"The golden age of mobile Internet is really over." This view is becoming the consensus of many people in the industry.
On the one hand, because the traffic dividend has encountered a bottleneck, iResearch's monitoring data shows that the scale of mobile application daily active devices in 2021 is 1.106 billion, an increase of only 1.4% year-on-year; on the other hand, the stock prices of Internet companies have fallen continuously in the past year, such as Tencent and Alibaba, which fell by more than 60% and 77% respectively compared with the highs.
But is this really the case? Recently, I watched the "2022 Mobile Application Trend Insight White Paper" jointly released by iResearch and the Huawei Developer Alliance, and I made a different discovery.
Anti-inward volume, opportunity is here
In the field of mobile applications, are there any new opportunities in the future? The answer is yes.
As can be seen from this white paper, there are still many new opportunities in the field of mobile applications, which the author summarizes into three points: hardcore technology, segmentation mining, and fine operation.
Frankly speaking, the internet and mobile Internet era in the past two decades is more of a traffic era, and the next decade will be the era of hardcore technology. This trend has begun to emerge, and hardcore technologies such as AI, cloud native, cross-end interconnection, and meta-universe are emerging as new opportunities.
For example, AI technology not only brings new experiences for application services such as object recognition, AR display, and semantic processing, but also opens up new spaces for application innovation in terms of application service stability and convenient services. According to the white paper, the user demand rates of object recognition, AR display, semantic processing, intelligent network optimization, and intelligent reminders are as high as 59.6%, 51.3%, 50.3%, 62.4%, and 65.8%, respectively.
Serverless also brings a new development experience to developers, which not only enables developers to focus on business logic to achieve leapfrog productivity changes, but also helps applications reduce costs and develop efficiency with advantages such as versatility, connectivity, efficiency, flexibility, and stability, which has been recognized by the industry as a leapfrog change in software development.
For example, the certification services, cloud functions, cloud databases, cloud storage, and cloud hosting provided by the HUAWEI AppGallery Connect application lifecycle service platform have the characteristics of no O&M, low cost, fast launch, and cross-platform, which have brought practical benefits to many developers. For example, after applying Tuya Paint to access the authentication service, the development workload is reduced, the workload of the server is reduced by about 80%, and the workload of the client is reduced by about 40%. Translation services reduce overall R&D cycles by 50% and labor costs by 45%.
The white paper shows that the application of intelligent interconnection under multiple devices and all scenarios is also deepening. The data shows that users who have a demand for multi-device collaboration use 5.8 smart electronic devices per capita, and they have a high demand for smart reminders, file synchronization, application sharing, IoT data access, and the installation of lightweight applications on smart wearable devices. For example, 66.1% of users expect multi-device collaborative audio and video services to improve the experience.
Mining to segment user needs is another big opportunity in the field of mobile applications. When everyone is complaining about the inner volume, they actually ignore the trend of user powdering, and the needs of subdivided user groups are not really met. For example, in the field of communication and social networking, the social needs of Generation Z and the silver-haired elderly are giving birth to new application manufacturers, and this area is receiving great attention from the capital market. In the field of e-commerce, the needs of users in the sinking market have also spawned "pre-sale + self-pick-up" community e-commerce, and the demand for user consumption upgrades has spawned an e-commerce life service form of "instant delivery + vertical subdivision", such as Focusing on the consumption upgrade needs of maternal and infant users, Wanwu Xinxuan received tens of millions of dollars in C round financing last year.
Segmenting user groups is one thing, and the more refined mining from users to scenarios is also full of opportunities. For example, the epidemic era has made the home fitness scene get the attention of some manufacturers, and the "Hundred Mirrors War" that broke out last year made the field of smart fitness mirrors hot, and this field has also become a field of deep integration of intelligent hardware and sports health services.
The era of inner volume also makes extensive management a history, calling for refined operation. Taking the marketing of mobile application developers as an example, the white paper shows that more and more developers attach importance to crowd segmentation marketing, and carry out customized analysis and marketing based on audience behavior data on the delivery end; on the operation side, operators also pay more attention to the conversion effect of the back link and select high-quality channels through data analysis. In general, we are evolving from the traffic era to the user era, and the value of the user life cycle is enhanced through refined operation.
So, it's not that there are no chances, but that the opportunities have changed, and it's hard to find a new continent with an old map that is anti-involution.
The key to "nuggets" is these four words
In this new world, opportunities and challenges come together. In other words, the same trend is an opportunity for some manufacturers, but a challenge for some manufacturers.
So, the question is, how do you turn challenges into opportunities? I summed it up in four words: "endogenous + outreach".
Endogenous, is to really switch to user-centric hardcore innovation, this is fundamental. Because in the era of inner volumes, it is difficult for small-scale tactical-level micro-innovation to stand out, and only the complete transformation of thinking + the hard-core innovation of science and technology is the right way. For example, in the social world, building an immersive virtual social space based on the needs of Gen Z is a promising opportunity to create an immersive virtual social space with the technology of the metaverse. According to the white paper's survey, Gen Z is highly interested and engaged with virtual social networking, with 63% of Gen Z users using related features for more than 1 hour per week. In this regard, Tencent and Facebook have come to the forefront of innovation.
