Cheng Jianfeng (Shang Huan) Dataobao Technology 2023-05-15 16:20 Posted in Zhejiang
This article introduces our data based on the integration of Taobao's business to reach users in a timely manner through manufacturer channels, attract users to download/use Taobao, and improve Taobao's DAU and user stickiness.
preface
▐Industry background
When the size of the user base no longer grows, it is especially important to increase the frequency and duration of user use. In the past, Taobao generally used a large number of external media advertising, which required a lot of capital costs to achieve off-end user drainage, and with the fierce competition of e-commerce, it became more difficult to improve ROI.
The external environment is also quietly changing, due to the overall decline in total domestic mobile phone shipments, and the user replacement cycle has become longer, domestic manufacturers have begun to seek diversified commercialization, hardware media, around the content ecology, APP growth service layout, on the one hand, hope to open up APP services to improve the ease of use / user dependence of the mobile phone ecology, on the other hand, hope to create a second pillar in addition to hardware revenue through the content advertising ecology; Various manufacturers have gradually launched a large number of free/paid desktop reach products, such as widget components, negative screen cards, system searches, system suggestions, desktop widgets, shortcuts, etc., and gradually formed around the reach ecology of manufacturers' channels.
With the help of the manufacturer channel to reach the ecosystem, we began to create a new and systematic way of desktop reach of manufacturers, based on the data of integrating Taobao's business, and reaching users through the manufacturer channel in a timely manner to attract users to download/use Taobao. In addition to external media advertising and PUSH/SMS, find new sources of drainage and improve Taobao's DAU and user stickiness.
▐ Channel analysis
Based on the form and functional characteristics of the channel itself, we classify the channel as follows, and score the channel on 4 important dimensions that we focus on:
Content expression: the richness of the channel's content performance, which plays a great role in subsequent business operations, user experience and conversion effects;
Content timeliness: The timeliness of content data updates of channels, and some businesses will have strong demands on timeliness, such as logistics and flash sales
Boot cost: the channel needs the boot installation cost before reaching the user, some channels need the user to open permissions or actively add to the desktop to use, high guidance cost is an important factor hindering the channel volume
Conversion effect: Based on the expressiveness, timeliness and operational space of the content, based on the experience of Handao, roughly evaluate the exposure conversion rate of each channel.
- Typical effect of a Desktop Widget
- Typical effect of Search Recommendations
- Typical effect of [other channels].
▐ Platform positioning
Based on the above industry background, channels and competitive product analysis, we decided to create our own desktop reach system for manufacturers.
Core objectives: to unite with the manufacturer ecosystem to develop a new position for Taobao's extension, and to reach the operation system for manufacturers integrating experience and efficiency precipitation and device-cloud, bringing Taobao DAU and access frequency increments.
▐ Achievement Showcase
Before we get into design and thinking, let's throw out our results. After nearly a year of construction, we have achieved rapid growth of terminal UV, first call UV, and DAU exclusivity by fitting manufacturers to explore channels, link business to reveal content, and precipitate infrastructure to improve efficiency.
【On the business side】, we achieved an increase of more than 2 times in the UV terminal compared with the beginning of the fiscal year, of which the proportion of the first call is very high; According to the business purchase price, it can save a lot of money for the company in one year; In addition, according to the strict AB caliber comparison within the use of Zeng, the manufacturer ecology is already the first source of Taobao DAU increment (October and November analysis).
【On the technical side】, we have precipitated the manufacturer's ecological experience platform from 0 to 1, as the infrastructure foundation for linking manufacturers and Taobao, there are already 6 operable channels, 2 non-operable channels, and 30+ downstream links, with rapid channel/business access, general operation and experience management and control capabilities, significantly improving the efficiency of business extension, channel expansion, and business operation.
