Reborn in 08, a heretical cultivator starting a business

Chapter 99: 500 Million Users, Payment Dilemma!

On the fourth day, the number of WeChat users exceeded 435 million, and the number of users of "WeChat Farm" exceeded 380 million.

On the fifth day, the number of WeChat users exceeded 476 million, and the number of users of "WeChat Farm" exceeded 420 million.

On the sixth day, August 13th, the number of WeChat users exceeded 5.2 million, and the number of users of "WeChat Farm" exceeded 4.6 million.

In the first three days, WeChat was the main driver of user growth for "WeChat Farm".

But starting from the fourth day, "WeChat Farm" became the game that drove the growth of WeChat users!

WeChat, which had been experiencing a bottleneck in user growth, saw a surge in downloads and a rapid expansion in user numbers thanks to the emergence of "WeChat Farm".

Moreover, WeChat's user growth rate is getting faster and faster!

There's no other reason than that there was a newbie gift pack a couple of days ago; if you stayed online for more than an hour, you could get two bags of high-speed fertilizer for free.

But it was gone on the third day!
However, they launched a new user acquisition campaign!
For every new user successfully invited, both the inviter and the invitee will receive a mystery box.

You are guaranteed to receive two of the following: regular fertilizer, high-speed fertilizer, rapid-release fertilizer, advanced seeds, one day's worth of dog food, or 10 diamonds.

For every 5 new users successfully invited, the inviter will receive an additional Super Box.

Guaranteed to yield two of the following: Rapid Fertilizer, Super Fertilizer, Rare Seeds, Chow Chow, Three-Day Dog Food, or 30 Diamonds!
It's no surprise that all the players were excited when they saw this event!
Successfully invite a new user and receive a mystery box.

Successfully invite 5 new users and receive 5 Mystery Boxes and 1 Super Box!
Fertilizer, seeds, Chow Chow, dog food, and diamonds are all available, with two guaranteed options!

Such generous rewards are irresistible even to paying players, and even more so to free-to-play and low-spending players!

They shared their referral links on platforms such as QQ, alumni websites, Baidu Tieba, and Tianya Forum!

With so many people sharing it, it's hard for netizens not to be tempted, and they all click the link to download and try it out.

As a result, he became so engrossed in it that he couldn't stop.

In order to get more referral rewards, they also started calling on friends and sharing everywhere.

Even retired aunties have stopped playing mahjong and are now asking their QQ friends to download WeChat and grow vegetables together.

In a short time, the number of users of both WeChat and FarmVille exploded!

The number of new users per day was only over 200,000 in the first two days, but it reached over 300,000 and then over 400,000 on the third day!
In just six days, WeChat gained 175 million new users!
Furthermore, the daily increase is getting higher and higher, far from reaching its limit.

At this rate, the number of WeChat users is expected to exceed 10 million by the end of the month!

The user growth effect of "WeChat Farm" is terrifying. No wonder it is the national game that sent Kaixin.com and Xiaonei.com to the top!
And the revenue generated was even more staggering!

In the past few days, the daily revenue of "WeChat Farm" has been around 200 million yuan.

The main source of revenue is from new annual members.

The paid user ratio is not high, only around 6%, far lower than Tencent games' 8%-10%.

But the quality is high, and most of them directly recharge the 96 annual membership fee!
U-Tuan International's revenue is even more staggering.

As WeChat users grow, U-Tuan International's daily revenue is also rising steadily.

On the 10th, the company's revenue exceeded 2700 million in a single day.

The number of new cases surpassed 3000 million on the 13th!
A resounding surge forward!
Looking at these numbers, Wang Junshan was not happy at all, and even called an emergency meeting.

“Just yesterday, Alibaba robbed us of another 30 yuan!” Wang Junshan sighed.

"???" Everyone was completely bewildered and puzzled.

Tang Jinghe instantly understood everything:
"The boss means... a commission on Alipay's transaction volume!"

"That's right!" Currently, YouTuan Technology's own payment platform is still under development, and it can only use Alipay.

Initially, the fee rate was the same as that for non-Taobao merchants, which was 1.2%!

Later, I saw that YouTuan Technology had a high daily turnover, reaching tens of millions, and I could get 12 yuan in commission every day, so it was definitely a big client.

Alipay then took pity on us and lowered the fee to the same rate as other Taobao merchants—1%!

Yesterday's revenue was 30 million, and Alipay gave away 3000!
Over the past few months, several million have already been siphoned off.

Wang Junshan was somewhat frustrated!
Tang Jinghe sighed: "It's really not good to let Alipay take away millions, but there's nothing we can do. Our own payment platform hasn't been developed yet."

Ning Shen, the head of WeChat Pay, nodded: "Yes, WeChat Pay has been developed very quickly over the past few months. The R&D is basically done, and only the integration with bank interfaces remains, which is very time-consuming."

"We have to connect to each bank's interface one by one and push forward with each one. So far, we have only successfully connected with one bank."

"It will take about two more months to connect with five banks."

"For WeChat Pay to be fully launched, it needs to cover 15-20 mainstream banks, just like Alipay and WeChat Pay, which will take about six months!"

"In about six months, we'll have to send tens of millions more to Alipay!" Wang Junshan said with a sigh.

Dealing with banks isn't easy.

Banks have their own procedures, and WeChat Pay can only cooperate with them.

Next, YouTuan Technology's turnover increased more and more, with Alipay taking hundreds of thousands of yuan every day, which amounted to tens of millions of yuan a month, and sixty million yuan in half a year!
No, eighty million, or even hundreds of millions!

Especially after the start of the school year, YouTuan group buying was launched!
There's also a huge boom in the mother and baby product category!
Vipshop will be launched later!
Then YouTuan.com's revenue will skyrocket. With Alipay taking a 1% cut, it's entirely possible that they could rake in hundreds of millions over six months!
Wang Junshan was very upset that Alipay took away 100 million yuan!

"Is there any way to get WeChat Pay launched as soon as possible?"

If we can launch a month earlier, we can save Alipay tens of millions of yuan in commission.

Going online six months earlier can save you hundreds of millions!

That's not a small amount of money.

Tang Jinghe frowned: "It's difficult. The banks aren't easy to talk to, and it's hard to speed things up. Even if we use connections, it's still difficult."

"This is indeed a problem, but there are solutions!"

Lin Feng, deputy head of WeChat Pay and former Alipay engineer, began by saying:

"If a proper integration takes six months, why don't we just acquire an existing payment platform and integrate it with WeChat Pay?"

"We won't have to wait half a year; it can be launched in a month."

"???" Tang Jinghe was completely dumbfounded: "You can do that?"

Wang Junshan's eyes lit up: "This idea sounds feasible!"

Due to lax regulation, payment licenses only appeared in mid-2011.

Currently, all payment platforms can operate without applying for a license, and are in a stage of unregulated growth.

There are hundreds of payment platforms of all sizes, and even more payment gateway technology teams.

Only a very few platforms, such as Alipay, Tenpay, and 99Bill, are thriving, while the rest are mostly poorly managed.

Countless others are on the verge of bankruptcy or have already gone bankrupt!
Lin Feng laughed and said, "Those payment platforms and payment gateway teams all have interfaces with 10 to 20 mainstream banks, and they have payment technology and technical teams."

"But it couldn't compete with big platforms like Alipay, Tenpay, and 99Bill, and lacked customers, which is why it couldn't make ends meet and was on the verge of bankruptcy."

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(End of this chapter)