Text | Wen Ze

Editor | Yang Xuran< /span>

produced | tide- biz

Before, Station B News of going public in Hong Kong has been reported several times, dating back as early as July 2020, and the amount of funds raised has also increased from US$2 billion to US$3 billion.

One ​​year time In 2019, the market value of station B soared to more than 40 billion US dollars. Overseas investors have voted on the future of Bilibili, but the expectations of external capital are still more than that.

From China, Asia The capital also hopes to participate in the content ecology of station B, and station B also needs this part of capital to amplify its advantages in community content.

Social platform content quality Today, with increasingly mixed fish and dragons, the community is like a "safe haven" for good content, attracting more creators to settle in.

but good content It won't come in vain, but it needs to be invested in it. It will be a matter of course to return to Hong Kong to go public again for financing.

Bilibili stock price trend (2019.3.28-2021.3.16)

New Driven by the upsurge of the second listing of concept stocks in the economy, the return of station B is a matter of course. "Break the circle" - attract new users - expand the content ecology - continue" Breaking the circle" forms a positive feedback between community content expansion and user increment.

But , if the time axis is extended, changes in the portraits of community groups may lead to corresponding changes in the style and quality of community content. Whether the "basic disk" of station B will form a fierce game with incremental users here ?

More importantly , Station B itself is a content community built on the basis of young people’s cultural identity. Will the large-scale entry of new users impact the original cultural identity?

Station B needs to go There are many balance issues.

Expanded window period?

Community Content is still the lifeblood of station B and the starting point of all commercialization.

B 80% of the core users of the site are 18-35 years old, which is also the core image of the site in front of the outside world.

This is even affected by overseas Approved by all parties. Including Cook, Beckham, Kobe and other international figures have been interviewed by the host of UP,The subtext is Recognize Bilibili = Chinese young people.

B station UP master talking to Cook, picture source: Hello teacher, my name is classmate He Weibo

But business and capital The natural impulse to expand is pushing Bilibili to develop from a youth community to a youth-oriented comprehensive platform. Enterprises must grasp the balance between the community atmosphere favored by young users and the expansion of enterprise scale.

Or rather, this It is a balance between interest orientation and cultural orientation. Station B tends to use a better sense of cultural identity to drive better community content output, and to identify good content through a good community atmosphere.

if no earlier With the expansion of users and content, it is difficult for excellent content and UP hosts other than the two-dimensional and ghost animals to appear. Especially education and technical bloggers such as heresy PPT, Luo Xiang said criminal law, food writer Wang Gang, etc., are all examples of a balance between user base expansion and content output.

broken It is impossible for the circle to "give up food because of choking". After the release of the 2020Q4 financial report, Chen Rui, CEO of Station B, proposed the user growth target for the next three years, namely By 2023, the monthly active users of Station B will reach 400 million, doubling in 3 years.

And in the number of users At the same time as content expansion is advancing, Station B is also facing increased investment in content and marketing expenses. The loss in financial data is also the inevitable result of Bilibili's strategic focus on user growth.

2020, B The net profit attributable to the parent of the station is -3.012 billion yuan, but the marketing expenses are 3.492 billion yuan, an increase of 242% year-on-year, which is 1.16 times the net profit attributable to the parent; by dividing the single-season marketing expenses by the new users, it can be found that the revenue of station B The cost of customers is also rising - 2020Q1-Q4, increased from 143.7 yuan to 212.7 yuan, an increase of 48%.

Speed ​​up user acquisition Speed ​​requires more investment in marketing expenses. This is based on the judgment of the growth dividend of video users in the next 3-5 years-Bilibili must seize the window period.

According to station B Goal, For a long time to come, high content costs and Marketing costs.

Station B is more inclined Use financing to solve funding problems. But the commercialization ability must be considered. Letting capital see the potential of commercialization is a prerequisite for attracting capital.

current station B Sources of income include mobile games, value-added services, advertising, e-commerce and other four parts. The main income comes from mobile games and value-added services.

