Should new media develop independent apps?

The Verge, a new American technology media, recently told readers not to download its own APP anymore, but to subscribe to the website on mobile browsers.

The Verge was born out of Engadget and was founded by former Engadget editors Joshua Topolsky and Nilay Patel in November 2011. Although young, the website has great ambitions. The Verge means always being at the forefront. Less than two years after its establishment, it won five Webby Awards, which are known as the "Oscars of the Internet."

The Verge has a background in doing this. Its editor once conducted an experiment on an article called "fanboys". Whether in mobile browsers such as Android and IOS, or in browsers on Windows and OSX computer systems, the reading experience of browsing and turning pages of this article is consistent.

The cost of making an APP remains high, and the promotion cost is beyond the reach of ordinary small businesses. New media is generally a money-losing project. Except for the rich who spend the country's money, independent APPs are becoming less and less of a good choice.

Since the launch of WeChat official accounts in 2012, more and more new media projects have given up on developing independent apps and have relied on self-media platforms such as WeChat official accounts and Toutiao. The debate over whether to retain web sites or independent apps has been ongoing.

There are certain risks in relying entirely on third-party platforms: the most popular WeChat public account platform banned a large number of public accounts starting in April this year. Since then, some accounts have been repeatedly banned by WeChat for a few days to a week.

The production cost of an independent new media APP is not cheap, and this money cannot be used once and for all. Continuous updating and maintenance require manpower, but even more expensive is the promotion cost.

More and more apps are competing for users' mobile phones, and the investment in new media is nothing compared to the money-burning tycoons in other industries. After the wild growth and Apple's crackdown, it has become increasingly risky to brush the charts in iOS, and the price is getting higher and higher, facing the risk of being removed from Apple's AppStore at any time; although many Android app stores clearly mark the price for promotion, the price is already extremely expensive.

In the era of mobile Internet, the cost of acquiring users is getting higher and higher. The cost for e-commerce to acquire a user is 100 to 200 yuan, and the cost for P2P to acquire a recharging user has exceeded 500 yuan. Even for information mobile products with lower user acquisition costs, a cost of 10 to 20 yuan is not uncommon.

Surviving on third-party platforms such as WeChat and adapting their own mobile websites to the mobile era to bring users a unified and good experience is also a way for new media to survive.

The Verge is famous for its exquisite website design. The homepage of the website has an average of 4-8 headlines, which are distinguished by different color blocks. The news titles use a uniquely designed font to increase recognition and highlight the content of the article.

Below the headlines are well-produced 90-second short videos featuring The Verge’s editor-in-chief and reporters.

According to media reports, The Verge currently has about 70 members, who are divided into four groups according to different divisions of labor. They are the news group focusing on breaking news, the documentary group engaged in traditional reporting, the feature group focusing on magazine-style writing, and the video group responsible for video content.

Although The Verge's app design is also very beautiful, they still chose to give up.

In contrast, many domestic media websites are ugly, especially the mobile pages, which are terrible. Because they are not taken seriously, various bugs often appear. Once I was browsing the news of Beijing Times on my mobile phone, and three floating square ads almost covered the text.

The very down-to-earth Chinese Internet companies saw this and quietly adapted to it.

Some new media projects should not be so ambitious as to become the second Jack Ma or something. Can they first make the mobile version of their own website better?

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.