Problems and challenges
▐ Challenging the status quo
Traffic problems: The high cost of connecting new channels and the lack of sustainable operations of old channels make traffic growth difficult
Comparison: Alipay's various channels, in-depth operation & combined positioning characteristics (tool attributes account for 70%+); Taobao's advantage lies in the richness of business content, and there is an opportunity to surpass Alipay on specific channels;
Efficiency: Complex channels, different vendor characteristics, and repeated business docking in various fields lead to low service extension efficiency
Comparison: Alipay has a unified vendor reach platform, providing perfect infrastructure and simplifying the cost of business docking
Experience problems: Channels are independent and difficult to perceive each other, and low-quality content is frequently drained, resulting in a deteriorating user experience
For example, there are multiple user complaints and feedback, some manufacturers' paid resource bits are forced to appear on the desktop and cannot be closed, and the main body of user complaints is Taobao
For example, users in the external environment have a stronger awareness of privacy protection, and the background environment of the system is more complex, which needs to balance user experience (interruption, timeliness), service requirements, and device-side performance (power consumption, lag).
▐Coping strategies
Solve [Traffic Growth Difficulties]:
【Incremental expansion】Mining incremental matrix, using desktop widgets as the main channel, enriching the reach product matrix, multi-channel capability mining and construction (search, floating window, calendar, voice assistant, Harmony FA native card, negative one screen, etc.).
[Stock quality improvement] can be put into good operation, build a visual operation delivery platform, realize [operation configuration-> material delivery-> data return] closed-loop SOP, improve business operation efficiency, provide crowd, experiment, strategy, algorithm and other operational intervention capabilities, and improve traffic conversion efficiency through continuous iteration.
Solve the problem of low service extension efficiency:
【Server side】Unified data channel, platform side convergence the complexity of each product access link, external smoothing out the differences of various manufacturers (desktop customization, desktop version fragmentation, different permissions), internal simplification of downstream business scenario access costs, etc., to achieve high-timely, scalable, easy-to-access vendor access channels;
【Client】The content is dynamic, and the end side breaks through the release restrictions through remote configuration, dynamic layout, and template investment, and improves the efficiency of existing channel business.
Guarantee [User Product Experience]:
【Client】Ensure user experience through low-power technology, interactive experience innovation, and real-time performance.
【Server】Ensure user experience through homogeneous content downscaling, refresh interval control, and low-quality content filtering.
Platform design
▐Overall architecture
Combined with the above coping strategies, we first define the following models for business entities and development functions:
【Business Model】Definition:
Application: Client APP, support middle office horizontal output
Channel: One system feature/capability of the manufacturer, a single application can support access to multiple channels
Business: The business identity created under the same application
Activity: Under specific application + specific channel, the configuration of trigger users created by specific services, mainly including timing, scenario, content, crowd, etc
Materials: Mainly refers to the reach content in the activity, and the optimization, precipitation and interactive innovation of the content help us improve the quality of traffic and user experience
【Development Model】Definition:
Strategy Library: refers to the delivery strategy adopted based on business requirements in the activity configuration, mainly the optimization combination of timing, scenario, content, and crowd
Experiment library: the ability to conduct AB experiments and effect recovery comparisons in different activity strategies
Material library: measurement, precipitation, comparison of high-quality material content, and recommendation of similar activity materials
On this basis, to achieve the operation SOP of "business supply-> operation launch-> effect recovery-> strategy adjustment", the platform focuses on the construction of five points: [channel & business rapid access], [general operation capability], [unified experience control], and [stability guarantee].
▐Fast access to channels & services
[External]: Classify according to the [data request mode] of the channel, provide [unified data channel], and realize the complexity and difference of the user's terminal operating system type, system version, model, authority and other environments;
Manufacturer direct request type: the manufacturer's system side directly initiates the request, and after the data is directly returned to the manufacturer, the manufacturer's system is responsible for display, typical such as smart screen recognition, Xiaomi picture search, etc
APP data pull: The APP side directly initiates the request, and after the data is directly returned to the APP, the APP/manufacturer system is responsible for display, typical such as WIDGET, lock screen component, iOS search, etc
APP data push type: from the cloud to identify the time of reach, actively push data to the client, and the APP/manufacturer system is responsible for display, typical such as floating windows, live activity updates, etc
[Internal]: Abstract [content delivery mode], provides multiple service access modes, and supports rapid and on-demand docking of downstream services
Resource delivery: Content update is realized based on pure operation configuration, typical of which are the four operation pits of the ICON Quick List, which are manually configured and adjusted by the operation
Business docking type: Implement content updates based on downstream business supply, typical data such as gold rush coin widgets
Hybrid type: The mixing of the above two modes, part of which comes from manual configuration of operations, and part of which comes from downstream business supply, typical such as iOS system search, 2000+ search phrases are the product of multi-party data mixing
- Unified data channels
There are various access points outside the manufacturer's end, including system widgets, widgets of various manufacturers, floating windows, calendars, searches, etc.; Different access methods may reveal different business data to users, have their own data refresh links, refresh frequencies, and there are differences in content, manufacturers, systems, and devices. Therefore, we implement [Unified Data Protocol], [Refresh Interval Control], and [Aggregate Request Mode], converge all channels together, smooth out all channel differences, and align to a certain time for unified scheduling, which can not only keep the request volume orderly and controllable, but also reduce the access cost of services.
