Q1 Q1 financial report, it can be seen that a series of operational activities started by Bilibili at the beginning of the year have achieved very good results. Whether it is revenue, user growth, user activity, and the number of large members have been greatly improved. However, behind the gorgeous data, there are also super high operating expenses, insufficient commercial monetization capabilities, distorted community atmosphere, competitors secretly making small moves, and other problems.

How to balance the contradiction between user scale and community atmosphere, how to alleviate the conflict of values between new and old users, how to always adhere to the concept of "user-centeredness", always think about problems from the perspective of users, etc., are the most difficult problems that Bilibili will face, and are also the core issues that Bilibili has to deal with if it wants to develop sustainably.

Finally, I wish B station better and better, and toast to Bilibili!

Author: Wang Zai 3191

Source: Wang Zai 3191