Before analyzing the characteristics of Douyin itself, let’s talk about the past and present of Douyin – the company’s boss Zhang Yiming and his Toutiao series of products. Today, ByteDance Technology Co., Ltd. has attracted much attention from the outside world. Their company’s organizational structure is different from that of most Internet companies. There are no business units divided by business lines. There are only three core functional departments: technology, user growth and commercialization, which are responsible for retention, new users and monetization respectively.
These three steps are the core of any mobile product from scratch to large. The company’s employees are also flexibly configured according to project teams, and the mobility of personnel is relatively large. In their company, there will not be a situation where one person is fixed in one position for a long time.
Now, many technology companies, including ByteDance, have already achieved fool-proof operation to quickly build an App software. Basic layout, key functions, graphical settings, etc., have long had mature optional solutions. As long as the company sees a direction, it will make several products at the same time. Whichever one comes out first and has good data will be supported.
In 2016, Zhang Yiming decided to focus on short videos. At that time, Douyin, Volcano, and Watermelon Video were launched almost at the same time. At the beginning, Huoshan’s data performance was the best. It launched an independent App software in August and connected to Toutiao’s algorithm system two months later. Douyin’s user growth was not fast in the early stage, but with the optimization of technology, Douyin’s retention was not bad, and the user stickiness was high enough, so all the high-quality resources of ByteDance tended to the Douyin project.
At the beginning of 2017, Douyin was only ranked 90th on the short video rankings, and it was not taken seriously by the giants at that time. Kuaishou, which was in the same period, had 100 million daily active users at that time, and it seemed to be firmly in the top position of short videos, but it was unexpectedly overtaken by Douyin. Kuaishou’s user population at that time was mainly concentrated in third-, fourth-, and fifth-tier cities, mostly young people in small towns, and the popular culture was Laotie. The population that Douyin cut into was just the opposite. It was aimed at first-, second-, and third-tier cities, and the people active on Douyin were a group of good-looking boys and girls, and they all had their own lifestyles.
In addition to the different populations, Kuaishou and Douyin also have different focuses. On Kuaishou, the number of fans increases relatively slowly, but the fan stickiness is very high, mainly because Kuaishou pays more attention to the creation of personal image. On Douyin, the focus is on content. No matter who you are on Douyin, whether you are a novice or an expert, as long as the interaction ratio of your work reaches the recommended standard, Douyin can push your work to become popular.