Why Chinese web users will pay for content that Westerners won’t, and the apps content creators can use to cash in
Apps such as De Dao make it easy for anyone to launch subscription channels, a business model that emerged from free mobile games where you can pay for an upgraded experience; on top of that, millions pay to watch live streams
And Li? Within months, he had close to 100,000 subscribers paying the equivalent of about US$30 a year – which works out to almost US$3 million in annual revenue.
It’s the kind of story that couldn’t happen in Western countries, where many people believe content should be free. In China, meanwhile, companies and individuals alike have managed to monetise smartphone apps, making money from news, entertainment and social media – by making people pay directly for it, instead of relying on advertisers. De Dao is just one in a whole economy of mobile apps where people such as Li Xiang can make real money.
“In China, we don’t really talk about advertising-supported models, whether it’s on PC or mobile,” says Jenny Lee, a venture capitalist at GGV Capital. “There are very few start-ups that actually grow very big on the back of advertising. There’s Baidu with search, but beyond search-based advertising, most of the large internet companies in China actually grew or monetised by charging the consumer directly.”
Recently [De Dao] opened a column by an economics professor from Peking university … He became the richest economics teacher in the world
De Dao, just a year old, already has seven million users. You can easily subscribe to channels with content on topics such as investing tips or “how to listen to classical music”, as well as books and magazines. Each channel costs the equivalent of about US$30 per year. It can curate content for you as well, and there’s even a portal to an e-commerce section that sells products such as books and high-end jewellery.