中國浙江明媚的陽光下,屏幕里頭發(fā)花白身穿紫色毛衣的女性正揀選晾曬的紅薯,身后蒼翠的山巒隱約可見,身邊的小雞咯咯叫,鳥兒啁啾啼唱。
這期視頻標(biāo)題是“童年的味道”,底部是黃色的購物車小圖標(biāo),寫著“農(nóng)家甘薯500克”的字樣,用戶點擊后只需花3美元就能買到半公斤視頻里同款美味?;ㄉ?3美元就能買一包綠茶,或者花21美元買自制枇杷蜂蜜。
該直播間是主播王偉的《山居雜記》,主要記錄浙江麗水老家附近的田園風(fēng)光,在快手平臺有445,000名粉絲。本周五,成立十年的中國短視頻應(yīng)用快手在香港啟動54億美元的IPO。
快手深受農(nóng)村和二線城市用戶歡迎,像王偉一樣的小商戶可在平臺上分享日常生活并銷售商品。王偉的小店里已經(jīng)賣了769件商品,也推廣山區(qū)旅游和農(nóng)家樂住宿。
快手在中國大都市圈之外的深度滲透引得投資者矚目,平臺上每天活躍的3億用戶都可能轉(zhuǎn)化為活躍消費者,這很吸引人。但有個未知數(shù)讓人不由得擔(dān)心,王偉之類主播直播銷售數(shù)十億美元商品的同時,快手如何獲得更多收入。
短故事
2011年,惠普前工程師程一笑開發(fā)了專門用于分享GIF動圖的應(yīng)用,GIF動圖是21世紀(jì)頭十年里占據(jù)互聯(lián)網(wǎng)的短動畫圖像。程一笑將應(yīng)用稱為GIF快手,意思就是“快速的手”。2013年,曾在谷歌擔(dān)任工程師的宿華加入合資公司,協(xié)助快手轉(zhuǎn)型為短視頻應(yīng)用,不管是名字還是平臺上,“GIF”功能都消失了。
在最早產(chǎn)品和當(dāng)前形式之間,快手指出了明確的聯(lián)系,在香港證券交易所提交的上市申請中,公司稱GIFs“本質(zhì)上是最早的短視頻形式”。然后很自然地,短視頻之后轉(zhuǎn)向長視頻,2016年內(nèi)容產(chǎn)品線中加入了直播。
直播為快手開辟了收入新渠道。平臺開始向用戶出售虛擬禮物和表情,用戶可以買來送給喜歡的主播當(dāng)成“打賞”。用戶打賞主播時,禮物圖標(biāo)會顯示在屏幕上,主播通常會念出打賞用戶的名字以示感謝。
王偉最新一次直播持續(xù)近五小時,他在村里閑逛,時而跟路人聊天,時而回答直播觀眾的提問和評論?!爸x謝你們的支持,朋友們!”他邊說邊爬上一段石階。走在一片樹林前,他笑著讀了一條要求他露個臉的評論,但他拒絕說:“我長得不好看!”