Data source: Bilibili financial report

2019Q3 - In 2020Q4, the revenue of station B doubled. Specifically speaking, the proportion of mobile game revenue continues to decrease, and advertising , e-commerce and other revenues continue to increase, and there is a trend of further expansion.

2020Q4, Station B The proportion of mobile game revenue decreased by 20.8 percentage points compared with 2019Q3. At the beginning of its listing, Station B was almost a game company, and game revenue accounted for nearly 80% of its revenue. Over the past few years, the growth rate of advertising, e-commerce, live broadcast and other businesses at station B has been much faster.

Compared to games, Community content is still the lifeblood of Bilibili and the starting point of its commercialization.

Compulsory Business Questions

B The balance between content and commerce is reached in "stages".

user The basis of platform recognition is a sense of cultural identity, and Bilibili is quite different from other Internet companies in this respect.

December 2019 On the 31st, the New Year's Eve party "The Most Beautiful Night in 2019" at Station B attracted more than 80 million users to watch online at the same time.

May 2020 , "The Back Wave" has become a phenomenal promotional film. The reason for such a big response is obviously not the video or the lines themselves, but the culture and values ​​represented by the film.

These values Identification is not limited to people of a certain age group, but has generalized into a kind of social empathy. More people begin to pay attention to the world that young people care about, and actively integrate into it.

Station B uses An open mind responds to "outside" concerns.

May 20 , On June 26, Bilibili successively launched the brand films "Into the Sea" and "Happy Meeting", trying to show the diversification of Bilibili to the outside world without breaking away from the perspective of young core users.

This is the same as Station B Later, the brand Slogan of "All the videos you are interested in is at Station B" echoed it:Relying on Young people, more inclusive.

The capital market gives these Initiative with positive feedback. In less than two months from May to early July 2020, in the firm declaration of breaking the circle, the stock price of station B rose from below 30 yuan to a maximum of more than 47 yuan, with a cumulative increase of more than 50%.

But in the next half year For a period of time, the market has repeatedly expressed concerns about the profitability/spending ability of Station B. As two sides of the same coin, such voices are inevitable.

Chen Rui once said , "Bilibili is centered on creators, UP masters create content, content attracts fans, and fans motivate UP masters." But in this process, who is motivating Bilibili investors? Obviously excellent content - breaking the circle - more users - commercialization opportunities logic.

But the content industry and What is completely different from other fields is that there is a trade-off between commercial interests and content, and it is not easy for companies to grasp the balance between corporate interests and community content orientation.

Traceback A considerable part of the history of the development of Station B and the formation of its community cultural identity comes from the suppression of profit-seeking content.

For example, 2019 At that time, student He once introduced that the cost of electronic product evaluation is relatively high, and many of them have to rely on family support. Since there is no commercialization, he can earn about 2,000 yuan a month from the "creator incentive" of station B. .

If not for community A sense of cultural identity, relying only on interests as a link to connect all UP owners and users, it is impossible to motivate creators like Mr. He to stay in the community and produce content.

He, Luo Xiang people choose to give up short-term benefits and use better content to pursue longer-term and wider-scale success. This situation is less likely to occur on profit-oriented platforms.

Current stage, capital This situation is accepted. On the one hand, the influence of content is getting bigger and bigger, and the number of people in the "circle" is constantly increasing;In addition On the one hand, in the limited commercial operation, Station B has shown a good momentum:According to past financial data, the gross profit of station B has maintained a growth rate of more than 100% for five quarters. The gross profit has risen from 398 million yuan in the 2019 annual report to 944 million yuan at the end of 2020. The gross profit margin has increased for eight consecutive quarters.

This is a capital I like the growth story very much, and the balance between content and business of Station B is achieved in "stages".

Users who must be retained

increase The richness of community content is the most direct strategy to retain users.

To understand station B How to retain users, it is necessary to understand the user characteristics of Bilibili’s self-built website and the source of cultural identity.

June 2009 On the 26th, an otaku who loves the two-dimensional culture established the predecessor of station B "Mikufans", out of a desire to let more people understand the animation and game culture (Abbreviated as ACG), and give colleagues a simple idea of ​​​​communication space .

