Along with Yigret's two major new product launches on October 14, there is actually a complete set of marketing plans involving various media platforms such as the Internet, TV, and newspapers.
The following Wednesday, Ygritte also officially announced a piece of data.
The number of users accessing the World Wide Web in the United States has officially exceeded the 10 million mark.
Internet users are usually based on families. The 10 million World Wide Web access users are of course more than just 10 million people.
To be more precise, it should be 10 million World Wide Web accounts.
According to survey data from the Igret Portal, the average number of individual users involved in each World Wide Web account at this stage is 1.6. In other words, as of October 1991, the number of World Wide Web users in the United States had actually reached 16 million, which was close to 8% of the total population of the United States.
Of course, the number of households in the United States is not 1.6. This is just a comprehensive statistic.
In the early 1990s, personal computers were still high-end electronic products. Even in a family of five, perhaps only one or two people could use the computer, not to mention the large number of single white-collar users who had access to the Internet.
However, this also means that with just the 10 million existing World Wide Web access accounts, there is still a lot of user potential to be tapped.
The 16 million Internet users have directly caught up with the average user size of the four major television networks in the United States, and they are all high-end social groups with strong spending power.
Therefore, it took only two days for the two major products Ypay and Ystore to be released. In fact, it only took 32 hours for Yigret to announce that the transaction volume of the Ypay online payment tool exceeded 10 million US dollars.
On the fifth day, the Yigret portal issued a press release again, indicating that the number of activated users of Ypay reached 1 million.
A full week after the release of the two new products, Yigret also announced a series of other exciting data.
The transaction volume of Yigret App Store Ystore reached US$28.39 million in seven days.
The number of active users of Ypay, Ypay's online payment tool, within seven days finally reached 1.53 million.
Because you can enjoy 12% to 95% discounts depending on the payment amount, coupled with the convenience of online payment, the amount of AOL network fees paid through Ypay channels in seven days reached 36.91 million U.S. dollars, and it was only the income in this week. It has exceeded 20% of AOL’s single-month revenue in September.
In seven days, the number of users who applied for credit cards directly bound to Ypay accounts through Citibank and Bank of America channels exceeded 18,000.
The 'Internet Computer' launched by Compaq sold 28,371 units in seven days.
This computer is divided into two categories: US$3,299 and US$3,799 depending on the configuration. Based on the average selling price of about US$3,500, in just one week, Compaq's sales of this computer were close to an astonishing US$100 million.
Because it is an emerging industry, there is not much to compare with other data.
Therefore, Compaq's "Internet Computer" seven-day sales data is what attracts the most attention to the industry.
According to industry survey agency statistics, during the week from October 14th to October 20th, global personal computer shipments were approximately 450,000 units.
However, Compaq sold more than 28,000 units of a single category of computers, which is equivalent to a 6% market share.
Compaq later announced that its full range of PC shipments reached 69,000 units, with a market share of 15.5%.
Just a month ago, Compaq's latest market share barely reached 13.2%.
In other words, just this time with the Internet marketing of Igret, Compaq Computer's market share increased by 2.3 percentage points.
From the birth of Apple in the 1970s to the present, competition in the personal computer industry has been fierce.
Therefore, a 2.3 percentage point increase in market share, and it was only a week, is already a small miracle.
If they had predicted in advance that this marketing could increase their market share by 2.3 percentage points, other PC manufacturers would never miss this opportunity.
In fact, most of the current brands, including IBM, Commodity, Apple, etc., were previously contacted by Igret.
However, because they could not agree on many details, these relatively established manufacturers eventually gave up this opportunity. In the end, only Compaq and Igret reached a cooperation agreement.
The sales of a single category of computers in seven days were close to US$100 million. The deposit generated through the Ypay channel was actually only US$5.56 million. This US$5.56 million discount fee was of course borne by Compaq.
What Yigrit Company received was an advertising contract worth US$15 million.
The contract period lasted for one quarter from the beginning of October to the end of the year.
According to the sales data of Compaq Computer after the first week of release by Ypay and Ystore, the return of the customized advertising contract of US$15 million far exceeded Compaq's expectations.
Many technology brands have been placing advertisements on the Yigrit portal for more than a year, but the amounts in the past have not been too large. The key reason why this marketing cooperation has not been concluded is that the Yigrit company has as high as Offer of $15 million.
Although most of the income earned by Yigrit is invested in the marketing of the company's brand.
However, many manufacturers at the time still believed that by adopting brand cooperation, they had already borne the preferential costs, and what Yigret received was the promotion of Ypay tools, which was a double win. Therefore, it is very unreasonable for Yigret to require additional huge advertising costs.
Now, no manufacturer would think so.
The plan given by Ygritte is of course not just a simple sale of Compaq's 'Internet computers' through the Ypay channel, but also a complete set of advertising plans for the entire platform that lasts for a quarter.
With the success of this cooperation between Yigrit and Compaq, other technology brands have begun to contact Yigrit. Damen also personally called Simon to discuss the online marketing of the Windows 3.1 system to be released next year. matters.
More than half of 1991 has passed.
For the new technology field, the rapid growth of Yigrit in the past half year is obvious to all.
Not to mention other things, just 10 million World Wide Web access users, through the IE browser installation fee of 10 US dollars per user, brought 100 million US dollars in revenue to Igret.
Because many operators are promoting free trial activities, even if the user does not become a regular user, the operator still has to pay the installation fee for the IE browser.
Therefore, as of mid-October, the software has actually brought revenue figures of $137 million to Igret.
Carol Butts is responsible for the formal integration of YWS's Igret Network Services. In the previous three quarters, due to the rapid growth of World Wide Web sites, and through products such as server rental, tool software and website solution sales, a total of YWS Gretel brought in $86 million in revenue, and the full-year revenue from this part of the business is expected to exceed $110 million.