2017年,快手90%以上的收入來自禮物銷售。公司招股說明書顯示,“虛擬禮物”仍然是應(yīng)用最大的收入來源,2020年前9個月占總收入62%。第二大收入來源是廣告,占同期收入33%。
從快手財務(wù)報表來看,電商業(yè)務(wù)并不突出。2020年前9個月,電商只貢獻(xiàn)了5%的收入,約3.15億美元。但這并不代表中國蓬勃發(fā)展的直播電商領(lǐng)域里快手只是小角色。事實上,2018年快手推出電商業(yè)務(wù)以來,通過應(yīng)用銷售的商品總價值(GMV)已從2019年的90億美元飆升至2020年的500億美元,快手也由此成為按GMV算中國第二大直播電商平臺。直播電商之所以對快手收入貢獻(xiàn)有限,主要因為平臺收取的服務(wù)費極低。
買買買
淘寶于2016年推出淘寶直播,成為中國首個推出直播電商的平臺,互聯(lián)網(wǎng)意見領(lǐng)袖紛紛利用自身影響力通過直播推廣品牌并銷售商品。兩年后,快手和抖音也躍躍欲試,但2019年阿里巴巴將直播模式融入龐大的雙十一購物節(jié),中國的直播電商迎來了突圍時刻。
根據(jù)中國電商研究公司100EC的數(shù)據(jù),淘寶直播仍然是直播電商的霸主,2020年通過直播電商銷售實現(xiàn)的約1580億美元GMV中,淘寶直播占了一半以上??焓质堑诙笃脚_,占總量21%。
北京品牌代理PBB Creative的戰(zhàn)略主管亞歷山大?夏皮羅說:“將龐大用戶群變現(xiàn),有點像把(快手)變成真正的社交商務(wù)平臺,非常了不起。”北京科技行業(yè)研究公司EqualOcean表示,中國競爭激烈的短視頻行業(yè)里,快手的用戶最活躍,留存率也最高,或許會成為競爭對手里最“社交”的電商應(yīng)用。
但就平臺銷售商品收取的服務(wù)費而言,快手低于競爭對手。
疫情之初快手便降低了農(nóng)民主播的服務(wù)費,方便小賣家在平臺上銷售??焓诌€采用去中心化的內(nèi)容算法,可將粉絲沒那么多的用戶視頻推送到專題頁面上,以獲得更多曝光。
種種策略幫助快手在中國小城市和農(nóng)村地區(qū)廣受歡迎,而相關(guān)地區(qū)由于市場飽和程度低于上海和北京等頂級城市,已成為電商爭奪的戰(zhàn)場。位于香港的零售業(yè)分析機構(gòu)Coresight Research研究員黃伊蓮(音)表示,快手用戶里有超過85%在小城市生活。
但市場分析機構(gòu)Agency China的研究和戰(zhàn)略經(jīng)理邁克爾?諾里斯表示,服務(wù)費下調(diào)意味著“快手的抽成,也就是商家銷售產(chǎn)品收取的傭金與其他平臺相比相當(dāng)?shù)??!?/p>
雖然快手收取的費用不到通過該平臺銷售商品總量的1%,但由于直播電商仍是年輕且競爭激烈的市場,快手似乎更重視爭取廣泛的用戶基礎(chǔ),而不是賺錢。
諾里斯說,隨著時間推移,快手抽成可能會上升,就像其他科技公司實現(xiàn)規(guī)模效應(yīng)后提高收費一樣?!坝行┩顿Y者認(rèn)為快手電商業(yè)務(wù)可走高,就會比較注重類似商業(yè)模式,”諾里斯說。
底線
多元化的收入來源也可幫助快手防范突如其來的監(jiān)管。隨著中國對認(rèn)定“低俗”的內(nèi)容加強監(jiān)管,通過銷售虛擬“打賞”禮品獲取大部分收入的常規(guī)直播很容易受到頻繁打擊。
最近,政府禁止了“吃播”,即用戶看主播直播吃東西。去年當(dāng)局就開始批評吃播視頻,稱暴飲暴食直播誘發(fā)食物浪費。據(jù)報道,快手的應(yīng)對方式是在吃播視頻下添加警告標(biāo)簽,鼓勵消費者“節(jié)約食物,合理飲食”。
