Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

By the end of the year, Zhihu, a veteran content community in which the market had been silent for a year, acted frequently.

Recently, Zhihu officially launched the online vocational education platform "Zhixue", which includes App, web page, enterprise version and other products.

A few years ago, the online education industry, especially K12 training, was once a very hot track, which was favored by capital. however, with the landing of the "double reduction" policy, the related industrial chain suffered a great impact. Well-known K12 training institutions, such as New Oriental, Yuanfudao, Xueersi and other leading players have been transformed.

Quality-oriented and professional adult education tracks have become the first choice for the transformation of online education enterprises because of their homogeneity. The influx of a large number of new players, coupled with the old players not to be outdone, the already narrow track is slightly crowded.

Is it really a good choice for Zhihu to join the Bureau at this time?

Zhihu? Choreographer! Zhihu is very new, from the post-60s to Generation Z is its user group; Zhihu is also very old, officially launched on December 19, 2010, it is only one year and three months younger than Weibo.

In ancient times, Zhihu used the invitation system as the registration method, and the first batch of seed users were only 200, including well-known entrepreneurs such as Li Kaifu, Ma Huateng, Wang Xing and Wang Xiaochuan, as well as outstanding professionals in their respective fields. These users created 8000 questions and 20,000 answers in the first 40 days.

It is this "small and sophisticated" model, established Zhihu professional platform tonality, and baidu know, Sogou asked a number of competitors to open the essential gap. A large number of users were attracted by the professional atmosphere of Zhihu, and even an invitation code of Zhihu was sold to hundreds of yuan on Taobao.

Then, in 2013, Zhihu shifted from the invitation system to the public, and the number of registered users directly increased tenfold in a year. As the saying goes, you can't have both a fish and a bear's paw. Although there is a flow of Zhihu, the quality of users has dropped sharply. The reputation of the platform has also changed from "professional" to "shrewd".

Some, such as "thanks for inviting, I am in the United States, just got off the plane", "Zhihu, share the story you just made up" and so on have become Zhihu's new impression.

In 2016, known as the "first year of paying for knowledge", Zhihu launched the advertising business, that is, information flow ads appeared on the question and answer page.

In 2018, Zhihu launched the paid content for knowledge, upgraded the "knowledge market" to "Zhihu University" and officially began to sell courses.

In 2019, Zhihu launched the "salt selection" business, focusing on paid online novels, in which romance and love story columns accounted for 87% of the hot Top100 of salt selection columns.

Source: Zhihu these novels often appear under all kinds of questions, most of them are narrated in the first person, inclined to oral expression, have a sense of reality, and are named "Zhi Zhi style" novels by the outside world. When the user is attracted by the beginning, Zhihu immediately pops up a hint of "open a member with a minimum of 0.3 yuan / day and view the complete content", requiring the user to sign up for salt membership.

It is this novel of "knowing the body" that contributes 335 million yuan to Zhihu's paid membership income (Q3 of 2022).

These "knowing body" love novels bring a large number of readers and paying users to Zhihu, and Zhihu is also paid very handsomely. According to the Times Finance and Economics report: novels published on Zhihu are estimated on the basis of like data. on average, each novel is worth 5-10 yuan, and if you write one or two short stories about 10,000 words a month, you can easily earn more than 10,000 yuan.

The "professionalism", which was once propped up by well-known entrepreneurs and elites in various fields, has gradually been diluted by articles of sweet love and love abuse. Zhihu gradually became an editor.

Commercialization is difficult on November 25, 2022, Zhihu founder, Chairman and CEO Zhou Yuan issued an open letter emphasizing Zhihu's three future directions, namely, community orientation, content ecology and vocational education.

The letter said that "professional discussion" will be Zhihu's long-term position, and Salt selection members plan to create 5 million creators with an income of more than 1 million in the next three years; at the same time, APP, a vocational education business with Zhihu's layout for three years, will launch a "knowledge learning program", hoping to join hands with more educational institutions to improve educational efficiency through flow support, content ecological construction and technical support.

The profit model has always been the Achilles heel of Zhihu. Ironically, there are hundreds of questions about "how to make money" on Zhihu, but Zhihu has failed to find its own "way to make money".

