2018 can be called the first year of mini programs. Giants and unicorns have entered the market one after another. WeChat took the lead, followed closely by Alipay, Baidu, and Toutiao, all of whom are building their own mini programs, deeply cultivating traffic pools, and creating an ecosystem.
On December 20, 2018, Baidu officially signed contracts with 12 companies including iQiyi, Kuaishou, WiFi Master Key, 58, Autohome, Ctrip, Perpetual Calendar, Cheetah Mobile, Baidu Video, Baby Bus, and Zhuoyi, announcing the first in the industry. A small program open source alliance was officially established.
Baidu Vice President Shen Dou made a metaphor. What Baidu Smart Mini Programs need to do is “break down the garden wall” and achieve interaction: users do not need to jump between different products and different interfaces. They can solve the problem in one go on the Baidu App platform. Complex, coherent requirements.
Ping Xiaoli, general manager of Baidu App, told Zinc Finance that Baidu internally hopes to establish a small program ecosystem first, rather than pursuing larger scale or numbers. In terms of profit model, it mainly makes money through smart mini program advertising components, part of which goes to developers and part to Baidu.
Advantages of Baidu Smart Mini Programs
Since when it comes to advantages, we definitely need a reference, so let’s compare it with the current WeChat applet in the WeChat ecosystem.
1. Baidu smart mini program traffic entrance:
Baidu APP internal entrance Baidu APP external entrance
Baidu APP entrance:
Baidu APP-Personal Center, in addition to seeing commonly used mini programs in the “My” menu, you can also enter the full-screen smart mini program page by scrolling down on the Baidu APP homepage. Baidu’s opening of drop-down entrance also means greater traffic.
Search and keyword search are one of the major advantages of Baidu’s smart mini-programs. Users can directly search for keywords in the search box and see related mini-programs in the associated words and smart search results.
In the information flow and feed flow recommendations, users can not only browse pictures, texts, short videos, etc., but now they can also browse smart applets.
Baijiahao article page is mounted. Developers submit Baijiahao materials on the smart mini program developer platform. After approval, they can choose to add smart mini program cards in Baijiahao article publishing. Baijiahao articles distributed in Baidu information flow can obtain smart mini program card exposure opportunities.
QR code scanning is of course a must to scan the QR code to enter the mini program. You can also use Baidu’s powerful voice search function to enter the mini program.
Baidu APP external entrance:
Baidu APP family bucket, other partners.
2. WeChat mini program traffic entrance
WeChat-Discover the main entrance of the Mini Program, open WeChat-Discover-Mini Program
Search bar, WeChat search can search for mini programs through keyword searches
WeChat group chat, mini program currently only supports forwarding to groups and friends
For public account articles, WeChat mini programs support inserting mini programs into group articles in three forms: text, pictures, and cards.
QR code, mini program QR code is a channel linking online and offline. By scanning the code, you can enter the store where the WeChat mini program is located.
How do developers (business owners) obtain traffic and users?
1. Baidu actively distributes hundreds of billions of traffic
Among the global traffic of hundreds of billions of Baidu APPs, Baidu Information Flow, Baidu Maps, Baidu Tieba and other cooperative partner APPs, various users have various needs.
Baidu search information flow can actively match suitable mini programs according to user needs and distribute traffic.
Developers just sit back and enjoy the results.
2. WeChat has one billion monthly active users, but users need to find it themselves
WeChat is a social tool with one billion monthly active users, but chatting and socializing are the main needs of users.
Developers need to operate their own traffic and accumulate users.
Fight for creativity
fight for resources
Fight for promotion
Developers are struggling to pursue traffic
Based on the development of Baidu smart mini programs and the closure of WeChat mini programs, Baidu smart mini programs are based on Baidu information flow recommendations and searches, and traffic is actively distributed to developers, while WeChat mini programs need to operate the mini programs themselves to obtain traffic.
The author believes that the best channel for mini programs is based on search, which may have more advantages. Baidu Smart Mini Program will open up the traffic of Baidu’s “search, information flow, Tieba” and other products. The characteristic of this approach is that Baidu’s series of products work together to cover a wider range of applications than WeChat’s alone.
Differences in core logic
Both WeChat and Baidu have launched their own mini programs, but their core logic is completely different. WeChat, which is based on social networking, focuses on passive acceptance by users. If it has very good operational capabilities for fission growth, it can create a popular mini program, a mini program. If the program is well run and can meet user needs at a certain point, it may stand out among the many mini programs on WeChat and become popular quickly.
The core logic of smart mini programs is search information flow, especially search, which is a highly purposeful behavior that users actively obtain, so that all mini programs have a fair environment to obtain traffic.
To sum up, from the distribution of traffic, developers’ acquisition of mini program traffic, and the difference in core logic, mini programs can better meet the needs of most developers. Especially for small and medium-sized enterprises, choosing smart mini programs can effectively Enterprises increase a certain amount of business value.