不過,監(jiān)管機構(gòu)對直播電商的審查也在加強,因為“行業(yè)里出現(xiàn)一些不擇手段的做法,”諾里斯說,他指的是有些主播夸大銷售數(shù)字的現(xiàn)象。
直播還有其他困難要克服。
本周一,代表藝術(shù)家利益的國有機構(gòu)中國音像著作權(quán)集體管理協(xié)會威脅稱要起訴快手侵犯版權(quán),理由是快手上有超過1.5億條未經(jīng)許可使用的歌曲視頻。
不過,監(jiān)管問題似乎并未影響散戶投資者的熱情。2月5日,快手登陸港股,開盤價為338港元,截至今日收盤,快手股票上漲160.87%,報300港元每股,總市值達(dá)12324.58億港元(約1600億美元),成為中國互聯(lián)網(wǎng)第五大上市公司。
如果螞蟻集團成功上市,可能已籌集到345億美元。但隨著螞蟻取消上市,快手的上市案成為了2019年Uber上市以來規(guī)模最大的互聯(lián)網(wǎng)公司上市案。
譯者:夏林
中國浙江明媚的陽光下,屏幕里頭發(fā)花白身穿紫色毛衣的女性正揀選晾曬的紅薯,身后蒼翠的山巒隱約可見,身邊的小雞咯咯叫,鳥兒啁啾啼唱。
這期視頻標(biāo)題是“童年的味道”,底部是黃色的購物車小圖標(biāo),寫著“農(nóng)家甘薯500克”的字樣,用戶點擊后只需花3美元就能買到半公斤視頻里同款美味。花上13美元就能買一包綠茶,或者花21美元買自制枇杷蜂蜜。
該直播間是主播王偉的《山居雜記》,主要記錄浙江麗水老家附近的田園風(fēng)光,在快手平臺有445,000名粉絲。本周五,成立十年的中國短視頻應(yīng)用快手在香港啟動54億美元的IPO。
快手深受農(nóng)村和二線城市用戶歡迎,像王偉一樣的小商戶可在平臺上分享日常生活并銷售商品。王偉的小店里已經(jīng)賣了769件商品,也推廣山區(qū)旅游和農(nóng)家樂住宿。
快手在中國大都市圈之外的深度滲透引得投資者矚目,平臺上每天活躍的3億用戶都可能轉(zhuǎn)化為活躍消費者,這很吸引人。但有個未知數(shù)讓人不由得擔(dān)心,王偉之類主播直播銷售數(shù)十億美元商品的同時,快手如何獲得更多收入。
短故事
2011年,惠普前工程師程一笑開發(fā)了專門用于分享GIF動圖的應(yīng)用,GIF動圖是21世紀(jì)頭十年里占據(jù)互聯(lián)網(wǎng)的短動畫圖像。程一笑將應(yīng)用稱為GIF快手,意思就是“快速的手”。2013年,曾在谷歌擔(dān)任工程師的宿華加入合資公司,協(xié)助快手轉(zhuǎn)型為短視頻應(yīng)用,不管是名字還是平臺上,“GIF”功能都消失了。
在最早產(chǎn)品和當(dāng)前形式之間,快手指出了明確的聯(lián)系,在香港證券交易所提交的上市申請中,公司稱GIFs“本質(zhì)上是最早的短視頻形式”。然后很自然地,短視頻之后轉(zhuǎn)向長視頻,2016年內(nèi)容產(chǎn)品線中加入了直播。
直播為快手開辟了收入新渠道。平臺開始向用戶出售虛擬禮物和表情,用戶可以買來送給喜歡的主播當(dāng)成“打賞”。用戶打賞主播時,禮物圖標(biāo)會顯示在屏幕上,主播通常會念出打賞用戶的名字以示感謝。
王偉最新一次直播持續(xù)近五小時,他在村里閑逛,時而跟路人聊天,時而回答直播觀眾的提問和評論?!爸x謝你們的支持,朋友們!”他邊說邊爬上一段石階。走在一片樹林前,他笑著讀了一條要求他露個臉的評論,但他拒絕說:“我長得不好看!”
