Technology
E-commerce strategy of station B: the choice between open-loop and closed-loop.
In the digital era, e-commerce has become the core area of enterprise competition, and major platforms are actively seeking breakthroughs. Bilibili, as a platform featuring content creation and two-dimensional culture, has carried out active e-commerce strategy exploration in recent years. This article will provide an in-depth analysis of the e-commerce development path of Bilibili, focusing on the "open-loop e-commerce" model it has chosen, and compare it with the "closed-loop e-commerce" strategy adopted by Xiaohongshu.
i.The "open-loop e-commerce" model of Bilibili and Pinduoduo cooperation.
Recently, the cooperation between Bilibili and Pinduoduo has attracted widespread attention in the industry. This cooperation innovatively guides users to jump to the Pinduoduo APP and realizes the promotion of Pinduoduo coupons at station B. This "open-loop e-commerce" model provides users with a more convenient shopping experience by directly jumping to complete shopping。This strategy not only improves the shopping efficiency of users, but also opens up a new way for the content creators of Bilibili to monetize business, injecting new impetus into the future profitability of the platform.
ii.Benefits of e-commerce partnerships.
This "open-loop e-commerce" model not only simplifies the shopping process and improves shopping efficiency from the user's perspective, but also significantly improves the user's e-commerce engagement and purchase conversion rate. Through the promotion card guidance, users can quickly and seamlessly jump from the Bilibili** page to Pinduoduo to complete the purchase。For Bilibili, this kind of cooperation is not only beneficial to the user experience, but also brings rich business monetization opportunities to the platform, becoming a new channel to achieve breakeven.
iii.The development status of e-commerce at station B.
However, to fully understand Bilibili's e-commerce strategy, it is necessary to examine its current loss situation。Although losses have eased in the past two years, there is still some way to go before CEO Chen Rui set the goal of breaking even by the end of 2024. According to the latest financial report, in the third quarter of 2023, the total revenue of station B will be 580.5 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 019%, with a net loss of 1.3 billion yuan, 22% narrower than the same period last year。This loss situation makes Bilibili urgently need to find an e-commerce strategy that is compatible with its content ecology to achieve long-term sustainable profits.
iv.Challenges brought about by the open-loop e-commerce model.
Although the "open-loop e-commerce" model has brought business opportunities to Station B, it also faces a series of challenges. First of all, too many advertisements and pitches can affect the user's browsing experience and satisfaction。Water army activity in the comment section, repetitive and templated comments, can disrupt the interactive atmosphere and authenticity of the community. Second, the excessive pursuit of commercial interests by up owners may lead to a decline in the quality of content, affecting the reputation and user attractiveness of the platform。In addition, Bilibili also needs to face operational challenges in many aspects such as cooperative management with e-commerce platforms, product quality control, and after-sales service coordination, which further increases the operating costs and difficulties of the platform.
v.Future development challenges of station B.
The game business of station B continues to be sluggish, and the advertising business is gradually approaching saturation. According to the data, in the third quarter of last year, the game business revenue of station B decreased by 33% year-on-year, and although the advertising revenue increased by 21% year-on-year to 1.6 billion yuan, the growth rate slowed down compared with the second quarter。In this unfavorable environment, it is difficult for Bilibili to invest a lot of energy to explore and build its own e-commerce model, and can only rely on the strength of partners such as Pinduoduo, JD.com, and Tmall to find growth breakthroughs.
vi.Comparison with the development of Xiaohongshu e-commerce.
In order to better understand the e-commerce development path of Bilibili, it can be compared with Xiaohongshu. After several strategic adjustments, Xiaohongshu finally chose the "closed-loop e-commerce" model and achieved remarkable results。During the 2023 Double 11 period, the number of buyers on the Xiaohongshu platform will be 33 times, the live GMV of buyers increased by 35 times, and the GMV of the store broadcast increased by 69 times, and the overall live GMV increased by 42 times. This successful experience shows that for content e-commerce platforms, whether they choose an open-loop or closed-loop strategy, maintaining continuous user growth and creating a strong e-commerce atmosphere are indispensable elements to explore the path to commercialization.
vii.Future outlook.
In the context of fierce competition in the current e-commerce industry, Bilibili is facing many challenges. Although the "open-loop e-commerce" model provides business opportunities, it still needs to be continuously explored and improved in terms of user experience, content quality, business cooperation and operation management. Bilibili needs to actively build an e-commerce model suitable for itself according to its own characteristics and user groups. Although the e-commerce exploration of station B is still relatively rudimentary, with the continuous growth of users and the improvement of the e-commerce atmosphere, station B is expected to gradually embark on the road of closed-loop e-commerce.
viii.In-depth thinking on the e-commerce strategy of station B.
In terms of the choice of e-commerce strategy, Bilibili has chosen a more open model to achieve user traffic guidance and business realization through partnerships。This "open-loop e-commerce" model has unique advantages in terms of increased convenience and business opportunities. However, the challenges that come with it cannot be ignored, including ad interference, content quality control, and rising operational costs. Bilibili's e-commerce strategy needs to be thought and adjusted more deeply to balance business interests and user experience.
ix.An innovative path for future development.
In the future development, Bilibili can solve the current challenges through innovative pathsFirst of all, the management and guidance of UP owners can be strengthened to ensure that the quality and originality of the content are not affectedSecondly, we can actively explore independent e-commerce models to reduce dependence on external platforms and reduce operating costsIn addition, Bilibili can also optimize advertising push and improve the accuracy of personalized recommendations through technical means, so as to improve the user experience
x.Epilogue.
As a content-centric platform, Bilibili is facing many challenges and opportunities on the road of e-commerce development. Choosing the "open-loop e-commerce" model is a useful attempt, but in the future development, we need to constantly sum up experience, adjust strategies, and find a more sustainable and innovative business model. Only on the basis of maintaining user growth and creating a strong e-commerce atmosphere can Bilibili truly achieve success in the highly competitive e-commerce market.