Zhou Hongyi: Why You Fail Even When Your Product Looks So Beautiful?

(Chinese Version)

When developing a new product or exploring a new field, you have to first ask yourself if you have found users’ demand point, if the product is optional or dispensable for users and if the demand is weak or strong.

If your product only meets weak demand, then it will be very difficult to promote it; on the contrary, if your product meets strong demand, users will pour in unstoppably. It’s easier for such product to become successful.

But what kind of demands can be called strong?

For example, films, especially “love action films”, are strong demand for some male users. This is also why many Trojan Horses are disguised as “love action films”, and many users will be tricked into downloading them. Although Qihoo 360 Desktop Assistant may warn users of potential risk, most users, I believe, will ignore the warning and even close Qihoo 360. This exactly demonstrates what strong demand means. So what can I do? We understand users’ strong demand and purposely develop the “Watch Love Action Films Protection” function, so that users can feel free to watch these films without worrying about computer viruses.

There are still other kinds of strong demands, and all you have to do is try your best to meet them.

Instant messaging tool QQ is indispensable because users will lose contact with their friends without QQ. Search engine is also indispensable because users will fall into a complete blank without search engine. Security software is also a strong demand because you will be constantly interrupted by pop-up ads and malware.

However, there are still demands without which we won’t care much in our lives, but if we are given products that satisfy these demand, we shall also use them sometimes.As a matter of fact, most products only meet people’s weak demands, and their appeal is quite limited. If a product only satisfies people’s weak demands, then its user base will grow very slowly.

While products that satisfy people’s strong demand can become potent traffic platform by itself, products that only satisfy weak demands have to reply on other potent traffic platforms to survive.For example, without pop-ups and the mobile APP, the traffic of Tencent News won’t necessarily surpass that of Sina. In other words, products that satisfy weak demands aren’t necessarily bad products. It’s just that they are more reliable on platforms.

As I mentioned several times before, this is also why many entrepreneurs can’t succeed in doing something while Tencent can easily succeed in doing the same things. For example, although it is Ph.D Fang Xingdong who brought blog first to China, his own blog platform BlogChina lags far behind QQ Zone in terms of traffic as well as revenue.

Only when your product satisfies strong demands can you attract enough users. As users’ advice keep coming in, you shall continue to improve user experience and finally succeed. Sometimes, even when you try your best to improve the interface and color, design of your product, you won’t succeed because you fail to find what users need most. It is safe to say any improvement in user experience that ignores users’ demand is unreliable.

Although you might think that Chinese internet tycoons’ new products aren’t as “cool” as that of Google and Facebook’s, they might actually meet lots of ordinary users’ needs and demands. So they ultimately succeed. After they succeed with these “uncool” products, they will accumulate much capital and traffic and develop “cooler” products and improve their weaker points.

(Note: This article is first published on Zhou Hongyi’s TouTiao Account with the title “Zhou Hongyi: Why You Fail Even When You’ve Tried Your Best To Improve Your Product’s Interface And Design?”)

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[The article is published and edited with authorization from the author @Zhou Hongyi, please note source and hyperlink when reproduce.]

Translated by Levin Feng (Senior Translator atPAGE TO PAGE), working for TMTpost.

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