2017年,快手90%以上的收入來自禮物銷售。公司招股說明書顯示,“虛擬禮物”仍然是應(yīng)用最大的收入來源,2020年前9個月占總收入62%。第二大收入來源是廣告,占同期收入33%。
從快手財務(wù)報表來看,電商業(yè)務(wù)并不突出。2020年前9個月,電商只貢獻(xiàn)了5%的收入,約3.15億美元。但這并不代表中國蓬勃發(fā)展的直播電商領(lǐng)域里快手只是小角色。事實上,2018年快手推出電商業(yè)務(wù)以來,通過應(yīng)用銷售的商品總價值(GMV)已從2019年的90億美元飆升至2020年的500億美元,快手也由此成為按GMV算中國第二大直播電商平臺。直播電商之所以對快手收入貢獻(xiàn)有限,主要因為平臺收取的服務(wù)費極低。
買買買
淘寶于2016年推出淘寶直播,成為中國首個推出直播電商的平臺,互聯(lián)網(wǎng)意見領(lǐng)袖紛紛利用自身影響力通過直播推廣品牌并銷售商品。兩年后,快手和抖音也躍躍欲試,但2019年阿里巴巴將直播模式融入龐大的雙十一購物節(jié),中國的直播電商迎來了突圍時刻。
根據(jù)中國電商研究公司100EC的數(shù)據(jù),淘寶直播仍然是直播電商的霸主,2020年通過直播電商銷售實現(xiàn)的約1580億美元GMV中,淘寶直播占了一半以上??焓质堑诙笃脚_,占總量21%。
北京品牌代理PBB Creative的戰(zhàn)略主管亞歷山大?夏皮羅說:“將龐大用戶群變現(xiàn),有點像把(快手)變成真正的社交商務(wù)平臺,非常了不起?!北本┛萍夹袠I(yè)研究公司EqualOcean表示,中國競爭激烈的短視頻行業(yè)里,快手的用戶最活躍,留存率也最高,或許會成為競爭對手里最“社交”的電商應(yīng)用。
但就平臺銷售商品收取的服務(wù)費而言,快手低于競爭對手。
疫情之初快手便降低了農(nóng)民主播的服務(wù)費,方便小賣家在平臺上銷售。快手還采用去中心化的內(nèi)容算法,可將粉絲沒那么多的用戶視頻推送到專題頁面上,以獲得更多曝光。
種種策略幫助快手在中國小城市和農(nóng)村地區(qū)廣受歡迎,而相關(guān)地區(qū)由于市場飽和程度低于上海和北京等頂級城市,已成為電商爭奪的戰(zhàn)場。位于香港的零售業(yè)分析機構(gòu)Coresight Research研究員黃伊蓮(音)表示,快手用戶里有超過85%在小城市生活。
但市場分析機構(gòu)Agency China的研究和戰(zhàn)略經(jīng)理邁克爾?諾里斯表示,服務(wù)費下調(diào)意味著“快手的抽成,也就是商家銷售產(chǎn)品收取的傭金與其他平臺相比相當(dāng)?shù)??!?/p>
雖然快手收取的費用不到通過該平臺銷售商品總量的1%,但由于直播電商仍是年輕且競爭激烈的市場,快手似乎更重視爭取廣泛的用戶基礎(chǔ),而不是賺錢。
諾里斯說,隨著時間推移,快手抽成可能會上升,就像其他科技公司實現(xiàn)規(guī)模效應(yīng)后提高收費一樣。“有些投資者認(rèn)為快手電商業(yè)務(wù)可走高,就會比較注重類似商業(yè)模式,”諾里斯說。
底線
多元化的收入來源也可幫助快手防范突如其來的監(jiān)管。隨著中國對認(rèn)定“低俗”的內(nèi)容加強監(jiān)管,通過銷售虛擬“打賞”禮品獲取大部分收入的常規(guī)直播很容易受到頻繁打擊。
最近,政府禁止了“吃播”,即用戶看主播直播吃東西。去年當(dāng)局就開始批評吃播視頻,稱暴飲暴食直播誘發(fā)食物浪費。據(jù)報道,快手的應(yīng)對方式是在吃播視頻下添加警告標(biāo)簽,鼓勵消費者“節(jié)約食物,合理飲食”。
不過,監(jiān)管機構(gòu)對直播電商的審查也在加強,因為“行業(yè)里出現(xiàn)一些不擇手段的做法,”諾里斯說,他指的是有些主播夸大銷售數(shù)字的現(xiàn)象。
直播還有其他困難要克服。
本周一,代表藝術(shù)家利益的國有機構(gòu)中國音像著作權(quán)集體管理協(xié)會威脅稱要起訴快手侵犯版權(quán),理由是快手上有超過1.5億條未經(jīng)許可使用的歌曲視頻。
不過,監(jiān)管問題似乎并未影響散戶投資者的熱情。2月5日,快手登陸港股,開盤價為338港元,截至今日收盤,快手股票上漲160.87%,報300港元每股,總市值達(dá)12324.58億港元(約1600億美元),成為中國互聯(lián)網(wǎng)第五大上市公司。
如果螞蟻集團成功上市,可能已籌集到345億美元。但隨著螞蟻取消上市,快手的上市案成為了2019年Uber上市以來規(guī)模最大的互聯(lián)網(wǎng)公司上市案。
譯者:夏林
A grey-haired woman in a purple sweater sifts through swathes of bright orange sweet potato stems drying in the sun, the craggy green mountains of China's Zhejiang province looming behind her. Chickens cluck and birds chirp in the background.
