The next day, the first thing Li Mugang did when he arrived at the company was to notify Chen Tong and ask him to come to his office with his plan.
Chen Tong has been feeling uneasy since he called Li Mu last night. When he learned that Li Mu wanted to see him, his uneasy mood became even stronger.
Chen Tong himself knew very well that Li Mu probably didn't like him very much. This had a lot to do with his inability to discern the situation. Based on this, Chen Tong was not very confident in the product concept of his light blog. He is afraid that as a content worker with no product experience, blindly trying to design products will lead to misunderstandings that he cannot see clearly. He is even more afraid that his products will be rejected by Li Mu. After all, Li Mu can be regarded as the top product in the entire Internet industry. Manager, my own light blog can be said to be a real trick.
Bite the bullet and arrived at Li Mu's office, Chen Tong felt so stressed even when he looked at Li Mu that he could only force himself to be calm and asked politely: "Mr. Li, are you looking for me?"
Li Mu nodded, stood up from the office chair, and said to Chen Tong, "Come on, Mr. Chen, sit on the sofa and chat."
With that said, Li Mu had already walked to the sofa first.
Chen Tong hurriedly walked over and reached the opposite side of Li Mu. Li Mu did not sit down, and he did not dare to sit down first. He just stood motionless.
Li Mu smiled and said: "Take a seat, Teacher Chen, don't be so formal."
Chen Tong said "ok" several times in succession, but after seeing Li Mu sit down, he cautiously sat down opposite him.
After sitting down, Li Mu asked one of Li Ziwei's subordinates to bring in two cups of coffee and said to Chen Tong, "Teacher Chen, I have carefully read your product plan."
Chen Tong stared at Li Mu and asked nervously: "Mr. Li, what do you think? Is it too superficial? I don't know much about products, and I don't think thoroughly about many things..."
Li Mu waved his hand and said: "It's not superficial. On the contrary, I think your research direction and ideas are not only correct, but also in-depth."
After receiving Li Mu's affirmation, Chen Tong finally breathed a sigh of relief. Before this, what he was most afraid of was being rejected, but now it seems that this worry can be dispelled.
Therefore, Chen Tong said humbly: "Thank you, Mr. Li, for your recognition, but I do still have a lot to learn in depth."
Li Mu looked at him and smiled slightly, and said: "Teacher Chen, I am very happy to see your changes now. You have now changed from 'making content that you think is good' to 'making content that the market thinks is good'. This is This is a very good signal, because an entrepreneur can be a cultural person, a philanthropist, an artist, or an expert or scholar in various fields, but he must essentially be a businessman.”
After a pause, Li Mu continued: "You see, there are all kinds of entrepreneurs around us. Among them are many high-quality talents. They are very influential figures in their respective fields. They are really entrepreneurial." Most of them cannot escape the fate of failure, and the fundamental reason is that they have not truly become a businessman."
Chen Tong nodded frequently and said, "Mr. Li is right. Those who make content should not only make high-quality content and in-depth content, but also make content that users like to see, with stronger communication power and more thorough marketization." content, this requires our content workers to first change their thinking, not to make content that they think is good, but to make content that the market thinks is good, or content that has more commercial value.”
"That's right." Li Mu said in agreement: "Fully understanding the needs of the market and catering to the needs of the market are the core of commercial development. Through your product solutions, I believe you have this awareness now."
Chen Tong said: "My product plan is not perfect in many places. I wonder if Mr. Li has any suggestions?"
Li Mu said: "I very much agree with your concept of slimming down blog content. At this stage, our users are facing too many temptations. Apart from games, it is difficult to have any products that can allow users to focus and exclusive for a long time." In this case, users will gradually lose patience with long-form blog content, and it is imperative to slim down the blog.”
At this point, Li Mu changed the subject and said: "However, there are two specific ways to embody this idea. One is to directly slim down the current blog, and the other is to directly use this concept as the core to create a new one. products, which one do you prefer?”
Chen Tong thought for a moment and said: "I prefer the former, because the data of the blog is going downhill at this stage. If we build a new product alone, it will definitely have a greater impact on the blog. In that case, the blog itself will become Even more useless, this way of using the left hand to fight the right hand will cause a certain waste of resources."
Li Mu said: "I personally prefer the latter."
Chen Tong asked curiously: "Why?"
Li Mu said: "Because refining the essence is always easier than reshaping it, and the refining adaptability will be higher."
Seeing that Chen Tongzhi couldn't quite understand what he meant, Li Mu said, "To interrupt the topic, does Mr. Chen know much about military affairs?"
"It's not bad." Chen Tong said: "When I was in the portal, I had some active and passive contacts due to professional reasons."
Li Mu nodded and asked, "Did you know that in the 1960s, the United States developed a supersonic reconnaissance aircraft called the SR-71 and nicknamed the Blackbird?"
"I know." Chen Tong said, "This aircraft is legendary, and military fans all over the world love it."
Li Mu nodded and said: "The reason why the Blackbird is regarded as a god by military fans all over the world is not only because of its advanced appearance design, but also its unparalleled flight speed and altitude, and its powerful variable cycle jet engine. , epoch-making titanium alloy fuselage, advanced radar reflection-reducing coating, and unique pilot pressure flight suit. Logically speaking, the United States should keep such a powerful product in service in the military, but in fact, this thing has just entered the 1990s. He has completely retired from active service since then, do you know why?"