- Efficient downstream docking
Provides pluggable docking mode to meet the service delivery requirements of different types of content such as "resource delivery", "service docking", and "mixed", and services can access the multi-layer capabilities provided by us on demand, minimizing the repeated implementation cost of downstream services.
The self-provisioning platform can meet the requirements of various flexible configurations of operations, and the unified delivery engine provides a variety of business strategy scheduling, and for businesses with self-built configuration capabilities, you can choose to connect to the delivery engine layer and cooperate with your own business operation system. For businesses that do not want to build their own operation systems, you can complete the operation configuration on the vendor platform after providing downstream business data docking.
▐ General Operational Capabilities
- Drop SOP abstraction
Because the required data content of each channel varies greatly, for example, widget is UI display with interface and the interface is customized by the business, while ICON Quick List is a standard data list format, just give the title, icon and end link. Therefore, it is necessary to abstract a set of general operational capabilities, sink the general delivery capabilities, operation strategies, and data measures to one level, and the differential content of each channel is used as a content configuration field and handed over to each channel to configure itself, so as to achieve rapid expansion and rapid operation of channels.
MATERIALS REPRESENT THE UI DISPLAY AND INTERACTION OF ACTIVITIES, ANALOGOUS TO HTML AND CSS, AND WE CAN ACHIEVE RICH EXPRESSION THROUGH MATERIAL CONSTRUCTION ON CHANNELS WITH DYNAMIC RENDERING CAPABILITIES SUCH AS LOCK SCREEN COMPONENTS, WIDGETS, AND LIVE ACTIVITIES.
Business supply represents downstream data supply, such as gold rush coin to be collected, shopping cart price reduction information, logistics status updates, etc., these business data need to be bound to materials, and finally presented as a dynamic interface for users.
Material + business supply forms the final content to reach users, and the fixed investment dimension means that we can target multiple pieces of content to more matching users, and the dimensions we currently have include crowd, manufacturer brand, system type, APP version, model, effective time, exposure fatigue, priority, etc.
Based on the common state-driven process + data recycling process, each activity is normalized to achieve a closed-loop process of configuration delivery, data recycling, and policy optimization.
- Material building
The interface of some channels has a large room for adjustment, so we meet the different interface display requirements of each business through the dynamic solution of the client, which greatly improves our R&D efficiency and channel operation capabilities. FOR EXAMPLE, THE FOLLOWING WIDGET IS THE INTERFACE GENERATED BY DYNAMICALLY BUILDING:
▐Experience unified control
- End-side power optimization
The timeliness of content will greatly affect the user's perception, for example, if the start information of popular live broadcasts is not updated in time, it may cause users to miss the live broadcast, resulting in greater public opinion; Frequent updates will cause Houtao to frequently pull up the main process in the background and frequently request data, resulting in background power consumption and networking problems, which is easily perceived by the manufacturer's security software and causes user complaints, and the water level pressure on the server side also increases significantly.
Therefore, with the help of the construction of [unified data channel], we add a layer of refresh interval control, and realize the interval control of the cloud pipe end through the control of the refresh interval of the channel level and the interface level; And the end side also uses [lightweight desktop independent process] to achieve data update through lightweight process.
The combination of the two minimizes power consumption issues caused by data updates on the user's mobile phone.
- Negative feedback monitoring
Last year was the starting stage of our desktop channel, and the content conflicts, duplication, and interruption to users between multiple channels were not high, but we also began to pay attention to this aspect of content in advance. It is mainly observed through two aspects of data:
- General public opinion: Observe public opinion data related to desktop channels
- Channel metrics: For each channel, we are gradually defining their relevant negative indicators to observe user retention and disgust.
