What kind of WeChat communication chain is worth using hidden behind Chunyu’s “closure”?

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This is the case with the recent "Tencent's acquisition of JD.com" case and the "Chunyu bankruptcy" case. Many media and self-media were involved and made a "great contribution" to the spread of false information.

However, we can explore the dissemination chain of WeChat from it.

Last weekend, Chunyu Doctor, a mobile medical company founded in 2011, experienced its first public opinion storm in its four years of operation.

This storm came with great force. October 17 and 18 happened to be the weekend, and an article titled "On the collapse of Chunyu Doctor" went viral on WeChat Moments. The author of the article was an orthopedic doctor born in the 1970s from Weifang, Shandong. Through logical analysis, the article argued that Chunyu Doctor had not made any money in the medical industry since it entered the industry through the Internet, and that it was going to build offline clinics, indicating that the attempt to conduct online consultations had almost failed. If it eventually went offline and wanted to make money, it would inevitably have to use the old profit model of the medical industry, such as surviving by selling drugs and medical devices, which would lose the meaning of change, and it would be better to close down as soon as possible.

Chunyu Doctor is an early mobile medical startup. According to Chunyu Doctor's official disclosure, as of July 2015, it has 65 million users and 200,000 registered doctors. It is one of the largest online consultation platforms and is well-known in the mobile medical field. Since the second half of 2013, with the gradual relaxation of a series of policies, the number of startups in the mobile medical field has gradually increased, and they have received close attention from capital. However, the mobile medical industry as a whole has not yet developed a mature profit model.

If the article that went viral was just written and indeed attracted attention from peers for its high-quality analysis, there is nothing wrong with it. But the strange thing is that the article was written five months ago, but suddenly became popular on October 18. And at that time, Chunyu Doctor was discussing strategic cooperation with an insurance agency.

Behind the crazy spread, was it "pushed by competitors" as Chunyu later said? Or was it directed and acted by Chunyu himself? Or was it just a wave of forwarding caused by "onlookers"? NetEase Technology reporters launched an investigation to trace back the chain of dissemination, but ultimately failed; as for the mastermind behind the scenes, please let the readers judge for yourself.

Origin: Doctors are dissatisfied with peer reviews

Judging from the evidence currently available, the incident may have been unintentional.

On the evening of October 16, Chunyu Doctor's official Weibo account received several messages from "Oncology Doctor Lin Hongwei". Judging from the screenshots Chunyu Doctor kept at the time, Lin Hongwei was mainly dissatisfied with the doctor evaluation mechanism on the Chunyu Doctor platform, and was quite angry, saying "I will quit Chunyu Doctor forever".

Chunyu Doctor launched a feature in late March and early April this year, which allows other doctors to comment on the previous doctor's advice after the patient consults with the doctor. At that time, Chunyu Doctor's medical director Yang Jing introduced this feature to NetEase Technology. The launch of this feature is to improve the quality of online consultations, give patients more options, and establish a doctor evaluation system that is more suitable for mobile medical care through peer review. This practice has long been practiced internationally and is called "second opinion."

On the evening of October 17, Chunyu saw Lin Hongwei's message in the background, but did not deal with it immediately. Chen Lei, brand director of Chunyu Doctor, told NetEase Technology that Lin Hongwei then found someone else's article "On the Collapse of Chunyu Doctor" written in May, gave it a reward of 9.9 yuan, and @ed several friends to forward it.

This is considered to be the beginning of the "Spring Rain Bankruptcy Wave".

NetEase Technology contacted the original author of "On the Collapse of Chunyu Doctor", a blogger named "One Doctor One World" on Weibo. The author told NetEase Technology that the article was written in May this year, when Chunyu Doctor announced that it would build offline clinics, and he talked about his thoughts. This is not the first time he has written an article that is pessimistic about Internet medical care. He has also written articles such as "Medical Internet+ is a demon wind, not a hot spot" that are not optimistic about Internet medical care.