"The tastes of my childhood," says the caption. At the bottom of the video is a small yellow shopping cart icon and the words, “farmhouse sweet potato stems 500g.” One click later, viewers can purchase half a kilo of the delicacy displayed in the video for $3. They can also buy a packet of green tea for $13, or, for $21, a jar of homemade loquat honey.
This is 'Wang Wei’s miscellanies of mountain living,' an account run by a man who goes by Wang Wei and documents the rural idyll of his family's village near the city of Lishui in Zhejiang. The account has 445,000 followers on Kuaishou, a Chinese short-video app gearing up for a $5.4 billion IPO in Hong Kong on Friday that is expected to earn the 10-year-old app a valuation of around $60 billion.
Kuaishou is popular with users in rural areas and lower-tier cities, offering small merchants like Wang a platform to share their daily routines and sell their wares. Wang has sold 769 items on his store and uses Kuaishou to promote mountain tours and village homestay experiences.
Kuaishou's penetration outside of China's biggest metropolises is a draw for investors; so is the potential to convert more of its 300 million daily users into active consumers. But a lingering unknown is how Kuaishou can rake in more revenue from the billions of dollars of goods livestreamers like Wang sell.
Short stories
In 2011, Cheng Yixiao, a former engineer at HP, created an app tailor-made for sharing GIFs—the short, animated images that dominated the Internet in the early 2010s. Cheng called the app GIF Kuaishou, or fast hand in English. But in 2013, former Google engineer Su Hua joined the venture and helped refashion Kuaishou as a short-video app, and the "GIF" aspect disappeared from Kuaishou's name and its platform.
The company draws a straight line between its earliest iteration and its current form, claiming in its Hong Kong stock exchange filing application that GIFs “are in essence, the earliest form of short videos.” Naturally then, longform videos followed short videos, and in 2016, Kuaishou introduced livestreaming to its content lineup.
Livestreaming opened a new revenue channel for Kuaishou. The app started selling users virtual gifts—icons and emojis—that they could then send to their favorite individual livestreamers as a “tip.” When a viewer tips a broadcaster, the icon is displayed across the screen and the broadcaster often responds by name-checking the fan who sent it.
In Wang's most recent livestream, which ran for nearly five hours, he wanders around his village, alternately chatting to passersby and responding to livestream viewers' questions and comments. "Thanks for your support, friends!" he says as he ascends a set of stone steps. At another point, in front of a copse of trees, he laughs reading one comment telling him to show himself in the livestream and refuses to do so, protesting, "I'm not good looking!"
In 2017, Kuaishou made over 90% of its revenue from selling tips and, according to the company prospectus, “virtual gifting” is still the app’s greatest revenue generator, accounting for 62% of revenue earned in the first nine months of 2020. Kuaishou’s second-largest money maker is advertising, accounting for 33% of company revenues in the same period.
E-commerce is a less prominent line on Kuaishou’s books, contributing just 5% of revenue in the first nine months of 2020, or roughly $315 million. But that doesn't mean Kuaishou is a small player in China's booming livestream e-commerce scene. In fact, since Kuaishou launched its e-commerce service in 2018, the gross merchandise value (GMV) of goods sold through the app has ballooned from $9 billion in 2019 to $50 billion in 2020, making Kuaishou the second largest livestream e-commerce platform in China by GMV. What's keeping livestreaming e-commerce from contributing more to Kuaishou's bottom line is the app's ultra-low service fees.