Including Compaq's huge advertising order of US$15 million, the advertising revenue of Yigrit Portal in 1991 reached a cumulative US$61 million.
This part of the revenue seems to be less than half of the revenue brought by an IE browser software. However, with the great success of this marketing cooperation with Compaq, the advertising business of Igret Portal will undoubtedly have a greater impact. Big growth potential.
You know, the sales of IE browser software are basically one-time.
According to the agreement, Yigrit guarantees free upgrades for the IE browser software installed by users for three years.
Simon's plan is to promote IE browser to be completely free in a few years.
This is mainly due to antitrust considerations.
The Yigrit portal is the fixed homepage of Yigrit's IE browser software. At this stage, Yigrit does not even give users the permission to change the homepage.
In a short period of time, no one thought it was inappropriate as a guide website to guide users to surf the Internet.
but.
As time goes by, someone will definitely react.
I've paid for the software, so I should have the freedom to customize my homepage as I choose.
Even if users don't react, other Internet companies in the industry will understand how much monopoly advantage Igret has in this area, so they will definitely jump out and raise objections.
If the IE browser were free, the related pressure that Igret would have to bear would be much smaller.
I provide you with free software, so you should have the convenience of a default homepage.
At most, Yigrit can make some concessions in the future that allow users to change the homepage of IE browser.
However, the default homepage of the IE browser software is destined to be only the Yigrit portal and the Yigrit search engine in the future.
Any industry that cannot produce sustainable business benefits will certainly not be able to develop and grow.
Yigerite has previously proven the feasibility of its YWS product and portal advertising business. This time, the success of Ypay tools and Ystore once again confirms the broad business prospects of the Internet industry. Capital from all parties and traditional business giants have begun to further increase investment in the Internet industry.
Then, some problems inevitably arise.
The core patented technologies of the World Wide Web, which is now the most popular, are basically in the hands of Igret.
Although on the surface, Igret maintains a very open attitude toward licensing, anyone who is not a fool will understand that Igret will definitely use its patent barriers to restrict the development of its competitors.
In fact, Simon himself would not deny it, and of course Ygret Company would do so.
It would be abnormal not to do this.
Now, Yigrit has taken the lead in many aspects such as server rental, portals, online payments, and e-mails. Unless Yigrit takes the initiative to open up the licensing of core patented technologies, it will be impossible for other companies to get involved in these areas. field.
Ygritte also basically implemented all the major Internet business models that later proved to be the most successful in Simon's memory.
So, if they want to completely bypass Igret's patent barriers and compete with this company, other companies will probably have to promote other basic network technologies.
Of course, there were other types of network protocols in this era.
However, after looking around, other companies had to admit that other existing network technologies simply cannot compete with the already very mature World Wide Web.
Simon Westeros has been sparing no effort in the research and development of World Wide Web technology more than two years ago. This kind of time advantage cannot be caught up by other companies. Moreover, protocols or languages such as HTTP and HTML are undoubtedly more suitable for the development trend of the Internet for those who have already used the World Wide Web platform.
In addition, Yigrit has also launched relatively popular Internet image formats, sound formats and JavaScript scripting languages, etc.
Not only these most basic technologies, Yigrit Company has also completed the development of related application software, such as IE browser, which is the most popular one, and other relatively professional software such as web design or website management, as well as complete World Wide Web site solutions, other manufacturers will not be able to catch up in a short period of time.
Even if we start catching up now, however, World Wide Web technology will certainly not stand still.
Not only that, once a commercial opponent emerges that threatens its own position, Ygret is likely to build more technical barriers on the way to catch up with other technologies.
Since it is impossible to catch up, if you want to get involved in the Internet industry, you can only seek authorization from Ygrit.
Yigret seems to be very open, but what if one day, when this company feels threatened by competitors, it forcibly stops licensing
This kind of thing happens all the time in the technology industry.
Even if a company whose technology licensing is stopped wins a series of lawsuits and regains income, if the lawsuits continue for several years, a company will eventually be severely damaged.
Simon has actually been aware of this problem since the beginning of this year.
With the success of the two major products Ypay and Ystore, the industry began to pay more attention to the emerging Internet industry, and he also realized that certain problems were becoming increasingly urgent.
The Internet must be an open platform. Only in this way can it attract enough companies and users.
Although Igret has been involved in most of the most successful Internet business models in Simon's memory, this industry is destined to have too much potential to be tapped, and human creativity is endless.
However, the current problem is that many people are worried about whether Yigrit will use its patents and technological advantages to suppress competitors.
Suppressing competitors is a sure thing.
However, for the rapid development of the entire Internet industry, Simon understood that it was not wise to use patented technology to do so.
In order to dispel the concerns of many people in the industry at once, after repeated consultations with several executives of Yigrit, Simon finally made a decision to completely release the core patents related to the World Wide Web held by Yigrit, including HTTP and HTML technologies, as well as related images, sounds and even JavaScript scripting languages and other technologies.
In the proposed plan, these patents will be placed in a non-profit World Wide Web Consortium Foundation, and Internet companies will no longer need to seek authorization from Yigrit to use these technologies.
Some things spread quickly.
As soon as the decision was made, the San Francisco Chronicle reported on it, catching Eaglet's management off guard.
After firing an Igrit middle manager who leaked the news, both Simon and the three Igrit giants, including several other technology companies in the Westeros system, immediately became the target of inquiries in the industry. object.
Although a decision has been made, the specific list of patents that need to be opened still needs to be repeatedly considered.
For example, the email-related technology held by Yigrit does not plan to be open to the public in the short term, and Yigrit will definitely restrict other manufacturers from using World Wide Web technology to develop browser software similar to IE.
However, in any case, this matter is a rare big deal for the entire industry.