On the morning of October 18, the author of the article suddenly found out that his article five months ago was rewarded, and he was very happy at the time. Later, he received a call from Chunyu Doctor and realized that the matter had become a big deal. However, he also told NetEase Technology that among his doctor friends, this matter did not attract much attention, so he felt that the people who paid attention to this matter were mainly people in the technology circle.

However, there is no trace of Lin Hongwei forwarding this article. Chen Lei told NetEase Technology that he had seen the article because he opened his phone early in the morning on October 18 and found that many friends asked him on WeChat and Weibo with this article, "What happened to Chunyu Doctor?" His first reaction was that the matter had become a big deal, so he quickly called Lin Hongwei and wanted to meet him to communicate and explain in person. At that time, he had read Lin Hongwei's Weibo.

According to the certified Weibo account, Lin Hongwei is an associate chief physician of general surgery at Beijing Tsinghua Chang Gung Memorial Hospital and a contracted self-media person on Weibo with more than 130,000 followers.

However, according to a subsequent investigation by NetEase Technology, Lin Hongwei's wave of forwarding did not have much impact.

NetEase Technology searched the Weibo with the keyword "春雨倒掉" and found that only two people forwarded the article "On the Fall of Dr. Chunyu" on October 17: Zhao Hong, editor-in-chief of Health World, and Yang Changqing, assistant to the CEO of Tsinghua Hospital. Zhao Hong has 49,698 followers, and Yang Changqing has 5,572 followers. However, the number of reposts of their messages was not large. Zhao Hong's Weibo was forwarded 19 times, and Yang Changqing's Weibo was forwarded 18 times. Only 8 people forwarded this article on October 18.

Fermentation: It was flooded with messages on October 18

The turning point occurred on October 18th.

According to Chen Lei's recollection, after turning on his phone on the morning of the 18th, he saw many friends @ him on WeChat, asking him what was going on. He was very surprised: "How could this article spread so quickly overnight?"

From the perspective of the spread of public accounts, according to a search by a NetEase Technology reporter, few people reposted the article on WeChat public accounts on October 17, but the number of reposts began to increase significantly on October 18. Taking the three public accounts identified by the NetEase Technology reporter: No. 0 Shanyuan Street, Baiyimei, and Youth Investors Club as examples, the number of readings of the article were more than 1,000 (Baiyimei), 4,000 (Youth Investors Club), and more than 20,000 (No. 0 Shanyuan Street).

Zheng Jingjing, editor of Shanyuan Street 0, told NetEase Technology that a colleague of hers saw the article by chance and recommended it to her. She was surprised to see the title of the article because she knew Chunyu Doctor had been doing well. She thought it had collapsed after seeing the title. After reposting it, she found out that it was someone else's analysis article. She told NetEase Technology that the article was not deliberately promoted and the number of readers was natural. This is not the highest number of readers for the public account. It had previously published an interview with Yan Yan, the chief partner of SAIF Partners, which had a readership of more than 80,000 (the number of readers of the article has been confirmed by NetEase Technology).

Judging from the spread in the circle of friends, the reporter of NetEase Technology also searched for the keyword "春雨倒掉" on his WeChat and found a total of 42 friends. Among them, 22 people forwarded the article "On the collapse of Chunyu Doctor", 6 people forwarded "How do you know that Chunyu Doctor will collapse", and the other 14 people forwarded other commentary articles, Chunyu's response, or their own comments.

NetEase Technology found that among the 22 people who reposted the article "On the collapse of Chunyu Doctor", 16 of them reposted the original article from Weibo to WeChat. The article has now been deleted by the original author. When you click on the reposted link, it will show "the original article has been deleted", but if you press and hold the screen to pull down, the top will show "the page is provided by card.weibo.com". The sources of the articles reposted by the remaining few people are relatively scattered.

According to the time, one of the 22 people reposted the message on the evening of October 17, one on October 19, and the remaining 20 on October 18. The reposting time was mostly between 7:00 a.m. and 3:00 p.m.