For another example, the e-commerce field seems to have a fixed pattern, but the introduction of hard-core technology still has a lot of room for breakthroughs. The white paper shows that three-dimensional display and augmented reality can achieve online display of more product categories and immersive fitting experience close to reality shopping, which is the next upgrade point of the e-commerce shopping experience. In this regard, the platform represented by Ikea Place and Snapchat provides consumers with online "try-on" services such as accurate placement of product size and color matching experience based on AR technology, which is welcomed by consumers.
Outreach is to unite all forces that can be united, especially in hard-core technology, and taking advantage of the situation can often shorten the threshold of technology application and quickly achieve a capability transition. In this regard, HMS Core is a popular platform for mobile developers, opening up Huawei's many core technical capabilities to the outside world, helping more and more developers to innovate and build high-quality applications.
For example, in the field of e-commerce, HMS Core has opened up technical capabilities such as artificial intelligence, AR, and network optimization to help e-commerce applications build diversified product display methods such as 3D, AR, and live broadcasting, and can also conduct intelligent product search based on voice, image, scan code, etc. Based on HMS Core's AR Engine, station B membership purchase business allows users to immerse themselves in the details of derivative goods by identifying and tracking the position and posture of 2D images in the environment, and real-time output image gestures to interact with the real world. The data shows that the participation rate of AR activities is about 2 times that of ordinary games, which has helped the overall income of member purchase platforms to increase.
In the field of travel, relying on the positioning services and map services provided by HMS Core, developers can provide a better experience in scenarios with high positioning requirements such as down ramp reminders, taxi pick-up point determination, and sidewalk route planning to meet the needs of users for accurate positioning. For example, by integrating Huawei's high-precision positioning capabilities, AutoNavi has launched the first lane-level navigation experience in the industry, and launched a dynamic guidance function for difficult and complex intersections, minimizing the possibility of users taking the wrong road and detouring, and improving the user's driving navigation experience.
Similarly, relying on weather perception capabilities, developers can provide better services in road planning, congestion prediction, rain and snow safety reminders, and passengers carrying rain gear reminders.
Therefore, the opportunity is left to those who are prepared, even if there is a gold mine in front of you, if you do not have the relevant ability, and the right tools to assist, you still can't dig gold well.
Postscript: Let's start with the metaverse controversy
When it comes to the field of mobile applications, I have to say metacosm.
For some time in the past, the metaverse was hot and controversial. Some people think that the metacosm is hype and gimmick, and some people think that the metacosm is a huge outlet for subverting the future.
The author believes that any hot spot has two sides of one body, from one side is a gimmick, from the other side is an opportunity. The metaverse is like this, rather than thinking that it is a gimmick to ignore, it is better to face up and find the opportunity to combine the metaverse and your own domain. For example, the immersive virtual social space combined with the social field and the metaverse becomes an opportunity to attract Generation Z.
The same is true of the Internet of Things, a field that was also highly controversial in the beginning, but from the current point of view, cross-end interconnection has become a real opportunity. The white paper shows that users have more than 60% demand rate in smart reminders, file synchronization, application sharing, Internet of Things data access, and installation of lightweight applications on smart wearable devices.
Similarly, the mobile Internet is the same, on the one hand, the golden age is no longer there, but on the other hand, it is a new golden age. In other words, the development path of the mobile application field has changed, and it is no longer the extensive era of traffic- only, but the era of refinement of only technology. In this context, mobile developers can only turn challenges into opportunities if they keep pace with the times, be determined to change, and be intrinsically outreached.
For example, rather than rolling into the domestic market, mobile developers should look globally and dig for gold in a larger market. The data shows that in 2021, the overseas application distribution volume of Huawei's application market will increase by as much as 56% year-on-year. The white paper also points out that the compound annual growth rate of revenue of mainland overseas applications in the Middle East, Africa and North America from 2018 to 2021 is more than 50%, which means that going to sea has great revenue potential.
Of course, the opportunity is always left to the manufacturers who are prepared and choose the right direction. The wind and waves are strong, and it is more necessary to choose the right partner. In this regard, Huawei AppTouch integrates resources such as global mobile operators and car companies to help developers quickly access the global market. Developers only need to upload once through AppGallery Connect to achieve global distribution, and can also get global settlement one-stop service, localization operations, multi-channel promotion and other comprehensive support.
Dickens put it this way in A Tale of Two Cities: "This is the best of times, this is the worst times; this is the age of wisdom, this is the age of ignorance; this is the season of light, this is the season of darkness; this is the spring of hope, this is the winter of disappointment; there is everything before people, there is nothing in front of people; people are walking into heaven, people are going into hell." ”
For mobile developers, the worst times and the best times are possible, and the key is to walk on the right path.