Translated by Jessie C.

The founders of Womany, PanMedia and PopDaily got together in an event held by 30 Magazine last month. Focusing on the next step of social media, they defined the meaning of media and community respectively.

Womany: Only When You Love Yourself Can You Love the World

“We dare to be ourselves” said Womany’s co-founder Tanya Chen. “Only when you know how to love yourself can you love the others and the world.”

Concerning about the gender issue, Womany sets “The Most Dedicated Feminine Media”as their slogan. In addition to online articles, they also invite politicians to talk about the power of women; build feminine related e-commerce; publish App for article push notification service.

PanMedia: We Don’t Want the Readers Outsource Their Brains

As the mother company of PanSci, Punchline and PanX, PanMedia puts emphasis on KNOWLEDGE. “Does social media make us smarter or more stupid?” ask Kuo-Wei Cheng, the chief editor of PanMedia.

He said that no matter is the promoter of popular science PanSci, the observer of entertainment industry Punchline or the follower of technology PanX, all are hoping to deliver more information and verified facts to the readers, triggering more discuss among them rather than make a judgement for them. “The need of receiving information always exists, but in the era of limited time with information explosion, more and more people are restricted by the frame of media. We don’t want to see them outsource their brains.”

PopDaily: We Care about the Topics in Daily Chatting

Kim Hung, the founder of PopDailay has started to make content since 2007. Before establishing PopDaily, he already shut down many companies. “The contents I made in the past and now are similar. The most difference is whether there is a Facebook, and we didn’t think of making content through videos at that time as well.”

The range of PopDaily’s contents are wide, such as tourist spots, songs, mood for love, wears and star signs. They now have 700 thousands fans; the natural growth is 100 thousands per month; main users are 16 to 20 years old people. Last year, they opened “PopDaily Malaysia” and “PopDaily China”, meanwhile, separated “makeups” and “pets” to independent platforms. “We want to be a media that deliver positive energy. It is important to us to offer the information related to fans’ daily lives and chatting.

Community Is More Important Than Issues

Three founders attending the talk are all in the new media. Thus, the host threw a question to them “RESONANCE is important to media. What is your concept about ISSUES?”

At the beginning, due to the “Star Sign Series,” PopDaily gained lots of attention, and that also made other brands imitate. However, Kim said “Every viral content is different, and the point is how to make people’s interest stay.”

When it comes to community, Cheng hope that PanMedia can avoid setting a frame for the readers. Usually, we would see sentence such as “……will make you angry”or “……will make you cry”in the titles of news. Most of the media tend to give the target an emotion (a frame), but we want to avoid that, especially PanSci. The thing that PanSci discussed is the fact and knowledge that drive people to choose their position and attitude, and then go a step further to figure out the reason behind every hate and like. Thus, the target audience of PanSci are the people who care the reason behind.

In Tanya’s opinion, the resonance is the community’s feedback, not just “numbers.” When the contents are related to the target audience, their lives and mental thoughts, the resonance would appear.

In addition to the information that people want, Womany also offers the information that people need, such as political issues. During the Sunflower Movement, Womany find both proposition and opposition to make their statement. “The value of resonance should come from every aspect of life, even your choice for future career or the position you take in certain issues.”

Cash Flow, Direction and Production

“I want to ask a question that all the content creators care about.”the host of the talk spoke again. “How can social media make money and when will the money come?”

“The expense for making a media is always great. I think there is no exception in the future.” Tanya said. “According to Womany’s experience, I have to say that if you are not ready to pour your money into business without hesitation, then you had better not start a business.”

“Why making a media costs lots of money? Because we need to accumulate enough flow for our website to let the ads in and find the sponsors for our activities. But to hold a large scale activity, money is not always necessary. Cooperation with other companies and resources exchange can also be the ways.” Tanya explained.

“PopDaily is lucky.” Kim said humbly. “But good luck comes from my past failure. I know how to make a right decision in different stage of business, such as whether to be investigated, merged or decide the company’s direction.

“Making content is money-costing, but would it cost more than making a magazine, newspaper or a TV station?” asked Cheng, the chief editor of PanMedia. He think this era is the best time to start a content business.

“The threshold is lower than before, and that’s why people rush into content business. However, it is important to make decision for the direction of business, no matter which kind of service you are going to offer. To build a business with content is not a bad start because content can gather people.”

Cheng mentioned that in the past, people made the production before thinking of marketing, but content business work in a different way. They gather the people first and find their target. Developing a good product becomes the last thing. “If you understand your community at the beginning of your business, then it’s easier to start with content, but it still relies on your ability to find a point and cut into it. I suggest that first, everyone should investigate yourself to devote to a professional area. When you have your own viewpoint in a certain profession, you’ll have the condition to make the content.” said Cheng.

From Media to Action:  What Kind of Media Do You Want to Be?

“Womany wants to be a social-based media, so we care about the interaction with our target audience. Thus, the offline activities are necessary and only when the activity is related to our content can we attract the group of people who are interested in to come and join.” Tanya said. “To decide when to launch your activities and product, you should trace back the initial passion that inspired you to make the media.”

Our reading App comes from a fashion word ‘Growth Hack.’ We studied on other reading App and collect the data of reading time and habits. After making a comparison between the data and our readers, we designed an effective reading App. To sum up, the point is what you want to achieve and you have to observe the data.”

Kim then explained how PopDaily collects content from the community and idea of demassification.

The content of PopDaily can be separated as two catalogue: UGC (User-generated Content) and PGC (Professional-generated Content). Some of the articles come from our users, and they are mostly astonishing. From Huang’s perspective, collecting content from the public is better than totally rely on the content by professions. Basically, the editors in PopDaily do not write articles but control the quality of them.

“Now demassification is more important than massification. We separate different catalogues from our original contents such as pets, K-trends and Japan to attract specific readers who already dissatisfied with PopDaily’s contents.”

Besides, Kim also mentioned the native advertising. “Actually, we are discussing how to make the ads more comfortable to the eyes. Advertisement should not cut off from the media, they should infuse into each other. Before doing what you want, you have to earn profit because you can’t change the thing that the whole business environment ask from you.”

“To PanSci, we care about the process. We want to create an environment that you can learn from the process of interacting with the community.” said Cheng. Taiwan has already had lots of great scientific content, so only be a new content provider can’t make any difference. The point is process; the process can make plenty of contents.

“We want to create a community that people are willing to write down their thoughts. However, it cost much (money and efforts). We strive to throw out a minnow to catch a whale. It is the whale that matters.”

CONTENT Can Do More

In the end of the talk, Kim said “The fields related to contents are large, creating, marketing, ads selling, and authorization are all included. Yet, we haven’t reached 10% of all the possibilities.”

Cheng shared about the recent action of New Science (an English well-known science magazine) with us. NS established a new dating site. Yes, a dating site. Their target audience spend too much time in the labs to do researches. They are not good at social, so the dating site just meets their needs. When you have enough understanding of your vertical field, you can find a different possibility.

“A man can fly high but a group of people can fly far; a man can stretch his wings but a group of people can change the direction of winds. We want to change the values in the society.” At last, the Womany’s founder, Tanya expressed firmly.

中文版連結

• 女人迷、泛科學、PopDaily 談媒體：「內容」能做的事還很多