According to Zhihu's latest financial data, Zhihu's total income in the Q3 quarter of 2022 was 912 million yuan, an increase of 10.7 percent over the same period last year. The average number of monthly active users (MAU) reached 97 million, a decrease of 4.2 million compared with 2021, and the average monthly payment of 10.9 million members, an increase of 99.5 percent over the same period last year and a net loss of 279 million yuan.

Enlarge the timeline, from 2019 to 2021, Zhihu's net losses for three consecutive years were 820 million yuan, 340 million yuan and 750 million yuan respectively, which failed to achieve the profit target.

In other words, Zhihu's monthly active users and net loss have been losing blood. In this regard, Yuan Yuan said bluntly at the earnings report last week: "the result of our efforts makes us more confident to invest in long-term growth while striving for short-term profits."

The main revenue of IPO Zhihu is divided into four parts, namely advertising, paying members, content business solutions and vocational training, which account for 22%, 37%, 29% and 9% of Zhihu's third-quarter revenue, respectively.

Zhihu's four main businesses are generally divided into two parts, one is advertising and content business solutions for B-side, and the other is C-side paid membership and vocational training business.

As a content platform, advertising and content business solutions are undoubtedly fundamental, but Zhihu's "housekeeping skills" have repeatedly failed. According to the financial report, advertising revenue in Q3 in 2022 was 197 million yuan, down 39 percent from 321 million yuan in the same period in 2021, while revenue from content commerce solutions was 265 million yuan, down 5 percent from 278 million yuan in the same period last year.

The advertising business has been frustrated one after another, but the business of paying members and vocational training for the B side continues to rise. In particular, the vocational training business made a net profit of 78 million yuan in the Q3 quarter of 2022, an increase of 457.5% over the same period last year.

With a growth rate of nearly 4.5 times, no wonder Zhi can't wait to continue to expand his vocational training business. Therefore, it is only natural to know the launch of the school App.

Zhihu needs a heart tonic too much.

According to the public information of the encirclement and suppression of adult education in Dachang, since 2019, Zhihu has made multiple layouts in the vocational education track by means of intermodal transportation, self-management, acquisition and so on.

At present, Zhihu has launched hundreds of licensed courses from universities and publishing houses, including artificial intelligence, programming, law exams, humanities, workplace office, musical instruments, CET-4 and 6, film and television editing, visual design and other industries.

Although Zhihu's road to adult education is progressing smoothly, there are also many thorns on the road, and the biggest challenge is direct competitors. in addition to traditional training institutions, there are also many Internet companies targeting adult education.

Douyin, Kuaishou, bilibili and other short video content platforms are also making efforts in the field of adult education, of which bilibili is the most active. Pan-knowledge content accounts for 45% of bilibili's total video playback on the entire platform, said Chen Rui, chairman and CEO of bilibili. 113 million users studied in bilibili in 2021, more than three times the number of college students in China.

Thanks to the strong learning atmosphere created by the vast number of excellent creators, watching video on bilibili has become the first choice for many users.

In addition to the short video platform, NetEase's educational genes are more rich, and NetEase Yun classroom was launched as early as 2012 to explore vocational education. In 2019, NetEase Yun classroom was incorporated into NetEase youdao, and the "youdao Adult Education Division" was established to upgrade the brand.

So far, NetEase Yun classroom has established cooperation with a number of education and training institutions, with 4,100 courses and more than 50000 class hours, covering more than 10 popular categories such as practical software, IT and Internet, foreign language learning, workplace skills, financial management, examination certification and so on.

Adult vocational education is not a new track. In the golden age of K12, adult education has been regarded as a chicken rib. The biggest reason is the uncertainty of adults.

Although many adults are willing to continue to learn and are willing to pay for professional and high-quality content, insufficient rigid demand, short user cycle and low conversion rate are the natural defects of adult education track compared with K12.

For adults with limited time and energy, 99% of them are energized in their spare time, unable to devote themselves to full-time study, and often give up halfway.

For Zhihu, it is still difficult to regard vocational education as one of the three major directions in the future.

This article comes from the official account of Wechat: zinc Finance (ID:xincaijing), author: sun Pengyue

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