After detailed inquiries by NetEase Technology reporters, it was found that 18 of the 22 people responded to the question of "where did you see this article?", one of them had forgotten the source, one saw it on Weibo, one saw it on a public account, four saw it in a WeChat group, and the remaining 11 saw it forwarded by others in their Moments.

These friends are all friends that NetEase Technology reporters actually know in real life. However, it is difficult to further trace back the source of the news they have seen.

Judging from the spread of the article in WeChat groups, as of October 18, more than 10 WeChat groups that the NetEase Technology reporter could see had forwarded the article.

NetEase Technology reporter consulted Zuo Sining (pseudonym), an industry insider engaged in social marketing, on how to trace the dissemination path of the article "On the Collapse of Chunyu Doctor" in this incident. Zuo Sining told reporters that if a link to track the dissemination path is embedded in the dissemination of this article beforehand, it is easy to see clearly, but if it is traced back afterwards, it can be traced on Weibo, but because the original author deleted the article, it is more difficult to trace. Tracing on WeChat is even more difficult because the dissemination in Moments is more private.

Competitor push? Inference without direct evidence

From noon to afternoon on October 18, E-Pharmacy Manager created three WeChat groups and gathered more than 1,000 people to discuss the matter, including the author of "On the Collapse of Chunyu Doctor", whose Weibo name is "One Doctor, One World". The group name was first "Looking at the Anxiety of Internet Medical Care from the Collapse of Chunyu Doctor", and later changed to "Internet Medical Bomb Meeting". The "collapse" of Chunyu has become a hot topic in the mobile medical circle.

Feeling that his title might be too bold and might lead people to misunderstand that "Spring Rain Poured Out" was a fact, which had a very bad impact on Spring Rain, "One Doctor, One World" confirmed to NetEase Technology that he took the initiative to delete the article on Weibo at noon on October 18.

According to Chunyu, on October 18, the speed at which the article spread "made everyone at Chunyu feel very uneasy," so a Chunyu employee asked friends in the public relations circle for information, and the response he got was that a competitor had spent money to buy channels to promote the spread of the article. However, Chunyu has no evidence for this.

In an investigation by NetEase Technology reporters into forwarding articles within their own circle of friends, they did not find any cases of "sending red envelopes to ask for forwarding" of the article.

Zuo Sining told NetEase Technology that the vast majority of articles that quickly go viral on Weibo and WeChat have promoters, and less than 5% are naturally forwarded. Even among this 5%, a considerable number are also promoted by others, but the promoters may not be doing so because they have received money from others.

Zuo Sining believes that the time when the article "On the collapse of Chunyu Doctor" was spread is quite typical. Because the article was spread on Weibo on the evening of October 17, it did not have much impact, and it spread early on the morning of October 18. "Generally, the forwarding of such articles is concentrated at night, from after midnight to 7 o'clock the next morning, because there is time to work on it at night. After a night of accumulation, everyone can see related information in many places when they turn on their computers in the morning, which makes people feel that everyone is paying attention to this matter, which is easier to cause spread. Generally, the time during the day is limited, and everyone is working, so they don't have time to read it after it is posted."

However, the people who forwarded this article in the friend circle of NetEase Technology reporter were all acquaintances. If there was a promoter, how could the promoter promote these articles to these friends and make them forward them? Zuo Sining explained that the reason is very simple, just like the principle of "onlookers". When an accident occurs on the road, there will definitely be a circle of people first. When others see people gathering around, more people will gather around, and the circle will get bigger and bigger.

"It's the same with promoting articles." He explained that general dissemination is divided into several rounds. The first round is to be placed among relevant media and natural persons. These media and natural persons can cover a considerable proportion of people in the medical circle. This round of placement costs money. After the first round of placement, it depends on the influence of the content being disseminated. As long as it has a certain value, someone will forward it, so there will be natural attention, and then everyone will forward it to each other naturally. In the second round of dissemination, some opinion leaders will be invited to comment on this matter and write some articles related to this matter, such as analyzing "why this article is so popular". If you want to expand the influence further, you will carry out other rounds of dissemination, from various angles. "The forwarding you see may have been attracted naturally after the promotion." Zuo Sining analyzed to NetEase Technology.

