Volume 3: Taking Roots 2016 Chapter 574: A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing
This novel way of interaction, the experience of remotely unlocking the car lock through a mobile phone, always gives people a sense of technology.
When Mobike was on the Internet, it claimed that it had hired Papi Jiang for a multi-million dollar endorsement fee, and it also used a grand press conference to tout the technological content of its products...
Despite this, the sense given to consumers is superficial and empty. After all, in the inherent impression of most people, isn’t it just a bicycle?
No matter how much it's hyped up, this is still just a bicycle. Just because it has two wheels, it can't be turned into a motorcycle.
But when you try it yourself and feel this unique way of unlocking, the "click" sound always gives you a different and novel experience.
Although this function is essentially like a car key, the fact that a common function on a car is placed on a bicycle is what is called a dimensionality reduction attack.
What's more, before this, no one would think that a bicycle needs to be equipped with such a high-end bike lock, but if it is placed on a bicycle that costs 3,000 yuan, it does not seem unacceptable.
After unlocking the bike, the guy jumped on the bike decisively. Although it was still a bicycle, he didn't know if it was a psychological effect, but he felt that the riding of this bicycle was different from others.
"Not bad, not bad. It's very comfortable to ride. I recommend everyone to try it. I have to go to work quickly. Please make way." With the crowd watching, the buddy set off on his bicycle with high spirits.
A group of young people who were eager to try could not help but look at the remaining Mobikes. Somehow, they seemed to hear a strange sound coming from the Mobikes.
"Uncle, come and play, it's not 499, it's not 399, just a deposit of 299, and you can enjoy the riding service for 1 yuan for half an hour~"
They were all young people full of vigor and vitality, how could they resist such temptation? Without hesitation, they took out their mobile phones and prepared to scan a shared bicycle to experience it.
After all, they said the deposit is refundable, so they wouldn't just be staring at my 300 yuan scam, right? (Funny)
Such episodes are constantly happening on the commuter routes during Shanghai's morning rush hour. Most of the young people who have seen Mobike ads online have become the first group of people to try them out .
When the 2,000 or so Mobike bikes were no longer just parked in one place but began to move rapidly, their inherent advertising function began to quietly manifest itself.
However, the real killer feature of shared bikes has inadvertently begun to show its fangs, and that is the financial attributes that theoretically come with its products.
Shared bicycles may seem like a simple public transportation project, but in fact they are just a financial project in disguise, especially the seemingly reasonable rental deposit system.
It is because in life, whether it is renting a house or staying in a hotel or other traditional rental services, there is a reasonable and legal deposit system.
Therefore, due to inertia of thinking, when shared bicycles require a deposit, most users think it is reasonable.
However, the biggest difference between shared bicycles and traditional rental services is that when we end a rental service, the deposit will be automatically refunded.
However, when this process was transferred to shared bicycles, especially when it was implemented with the help of the convenient tool of mobile phones, this process has been subconsciously ignored by everyone.
In other words, the designers intentionally let users ignore the fact that placing the deposit on the platform is obviously a more convenient measure compared to the cumbersome operation of paying a deposit every time it is used.
In addition, under the propaganda paralysis of "the deposit can be refunded at any time and the money will be credited to the account immediately", even the most vigilant users will most likely not perform such repetitive and meaningless operations again after trying to successfully refund several times.
With the support of this financial model, shared bicycles are obviously no longer just a means of transportation that simply makes profits from rental, but more like a walking sales machine.
Let's do a simple calculation. The original rental business was 1 yuan for half an hour. In theory, a Mobike bicycle costing 3,000 yuan could only make 48 yuan in a day by seamlessly picking up passengers, and it would take 62.5 days to break even.
Of course, this is only in theory. In fact, the ideal condition for a bicycle is that it can be in operation for one-third of the day, which is definitely a model worker-level performance.
Therefore, it would conservatively take nearly a year to achieve profitability relying solely on rental income, whereas Mobike can theoretically reach the standard of five years of high-frequency use without the need for manual maintenance!
In other words, theoretically there is a profit period of up to four years. From this perspective, shared bicycles are just an ordinary profit-making project.
In fact, the rental fee is just an appearance. The key point is that each shared bicycle does not correspond to only one user. After all, this is a shared bicycle, not a bought and sold bicycle.
Compared to making profits from rental, which has a long payback period of up to one year, a Mobike bike actually only needs to attract 10 new users to pay a deposit to make a profit!
Attracting 20 new users means double profit... Over and over again, a considerable cash flow will appear in the hands of shared bicycle companies.
Although the deposit does not nominally belong to the enterprise but to the user, as long as the user does not apply for a refund of the deposit, the money will always be in the hands of the enterprise!
For the sake of convenience, most users do not refund their deposits frequently due to laziness. As long as the cash flow is stable and there is no large-scale bank run, it is enough to ensure that there is always a stable amount of funds available.
Looking at it this way, does this model look very familiar? To round it off, it is like a bank, or even a fund institution that raises funds from users.
Moreover, it is the kind of fund institution that does not need to pay interest and profits to users. It only needs to continuously release shared bicycles to the society in a regular and quantitative manner to maintain this operating model.
What's more, rent is also a stable income that can be accumulated over time. This model may seem ordinary at first glance, but in time, it will spread across the country like wildfire...
Naturally, it’s out of control!
Of course, more and more people will see through the true nature of this model . It is a wolf in sheep's clothing!
However, when you see through a model that is extremely profitable but simple and crude, especially when there are only a few pedestrians on this track, will you choose to go along with it and make a fortune together in silence...
Or flip the table over with great force?
Both are human nature. If you choose the latter, then I can only give you a thumbs up to say: "You are noble and amazing."
In reality, the fancy shared bicycles that have sprung up like mushrooms after a rain may have given an answer.
What's more, in the face of the trend of the times, even if you choose to overturn the table with righteous indignation, it will be like a mantis trying to stop a chariot, and it will not cause even a single ripple.
At the same time, after a day's work, Mobike's operations team handed over the freshly summarized data report to Hu Weiwei.
Holding this hot data report and looking at the impressive data on it, the last bit of uneasiness in Hu Weiwei's heart was swept away, and turned into joy that burst out.
The intuitive data impact made Hu Weiwei a little dazed. Even if he was slow, Hu Weiwei had already discovered that the potential of this project seemed to be far beyond his imagination.
