ByteDance has entered Baidu’s territory again
As the saying goes, “three times the limit”, but in the face of the “big cake” of search engines, ByteDance has launched its fourth charge.
An app called “TikTok Search” has been launched in major app stores. Sina Technology found that this is the fourth independent search app launched by ByteDance after Toutiao Search, Wukong Search, and Lightning Search. As apps based on content such as TikTok and Xiaohongshu occupy more and more user time, the search functions of these apps are increasingly replacing the original Baidu search. In addition, the mobile Quark browser has been expanding in recent years, and Baidu search is no longer in the spotlight. Facing the fiercely competitive new environment, Baidu may not have found a way to deal with the attacks of major competitors.
Search demand is decentralized, Baidu is increasingly embarrassed
“How do I pass the Tiger Vanguard?” “How do I get the Monkey King suit in Black Myth?” With the recent popularity of “Black Myth: Wukong”, searches for related guides in the game have become more and more frequent. Some players told Sina Technology that if they are stuck at a certain level or want to obtain special props in the game, they often search directly on Bilibili or Douyin instead of searching on Baidu.
“The guides you search for on Baidu are mostly pictures and texts, while those you search for on Bilibili are video tutorials, which are easier to follow.” Netizen Li Shuai told Sina Technology that due to the above problems, the search results given by Baidu often point to Bilibili, so it would be more convenient to just search on Bilibili or Douyin.
(Left is Douyin search, right is Baidu)
Sina Technology found that as major content platforms have gradually formed their own “data islands”, Douyin, Xiaohongshu, Bilibili, Quark, etc. have become new fronts for users to search for content. According to the data from the “2024 Massive Engine Search Advertising Marketing Plan”, Douyin users now conduct an average of 7 searches per day. This number has shown a rapid growth trend compared to 1 in 2021 and 3 in May 2023. 41% of users will search within the first 30 seconds after launching the app. Although Douyin has not officially disclosed DAU in recent years, during the Spring Festival in 2021, Douyin’s DAU reached 700 million. If estimated at this scale, the daily search volume on the Douyin platform exceeds 4.9 billion times.
On the other hand, Xiaohongshu and Quark Browser are also expanding in the search field. Xiaohongshu COO Conan revealed in an interview in December 2023 that nearly 70% of Xiaohongshu’s monthly active users will search, and one-third of monthly active users will go straight to search as the first step after opening the software.
As for the Quark Browser, according to the data disclosed at Alibaba’s financial report meeting in September 2023, its DAU (daily active users) increased by more than 35% year-on-year. The “2023 Research on Intelligent Efficiency Applications for Young People” report released by the third-party data agency QuestMobile showed that with smart tools and content products such as network disk, scanning, and documents, the Quark App has the highest user share among the general student population and the new generation of working people, and the usage time of young users ranks first in the industry.
Nowadays, in the newly launched “Tik Tok Search” App, its core is to present user search results through various videos on Tik Tok. After opening it, you will find that there is a prominent search box in the core position of the homepage. However, Sina Technology conducted several comparisons and found that after searching for different content, there is almost no difference in the results given by the Tik Tok Search App and the Tik Tok App. Even the friend relationship, Tik Tok daily preferences, etc. are consistent with the Tik Tok App. Therefore, the current Tik Tok Search App is a Tik Tok App with a “fine-tuned” interface style, but if it is regarded as a tool to solve daily problems such as clothing, food, housing, transportation, and play, Tik Tok Search also has its uniqueness. When searching for these problems, the information content provided by the video is richer and more intuitive than the text content, which may make Baidu search more and more embarrassing.
The second half of search: information links people, goods and places
Since natural content generation platforms such as Douyin and Xiaohongshu have risen to become “must-have” super apps, these super apps have greatly reduced the importance of Baidu, a former information distribution platform. In Baidu’s latest financial report, part of the revenue decline also came from this.
According to the recently released Q2 financial report, Baidu’s performance in the second quarter was not optimistic, and there was a clear trend of differentiation in the core performance. Among them, online marketing revenue was 19.2 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 2%, and non-online marketing revenue was 7.5 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 10%, mainly driven by the intelligent cloud business.
Combined with Baidu’s financial performance in the past six quarters, online marketing revenue, which was once the main growth engine of Baidu’s core business, has been declining for several consecutive quarters, and now has negative year-on-year growth. Obviously, Baidu is also aware of the difficulties faced by the traditional search business. Baidu Chairman and CEO Robin Li pointed out in a phone call after the financial report that more and more users are spending time on short videos and social media platforms, which has an impact on Baidu’s online advertising business. For other platforms, the search field does not have to face Baidu’s dilemma, because its business model is no longer limited to advertising, which means it has more room to play than Baidu.
An industry insider told Sina Technology that the search quality of content platforms such as Douyin and Xiaohongshu may be better in daily life. At the same time, these platforms do not rely on advertising, but aim to create a link between people, goods and places. Simply put, when users search for a certain product, they can see its advantages and disadvantages on Douyin, and then place an order directly on Douyin, which may even offer a more favorable price. If they want to complete this operation on Baidu, users need to open different web pages to view the content, and then go to JD.com and Taobao to make purchases. The link is lengthened, and the end result is that users feel that the search efficiency is not as high as these new platforms.
(Left is Douyin search, right is Xiaohongshu)
At the same time, he also pointed out that according to the “2024 Massive Engine Search Advertising Marketing Plan”, users’ search behavior on Douyin is mainly divided into two categories: 53% of searches are “search after viewing” triggered by watching content, while “active search” accounts for the remaining 47%. This shows that Douyin users are very proactive in searching, and their search purposes are becoming more and more clear, which not only reflects their growing willingness to buy, but also shows that platforms such as Douyin or Xiaohongshu, which can plant grass by themselves, can turn search into a pure tool without bearing too much advertising pressure. “These platforms can also rely on live streaming and e-commerce,” he said.
This analysis also echoes the rise of Quark Browser in recent years. In the Quark App, users not only use it for search, but also frequently use functions such as Quark Cloud Disk and Quark Scan King. Sina Technology found that the “document” function and resume template provided by Quark provide many functions for office people, and are also popular among students by providing “take photos to answer questions, one-click search” and other functions. Although this does not determine the results of the search, it is precisely because of the existence of these tools that today’s search portals have become more and more fragmented. This may be the second half of the search field.
Conclusion: The era of diversified demands will reshape the search market
In February 2021, Zhang Nan, former CEO of TikTok Group, said: “In the past few years, the entire society’s expression and creation have been video-based. As the most direct way to obtain information, search is also video-based.” After three years of changes, people’s search behavior is no longer just to get answers. Users may need to buy directly after searching, or download and edit and modify after searching, or share and socialize after searching.
In the era when single-dimensional search corresponds to Baidu, users are of course more dependent on Baidu. But when the era of diversified demands comes, Douyin, Xiaohongshu, Bilibili, Quark, etc. will also reconstruct the search market.