According to Zhang Rui, the founder of Chunyu Doctor, the actual effect of the article's dissemination was "a significant increase in Chunyu downloads and a 20%-30% increase in activity." Zhang Rui said that the cost of purchasing channels by competitors saved Chunyu ten times the marketing costs.

Therefore, some people in the industry believe that this is a marketing campaign directed and performed by Chun Yu. In response, Zhang Rui said: "You have known Mr. Zhang for so many years, have I ever done this?"

According to Zuo Sining's analysis, it is unlikely that Chunyu Doctor directed and acted in the spread of this article, because at first glance, the spread of the article "On the Collapse of Chunyu Doctor" does not benefit Chunyu Doctor. No one can predict the effect of the spread, and there are risks. If Chunyu Doctor spends money to do this, if it doesn't work out well, it will be shooting itself in the foot.

However, it is hard to predict the results of many "black articles". If the article is promoted by a competitor, the result may not be unfavorable to Chunyu, but may benefit from it. This is not uncommon in the marketing circle. "This is a PR mistake," Zuo Sining commented.

Wang Guanxiong, a veteran who has participated in the IPO public relations of Internet companies many times and the founder of the Innovation Laboratory, told NetEase Technology that similar incidents are not uncommon in the public relations circle. In his opinion, the Chunyu incident is "child's play". He thinks it is nothing and "being hacked is the medal of the winner."

Wang Hui, founding partner of Highlight Capital, has been investing in the pharmaceutical and health sector for many years. He told NetEase Technology that he has seen many such cases in his previous investment career. "The competitive environment for Chinese companies has always been worse than that of other countries because there are so many Chinese people. Successful entrepreneurs often go through many trials and tribulations," Wang Hui said frankly.

At the same time, he believes that this incident is also a test for Chunyu. "Any trick can be dismantled. It depends on whether the company itself is strong enough. At the same time, Chunyu should also take this opportunity to reflect on itself. It takes two to tango. We should try our best to improve the areas where we are not perfect."

Stop loss: Chunyu urgent media communication

As soon as work started on October 19, Chunyu Doctor took emergency action and invited more than 20 media outlets to hold a media communication meeting at Chunyu’s office area in 768 Creative Park at 4 p.m. on the 19th.

After the article "On the Collapse of Chunyu Doctor" went viral, many people hoped to analyze the current difficulties faced by mobile medical care through the spread of this article, and questioned the sustainability of the Chunyu model.

Zhang Rui, the founder of Chunyu Doctor, summarized Chunyu’s exploration over the past four years with three key words: QA (Question and Answer), private doctor, and insurance.

He explained that Chunyu Doctor first started with remote online consultation, or QA. Later, in order to solve the integrity of the user experience and take into account the seriousness of medicine, Chunyu launched "Private Doctor", hoping to promote the establishment of a long-term, continuous and stable trust relationship between doctors and patients. At the same time, Chunyu announced in May this year that it would open a Chunyu Clinic, also for the integrity of the user experience, because online cannot solve all problems, and patients still have to go offline for prescriptions and examinations. Ultimately, Chunyu's business model must rely on insurance to form a closed loop, because mobile medical care can help insurance control medical expenses, and Chunyu can make money by selling insurance. "It's not me who is looking for a business model, but the business model that comes to me," said Zhang Rui.

As for the last point - the formation of the business model, Zhang Rui emphasized the explanation that Internet medical care can control costs for three reasons: first, through online consultation, it can help people who do not need to go to the hospital not to go to the hospital; second, it can help those who do not go to the hospital for various reasons to seek medical treatment in time to reduce the occurrence of more serious diseases; third, it can help change the motivation of doctors. The value of Chunyu's diversion of offline clinics lies in controlling medical expenses, not taking commissions from medical expenses, so Chunyu does not make money from medical care.