Image source: Mikufans

The barrage is B station features. Let Bilibili become a community platform for interactive sharing and ACG cultural creation. This is the original appearance of Bilibili.

From the start, Station B has the characteristics of strong voice of users: community content is completely developed around users, and users have a great influence on community actions.

This For giant companies with stronger control and desire to control, it is almost intolerable, but Bilibili has thus obtained a relatively independent living space.

With Station B With the expansion of user collection, the number of users and the increase of user types, a single Japanese two-dimensional style obviously cannot meet the needs of new users, so the earliest "breaking the circle" starts here.

2013, established More than five years later, with the continuous growth of users, the content of the community has gradually migrated from the two-dimensional to the general two-dimensional. Station B has also added partitions and independent popular rankings, and more than 30 secondary partitions for dramas, comics, games, etc. , almost every user can check himself in at Station B.

According to Zero2IPO research According to central data, from 2009 to 2016, the output value of China's animation industry increased by 2.6 times, reaching 132 billion yuan in 2016; during the same period, the scale of China's animation derivatives market increased by 2.5 times, reaching 45 billion yuan in 2016. Station B, which relies on animation content to attract young users, has caught up with the explosive period of the industry.

After the listing of US stocks, With the support of capital, the speed of "breaking the circle" has been significantly accelerated, and the most obvious manifestation is user data. According to the 2020Q4 financial report of Station B:

1. Active users : MAU reached 202 million, a year-on-year increase of 55%, and DAU reached 54 million, a year-on-year increase of 42%;

2. Paying users : Monthly paying users reached 17.9 million, a year-on-year increase of 103%, and the monthly payment rate was 8.9%, the highest level since listing;

3. Active moon UP hosts: 1.9 million monthly active UP hosts, an increase of 88% year-on-year;

4. Video submission Volume: The average monthly video submission volume is 5.9 million, a year-on-year increase of 109%.

These groups of videos The core content indicators have all increased significantly, indicating that Station B’s past user expansion strategy has been effective.

Get How to retain users is the key, and increasing the richness of content is the most direct strategy to retain users. So on the way of expansion, the label of "two-dimensional" at station B is gradually fading. This does not mean giving up the two-dimensional content.

According to Huoshaoyun statistics , In 2020, after excluding the official account of Station B, the top ten ranked by the number of fans, Lao Tomato, LexBurner, Liangfeng Kaze, Ao Factory Director, China BOY Super Gorilla and many other top UP owners are still related to the second dimension, The rest of the UP hosts——Luo Xiang said criminal law, Jing Hanqing, the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League, Saturday Ye Zoey, and Li Ziqi have different styles, representing the diverse cultural content preferences of users.

Except In addition to supporting various types of UP owners, Bilibili also chose an investment strategy.

According to the financial report of Station B And public data, in 2020, Station B made 26 foreign investments, involving 7 MCN institutions. In 2019, there was only 1 and 8 game companies. The games and value-added services related to these two pieces contributed 8.65 billion yuan , accounting for 72.1% of total revenue in 2020.

Also, prospectus According to the information provided, in the past three years, Station B has made 24 investments, with a total cost of 1.454 billion yuan, mainly various domestic animation companies, investing in the entire industry chain for animation production. Enterprises will become the source of the content of station B.

It can be seen that, It's also a balance. When young users find that Station B is no longer exclusive to young people, they can still stay because of more, more interesting, and more valuable content. And to have these good contents, capital investment is essential.

This is a need An important expenditure item that Bilibili keeps investing in.

Write at the end

The market value stands at 400 Bilibili, which is valued at US$100 million, is one of the best-performing Chinese stocks in the market in the past year. After replenishing capital ammunition again, its ability to produce community content will also be visibly enhanced.

Station B is for capital The desire of the capital has formed a wonderful resonance with the expectations of the capital on Bilibili: Bilibili told the capital that I need money to expand and grow, and one day in the future we will bring capital returns; and the capital will tell Bilibili that you should not rush to make a profit , and more importantly, to expand the user base.

As long as the platform Everything is possible if young users don't leave. After allIn the wave of content video, station B is still the one most sought after by all parties scarce targets.