Buy buy buy
Alibaba-owned shopping website Taobao became the first platform in China to offer livestream e-commerce—in which Internet influencers use their clout to promote brands and sell merchandise through livestream broadcasts—when it launched Taobao Live in 2016. Kuaishou and Douyin, TikTok's sister app in China, jumped on the trend two years later, but livestream e-commerce in China had its breakout moment in 2019 when Alibaba integrated the model into its massive Singles Day shopping festival.
According to Chinese e-commerce research firm 100EC, Taobao Live remains the dominant player in livestream e-commerce, accounting for over half of the roughly $158 billion in GMV sold through livestream e-commerce in 2020. Kuaishou is the second largest platform, accounting for 21% of total GMV.
“[M]onetizing their user base is kind of turning [Kauishou] into a real social-commerce platform, and it’s exceptional,” says Alexander Shapiro, head of strategy for Beijing-based branding agency PBB Creative. According to Beijing-based tech research firm EqualOcean, Kuaishou has the most active users and the highest user retention rate in China’s competitive short-video industry, making Kuaishou perhaps the most “social” e-commerce app among its competitors.
But Kuaishou ranks lower than its rivals when it comes to the service fees it charges for goods sold on its platform.
Kuaishou made it easier for small-scale sellers to operate on the platform by lowering service fees for farmers at the start of the pandemic. It also implemented a decentralized content algorithm that pushes less popular user videos onto featured pages for more exposure.
Those tactics have helped Kuaishou gain traction in China's smaller cities and rural regions, which have become e-commerce battlegrounds since they are less saturated than top-tier hubs like Shanghai and Beijing. In fact, over 85% of Kuaishou’s user base live in lower-tier cities, according to Eliam Huang, a Hong Kong-based researcher at retail analyst Coresight Research.
But reduced service fees mean “Kuaishou’s take rate—or the amount of commission it charges merchants for selling through its app—is quite low compared to the other platforms,” says Michael Norris, research and strategy manager at market analyst Agency China.
The app receives less than 1% of the total GMV sold through its app, but, with livestream e-commerce still a young and competitive market, Kuaishou seems more focused on building a broad user base than on making money.
Norris says it's likely Kuaishou's take rates will increase over time, just as other tech companies have raised fees after achieving scale. "Investors who see upside in Kuaishou's e-commerce offering will be looking for a similar pattern," Norris says.
Bottom line
Diversifying its revenue streams could also help Kuaishou guard its business against sudden regulation. Regular livestreaming—the medium through which Kuaishou makes most of its revenue, by selling virtual 'tips'—is susceptible to frequent crackdowns as Beijing polices what it considers “vulgar” content.
More recently, Beijing discouraged mukbang livestreams, where viewers watch livestreamers eat. Authorities began to criticize mukbang videos last year, lamenting that the binge-eating streams encouraged food waste. Kuaishou reportedly responded by adding warning labels under mukbang videos, encouraging consumers to “save food, eat properly.”
But regulatory scrutiny of livestream e-commerce is increasing too, as “a number of unscrupulous practices have emerged in the industry,” says Norris, citing influencers who inflate sales figures.
Livestreaming has other pitfalls to contend with too.
On Monday, the China Audio-Video Copyright Association (CAVCA)—a state-backed organization that represents artists—threatened to sue Kuaishou for copyright infringement, claiming the app hosts over 150 million videos that feature unlicensed songs.
Retail investors seem unperturbed by the crackdowns, however, and have poured $302 billion into Kuaishou's share subscriptions—leaving its IPO allotment for retail investors 1,200 times oversubscribed.
Had the Ant IPO gone through, the firm would have likely raised $34.5 billion. But with the Ant IPO scrapped, Kuaishou’s $5.4 billion IPO Friday is now in line to be the biggest Internet sector IPO since Uber went public in 2019.