In China's medical insurance system, commercial health insurance accounts for a very small proportion. Chunyu Doctor is working with commercial insurance companies to develop new types of commercial health insurance. Its entry point is to negotiate with companies and let them buy health insurance for their employees. At the same time, in the sale of commercial health insurance, private doctors are standard to help control medical expenses.

Zhang Rui said that Chunyu Doctor's revenue has reached 150 million yuan this year, of which 120 million yuan is from commercial insurance sold to enterprises, and 30 million yuan is from plus-on and consultation on the platform. "If we don't invest in marketing this year, we can break even. But we can't do that yet, because we still have to invest in marketing," he said.

As for the question in "On the Collapse of Chunyu Doctor" that "mobile medical platforms will eventually run out of money to run hospitals", Zhang Rui disclosed for the first time the way Chunyu runs clinics. Chunyu does not build clinics entirely at its own expense, but adopts four methods: cooperation, trusteeship, franchising, and self-construction. Self-construction means cooperating with doctors to build famous doctors' clinics and giving part of the shares to doctors, which is currently under preparation.

Signal: Mobile healthcare is competing for strategic resources

From the perspective of the industry, Wang Hui, founding partner of Highlight Capital, believes that if it is true that competitors have contributed to the development of the entire incident, this incident has indeed sent a signal that the entrepreneurial environment for mobile medical care is deteriorating.

On the afternoon of October 21, E-Drug Manager Magazine organized an offline salon to discuss the life and death struggle of Internet medical care after the "Chunyu Incident."

Liu Yun, founding partner of Guanghe Capital, who was invited to attend the salon, introduced the current investment status of mobile medical care. When mobile medical care was popular last year, "no investment without Internet", this year the investment circle has become "no investment with Internet". The reason for this situation is that everyone was convinced that the Internet could change medical care. Last year, mobile medical care was tried in the fields of registration, consultation, payment, etc., but now everyone finds that these applications have not changed the medical experience much, so the lack of payers has caused the lack of a business model for Internet medical care.

"China has 3,000 mobile medical apps, which means there are 3,000 mobile medical companies. So, is there a current profit model? No. You can't go to B or to C, what should you do? Going to VC, is that reliable?" Liu Yun asked.

He did a math problem: the entire health industry is worth 8 trillion yuan, while China's PE and VC combined are worth 4 trillion yuan. According to industry segmentation, VCs in the medical industry account for 2% of all VCs, so this is a burden that VCs cannot bear. VCs cannot support the medical industry or the mobile medical industry. "Therefore, his conclusion is that 99% of existing mobile medical companies will die.

Over the past year or so, Liu Yun has observed that mobile medical startups have shifted from competing for customer resources to competing for capital. The number of new mobile medical projects in the investment circle has greatly decreased, and even projects that have previously received financing have found it relatively difficult to continue to raise funds.

However, Chunyu Doctor founder Zhang Rui's personal experience is somewhat different from Liu Yun's observation. He did not feel how fierce the competition with other mobile medical companies in the capital market was. From his perspective, the only reasonable explanation he could think of was that there might be friction with other competitors in cooperation with insurance institutions.

"It's nonsense to say that mobile medical enterprises are taking sides with BAT. What can BAT give to mobile medical enterprises? Insurance institutions are the future payers, and mobile medical enterprises may take sides with insurance institutions in the future. There are only so many good insurance institutions, and this strategic resource is scarce. Mobile medical enterprises may compete for strategic resources." Zhang Rui said, "At present, the cooperation between insurance companies and mobile medical enterprises to develop new products is generally one-to-one, because it involves resource sharing, so both parties are more assured."

Zhang Rui believes that if this is indeed the reason, then the Chunyu incident is just a preview. Although it is the first in the industry, it will definitely not be the last. This may just be the beginning.