Chen Tong thought for a moment and said: "I have seen some analysis before. The main reason should be that the cost of using Blackbird is too high."
Li Mu nodded and said: "The high cost is one aspect, but there are many other reasons. For example, in the 1960s, the Blackbird was faster than almost all fighter jets and even anti-air missiles, but by the 1990s, the advancement of missile technology has The speed advantage of the Blackbird is greatly reduced, which makes the Blackbird begin to bear an increasing threat. The S300 anti-aircraft missile officially installed by the Soviet Union in the 1980s, if used to hit the Blackbird, it will basically hit the target accurately; "
After a pause, Li Mu continued: "For another example, the continuous development of satellite technology has also made the Blackbird's reconnaissance capabilities more and more useless. In this case, why do we keep such an aircraft if it is not retired?"
Chen Tong finally understood what Li Mu meant.
At this time, Li Mu said again: "However, although the Americans retired the Blackbird, the various top technologies and techniques they accumulated from the Blackbird have been refined and continuously used by them. You see, many of the Americans currently in service Weapons and equipment all have the shadow of the Blackbird, including the B-2 bomber, F-22, F117... So you see, although the Blackbird is gone, its advantages have been inherited and carried forward in other products."
Chen Tong hesitated for a moment, and then asked Li Mu with some confusion: "Mr. Li, I understand what you mean, but are we just going to give up on the blog?"
Li Mu smiled slightly and said: "The Americans have not completely given up on the Blackbird. Except for one or two that NASA has retained for various experiments, the rest of the existing Blackbirds have basically been put into flight museums, no matter where they are. It can be said to be the treasure of the National Flight Museum, so we will not give up the blog completely, we will continue to keep it, but we will stop importing resources to it. Strictly speaking, it is stocking up, not giving up."
Chen Tong asked tentatively: "If we let blogs grow, will we focus on cultivating light blogs next?"
Li Mu nodded and said without a doubt: "That's right! The blog stopped supplying blood and entered the natural breeding stage. Then we will fully develop your 'light blog', but with all due respect, your 'light blog' is in my opinion Now, it’s just a semi-finished product. You only solved what kind of content you should guide users to create, but you didn’t solve how to guide users to carry out special social interactions based on this lightweight content.”
Chen Tong blurted out and asked: "Social?"
"Yes." Li Mu said lightly: "If you think about it carefully, what is a blog? A blog is like a classroom. Every blogger is a teacher who talks non-stop in the classroom. A class lasts 45 minutes. One person sings a one-man show for 40 minutes, and other students are not allowed to express their opinions during this time, and then the remaining five minutes are left for students to ask questions or interact with students. If you look at the current celebrity blogs, articles of several thousand words can be written. Readers either leave without finishing the article, or leave after reading it. The most they can do is give a like or leave a comment. Not only are readers unable to interact with the blogger, it is also difficult to interact with other users.”
Chen Tong thought about the scene of the teacher teaching in the classroom, and suddenly realized in his heart, he sighed: "When you said that, it feels like this is really the case..."
Li Mu continued: "It is precisely because blogs are like classrooms that light blogs have to break through this limitation and shackles. We cannot make it a classroom, or even let it have anything to do with the classroom. We should make it a A social setting is a social setting where everyone can have an opinion, everyone can hear the opinions of others, and everyone can connect and interact with everyone.”
Chen Tong said with some embarrassment: "Mr. Li, I roughly understand what you mean, but I can't think of how this concept should be presented in products."
Li Mu smiled slightly and said: "How to present it specifically, I will conduct more in-depth secondary development based on your light blog, adopt the information display mode of information flow, and combine it with a complete follow, friend, and interaction system to bring you The socialization of light blogs.”
Speaking of this, Li Mu looked at Chen Tong and joked: "But the real name of the product cannot be called Light Blog. This name is not pleasant to hear, but it is too closely related to the literal name of the blog."
Chen Tong asked hurriedly: "Then what do you call it?"
Li Mu said: "The Chinese name is Weibo. Weibo originally means microblog, but we don't promote it to the outside world like this. We just treat Weibo as a brand new product to users."
"Weibo..." Chen Tong thought for a moment and said in agreement: "I think this name is pretty good. It's simple, easy to remember, and catchy."
After that, Chen Tong asked again: "Then the English name is MicroBlog?"
Li Mu smiled and said: "I just said, don't have too close contact with blogs or blogs in words. What is the difference between your MicroBlog and your light blog..."
Chen Tong said with shame: "I took it for granted, thinking that a literal translation of the English name would be enough..."
Li Mu said calmly: "Actually, I already thought of an English name last night. It's called Twitter."
Chen Tong asked curiously: "Why is it called Twitter? This word seems a little strange and unfamiliar. What does it mean?"
Li Mu said: "It means to describe a person or bird chattering non-stop, which is exactly in line with the lively scene on Weibo where you say a few words, I say a few words, and everyone says a few words together."
"Chirp?" After hearing this, Chen Tong said with a smile: "This word is really vivid! For native English-speaking users, it should also feel very friendly, easy to remember, and smooth."
Li Mu smiled and asked him: "By the way, do you know how Twitter should translate it in our language to more closely reflect how Americans feel about the word
Chen Tong asked curiously: "How to translate?"
"Forcing B to talk."
PS: I’m a little tired today, so I’ll try to do two more updates tomorrow…
(End of chapter)