2003: Starting with Foreign Trade

Chapter 315 The Dual Attack of Physical and Internet Platforms

"What's the point of having a face when you're on the internet! Have those people criticizing you online ever thought about having a face? Did NetEase have any shame when it was doing marketing?"

Tan Jincheng's response left Cheng Hao and Liu Yifei speechless.

These days, people haven't really tried this kind of viral marketing tactic before, or rather, those who do are tacitly aware of it, since it's not something to be proud of, and the outside world doesn't know much about it.

Besides, what I'm doing is at most sending some spam text messages to users. You'll see how outrageous it is during the 3Q War in a few years; that's user hostage-taking.

By the way, 360 was only established last September, and its free antivirus software hasn't been released yet.

"Alright, just make the changes as I suggested. Director Cheng, contact MSN to finalize the cooperation. Don't bother with QQ for now."

The initial promotion relied on Cheng Hao's connections in the internet industry. He had worked as a product manager before, and although he wasn't very good at it, he had accumulated a lot of connections, which was one of the reasons why Tan Jincheng recruited him.

Cheng Hao understood this principle well. The success of Kaixin.com had little to do with the underlying technology; it depended on whether this viral marketing campaign could be effective.

In 2006, in the SNS (Social Networking Service) sector, QQ and MSN held the majority of the market share, while Skype and other software also occupied a certain share.

The websites themselves are a mixed bag, including QQ Space, Renren, Mop, Tianya Community, Douban, Baidu Tieba, and many others.

Among the websites, QQ Zone is still the most popular. Relying on the massive QQ user base, QQ has a very good level of activity. Baidu Tieba is still a relatively minor player at this time, ranking last among the top 10 websites.

While it may seem like a battle among many players, QQ's dominant position is already evident. QQ currently holds the largest market share among software companies, and it has secured investment while also gaining the support of figures who could change Tencent's fate.

QQ is not what it used to be. On the last trading day, the closing price had risen to HK$16.30, and the market value of the 600,000 shares of Tencent invested by Tan Jincheng was close to HK$10 million.

With an investment of only HK$330.8 million, the profit is already close to three times.

“Okay, I’ll arrange it right away. I’ll have the tech team work overtime to finish the website upgrade. Apart from the game currency integration, the other issues Mr. Tan mentioned are easy to resolve. As for MSN, I’ll handle the negotiations myself.”

"Okay, it's all or nothing. You have to get a deal with MSN no matter what method you use."

Then, Tan Jincheng added with a smile, "In addition, once we discuss the cooperation with MSN, Director Cheng can exercise his rights ahead of schedule."

Pressure needs to be met with motivation. Cheng Hao is still very important to Orange Technology. He is like an entry ticket for Tan Jincheng to enter the Internet industry. Only through Cheng Hao can Tan Jincheng truly come into contact with the Internet industry.

Cheng Hao smiled from the bottom of his heart. With the first batch of options exercised, he could personally get 1.5% of the shares. It seemed like not much, but it was actually a lot. He was the one who did the Kaixin.com project, so Cheng Hao was well aware of its prospects after it was launched.

As the legends say, Boss Tan is very generous to his employees.

Although Orange Technology is independent of Flash Group, Cheng Hao has not been completely oblivious to the world during his time in Beicang. He has met with Flash Technology's internal employees, visited the factory, and browsed the local internet.

FlashCheer has a great reputation not only among its internal employees, but also throughout the entire North Warehouse.

Investors and bosses who provide both tasks and compensation are truly commendable.

"Qingqing, please have the finance department prepare to issue bonuses to the two project teams."

If the leader gets to eat meat, the others should also get some soup, so that everyone can see the results of working overtime and stay up late, which will motivate them to work even harder in the future.

As the only outsider present, Liu Yifei didn't quite understand what Tan Jincheng and the others were talking about, but being in such a complex environment as the entertainment industry, her ability to read people's expressions was better than anyone else's.

Cheng Hao, who is hundreds of times older and more skilled than Tan Jincheng, has great faith in Tan Jincheng, which is quite intriguing.

At such a young age, he has excellent management skills and is generous with his money; no wonder he has built such a large business.

After Cheng Hao left, Tan Jincheng tried playing the game of stealing vegetables for a while. He had too few friends, and apart from Cheng Hao and Gu Yanning, Qingqing and Liu Yifei had just started playing the farm, so he didn't find it very interesting.

However, the overall feel of the game is pretty much the same as I remember it, and that's enough.

These kinds of games don't require much skill; the simpler the gameplay, the better. I remember there was a sheep-themed game before I was reborn; it was incredibly simple, and it became a viral sensation online because it captured the psychology of human nature.

"Not bad, you guys are noobs, but you've done a great job making the game this good. On the other hand, try to optimize it a bit more, and collect user feedback after it goes live."

Gu Yanning smiled: "Director Cheng and the Kaixin.com project team gave us a lot of guidance, otherwise we wouldn't have been able to achieve this effect."