- For example, the WIDGET channel, we and use additive products and BI to define user retention observation, which is used to measure the quality of channel content;
For negative feedback monitoring, we are also gradually improving, the difficulty of external channels compared to the end is that many channels cannot get the client buried point, the behavior is controlled on the system side, and the effect can only be indirectly measured through the server-side request and end-end tracking.
For channels with low-quality content and high user interruption, we will continue to improve traffic control and early warning strategies to ensure the overall experience of users outside the terminal and avoid being regarded as rogue software by users.
▐Stability guarantee
The traffic distribution mechanism in our cloud is a distribution process from interface > channel - > business - > configuration - > downstream supply, and the effect of layer-by-layer distribution will be formed in the aggregate request mode. At each layer, we have corresponding flow limiting protection, try to control large abnormal traffic fluctuations in the front link, do not affect the time-consuming downstream, and require all channels under the business to configure the bottom configuration when releasing the event configuration to ensure the end-side user experience and content correctness.
- Business monitoring
Internally, we format all the requested processing data and save it to SLS logs, and then generate channel-level, business-level, and activity-level request success rate, failure rate, request volume, and some technical dimension data based on the real-time processing link, configure it for sunfire monitoring, and precipitate it to ODPS tables for downstream use.
- Current limit protection
In terms of current limiting, we use a multi-layer current limiting mechanism, the ingress link current limit is as large as possible, the service current limit is as accurate as possible, and the downgraded disaster recovery link is taken during the current limit, showing the bottom configuration content:
- Ingress current limiting: Aserver current limiting, Sentinel inlet current limiting, Noah current limiting
- Service throttling: channel-level throttling, business-level throttling, and downstream service throttling
And the service throttling, can accept the switch dynamic configuration, because the business is still efficient iteration, the traffic changes very fast (compared with the beginning of the fiscal year, our traffic increased by more than 20 times), so through the switch dynamic configuration service throttling, in the event of real-time warning, you can easily adjust the current limit allocation to ensure the dynamic allocation of machine resources and capacity.
- Degrade disaster recovery
All channels of business, when configuring online activities, must configure back-up activities; The activity content is enabled when some online throttling scenarios, downstream service exceptions, and hit activity configuration are abnormal, efficiently and quickly returning the user's basic available data to ensure the user experience in abnormal scenarios.
Outlook for the future
【Business dimension】, moving towards complex scenario business solutions, providing global reach solutions for services by opening up internal and external resources, improving business transformation effects and reducing business docking costs.
Outside the end -> Inside the end: the main pulling integration, the end outside reach (manufacturer channel, PUSH), the end inside (POP, fixed pit)
For example, iOS search delivers keywords, and users can issue specific channel benefits after searching for clicks on the system
In-end -> Out-of-Device: The main service extension is added, based on the behavior and operation of the user
For example: the user in the terminal enters the gold mining coin, and the POP guide to add the gold mining coin widget pops up;
For example, the user's search and browsing behavior can directly write the product information of interest to the system search, bringing new traffic increments;
【Technical dimension】, we will focus on the vendor ecology and user experience, continue to complete the expansion of new channels and deep digging of existing channels, build content undertaking strategies and experience control solutions, and create a multi-channel/experience-guaranteed/high-conversion device-cloud integrated vendor reach engine.
Client: Explore more features of manufacturers/systems, cooperate deeply with manufacturers, and combine core technologies such as low power consumption and keepalive to bring more incremental reach
Platform side: enrich content supply, improve undertaking strategies, experience control, improve traffic conversion efficiency and ensure user experience, and achieve sustainable development.
Team introduction
We support Taobao, Tmall core e-commerce, Xianyu, Diantao and other innovative businesses, serve 900 million users, and as the core technical team, provide basic technical support for the Double 11 shopping carnival every year. We have deep accumulation of Android and iOS system technology, the world's largest e-commerce scenario and first-class mobile technology platform, and create industry-leading technology products, covering dual-end architecture, performance optimization, APP framework, observable technology, high-performance middleware, user growth & platform reach, privacy compliance and other key areas, and are committed to the cutting-edge technology exploration of mobile systems and vendor ecosystems, and continue to precipitate leading and general technology products in the mobile field.