Indeed, as Tan Jincheng said, they were all novices. They had just started working and were already doing projects independently, so they weren't very confident. Only Tan Jincheng was bold enough to use them.

"The Happy Farm project team will also be giving out bonuses. You can decide the specific amounts yourself; I'm too lazy to manage that." Gu Qingqing smiled and said, "Okay, I'll arrange for the finance department to handle it in a bit. Tomorrow is Monday, so the money can be deposited directly into the account. But when will Kaixin.com be launched to the market?"

"Don't worry too much about the dates. Once the minor bugs are fixed, we can launch it directly to the market. Let Cheng Hao handle the rest. Just do what you need to do here."

Besides Cheng Hao's visit to MSN to discuss cooperation, Kaixin.com also arranged some other promotional activities.

Orange Technology has money in its account, and it has prepared advertising investment and sponsorships for some internet-related activities. The effect may not be as great as viral marketing, but it can still accumulate some users in the early stages.

In addition, the use of online trolls to generate traffic through soft articles on various social media platforms is also essential, and these are all considered part of Kaixin001's customer acquisition costs.

Gu Qingqing thought for a while and then nodded.

She is the CEO of Orange Technology. This promotion marks her first real appointment. She can't rely on Tan Jincheng for everything; there are some ideas she must make herself.

From today until the end of summer vacation, Gu Qingqing will be stationed in Beicang, living the life of a true urban white-collar worker.
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Monday, April 7th.

At 10:00 a.m., people were bustling around the entrance of a FlashCar flagship store in the city center of Ningbo.

"Why aren't they here yet? Wasn't the meet-and-greet supposed to start at ten o'clock?"

"It should be soon, right? Didn't some gossip media say it arrived in Ningbo yesterday?"

"I heard that buying an electric scooter today comes with an autographed gift, is that true?"

"It's true, but you have to buy the Fengchi Feiyi series to get a signature from Tianxian Meimei, the Shanchi series to get a signature from Li Yuchun, and the Guan series to get a signature from Jay Chou."

"Hehe, I'm planning to buy a Crown Energy. Not only is it cool, but I can also get Jay Chou's autograph."

"Isn't this a meet-and-greet for the 'Fairy Sister'? You're buying Guan Neng?"

"Why not? I met him, and I also got Jay Chou's autograph. It's a win-win situation."

"You can do that? I've learned something new."

"Don't get too excited. There are only 200 spots available. Look at the queue, it's hard to say whether you'll even get one."

In Shanghai, the scene outside the event store in Yicheng was similar. Hu Xiaoyong looked at the long queue outside and couldn't help but shiver in the sweltering heat.

"Brother-in-law, there are too many people here. Won't something bad happen?"

Although Tan Lixin was well-traveled and knowledgeable, he had never seen such a scene before. There were just too many people. And was this blond-haired guy really that popular?
Tan Lixin knew that FlashTech's marketing department had arranged for some people to visit smaller cities to avoid attracting too many visitors, but he knew there was no way there could be that many.

Tan Lixin forced himself to remain calm and said, "Quickly ask the staff at Flash Motors if the security is in place."

Don't let it cause any trouble, or it will become a laughing stock.

Tan Jincheng had never witnessed the level of popularity of Chun Ge at a live event. In addition, most of Chun Ge's fans are non-mainstream, and his popularity in small cities is no lower than that in big cities.

In an era of spiritual scarcity, when young people in small cities heard that a celebrity they liked was coming and they could see their idol without buying a ticket, it was like celebrating the New Year. The news spread like wildfire, and people automatically flocked to Tan Lixin's shop.

Chun Ge's appearance drew screams from the audience. It's summer vacation now, and the audience consisted mostly of young people, including some students and their parents. Their spending power was average, so it's hard to say how many cars they sold. But in terms of popularity, it was even more popular than the event in Ningbo.

In addition, the scene at Jay Chou's concert in Shanghai was packed with people. The security forces arranged by the event organizers, as well as the security forces provided by relevant departments, were necessary to ensure order at the scene.

Overall, Ningbo had the lowest popularity. While many people liked Liu Yifei during the non-mainstream era, the majority of the audience consisted of fans of Chris Lee and Jay Chou. In addition, Jay Chou will release a new album in two months, which also attracted many reporters to the event.

Mobile phones have entered a semi-intelligent era. At the three events, fans who don't care about data usage frequently send photos of the events online in real time. In addition, the marketing department of FlashTech, which organized the events, has also started hot posts on major social media platforms to provide live updates.

This event had been generating buzz online for a long time, attracting far more attention than the event itself. Photos from the event were uploaded online, sparking heated discussions among fans from other cities that were not selected.

"Tell Zhou Ao to send a copy of all the photos from the various events he has collected to Orange Technology."

Kaixin.com is currently fixing bugs and hasn't officially launched yet, but that doesn't matter. There are nine cities covered, so it'll catch up eventually.

Opening an account on Kaixin.com under the name of FlashTech and occasionally sharing news and gossip about the spokesperson to interact with fans is a way to connect online and offline.

(End of this chapter)