Click to read the original text for details Private domain seems to be heading into a dead end. The 'private' in private domain has led companies into a narrow mindset. When private domain goes astray, the emergence of shared private domain is timely. Sharing is difficult, but it represents a broader vision. On June 10th, two live streams introduced the concepts of 'shared membership' and 'shared private domain' respectively, which are refreshing and may point to a new path for private domain. 01 Case 1: Shared Membership 《中童传媒》 is a well-known self-media in the baby products industry. Editor-in-chief Wang Chen mentioned a case during a live stream with expert Yu Laoshi, as follows: The characteristic of this case is that the brand and retail small b jointly serve users. The brand provides 'professional' services (because baby products require particularly high professional services), and the small retail stores provide 'customer relationships'. The brand's approach of jointly serving C-end through small b is bC integration. So, what kind of user membership system does this form? Yu Laoshi proposed a concept of 'shared membership', meaning the shared membership of the brand and retail stores. Shared membership immediately resonated. During the live stream, I liked the term 'shared membership' and it sparked discussion between host Wang Chen and Yu Laoshi. Baby products have had a deadlock in the past: retail stores guard their own members, but member loyalty is getting worse; brands bypass retail stores to reach members, poaching small b's customers, which small b strongly resists. Shared membership is a good concept, but it also needs to solve two problems: First, increment. Sharing must bring increment, otherwise it falls into zero-sum competition with no shared profit. Second, profit-sharing mechanism. With increment, how to distribute profits must be agreed upon in advance. 02 Case 2: Shared Private Domain In the live stream by self-media 《新经销》 on June 10th about distributors doing private domain, Gao Jingjing, General Manager of Beijing Guoyingjian Economic and Trade Co., Ltd., shared her private domain case. She utilized the offline relationships of retail stores, operated communities together with store owners, turned store owners into 'group leaders', and reached tens of thousands of users. Moreover, the thinking for reaching C-end shifted from a transaction perspective to a marketing perspective, such as promoting new products. In the summary phase of the live stream, I said 'I am very excited' because after advocating bC integration for over three years, I found a 'soulmate' with practical experience. I call Gao Jingjing's approach 'shared private domain'. The private domain belongs to both small b and the distributor, and both parties operate it together. Shared membership and shared private domain are logically similar and may break the current dilemma of membership systems and private domain systems. 03 Private Domain: Exclusive vs. Shared I have always questioned the concept of private domain. First, private domain implies exclusivity and 'exclusive enjoyment'. It follows the logic of de-intermediation and DTC, eventually becoming direct e-commerce (F2C). I have always said, direct e-commerce is a pitfall. It cannot grow big because the mindset is small, small in selfishness, exclusivity, and exclusive enjoyment. Second, private domain has a hint of 'unscrupulous tricks'. Look at Baidu Baike's definition of private domain traffic. Key words: diverting from public domain and other domains to private domain. Isn't bringing others' traffic into your private domain a bit less than honorable? If private domain falls into the logic of privatization, exclusive enjoyment, and traffic diversion, it is a dead end. As long as you are exclusive, others are destined to 'exclude you'. This is a dead end in business. The concept of private domain has been popular for five years. Except for chain businesses where private domain is naturally shared and thus thriving, distribution private domain has basically achieved nothing. Is this the cause? Shared private domain suddenly opens up new thinking. Perhaps shared private domain is the way out for private domain. Each link in the distribution chain has value, and together they form a value chain. If brands, distributors, and retail stores all exclusively enjoy their own private domains and are closed off, does the distribution value chain still exist? 04 Shared Private Domain: With Whom to Share? If private domain belongs only to small b, brands and distributors cannot share it. If private domain belongs only to brands or distributors, it also cannot be shared. After all these years of working on private domain, perhaps few have realized this. Private domain is about relationships, not connections. Or, private domain is user connections based on relationships. The premise of private domain is relationships. Brands and distributors face millions or tens of millions of users and cannot establish user relationships, only user connections. Only small b can establish offline relationships with users. Therefore, users belong only to small b, and even KA stores find it difficult to build private domain. Whether KA store memberships are truly private domain is debated in the industry. Will small b share the private domain that belongs to them? Zeng Ming's S2b2C theory: without the supply chain (brands, distributors), small b's private domain cannot be monetized; without the supply chain's professional services, small b cannot maintain the private domain. So, will small b share private domain unconditionally with all suppliers? Of course not. There are two prerequisites for sharing: first, trust. Whether the brand or distributor is trustworthy; second, service capability. The brand (or distributor) works with small b to provide professional services to the C-end. In professional services, small b's advantage is user relationships, while the brand's (or distributor's) advantage is professional services. When serving together, the resulting private domain should naturally be shared. Then, what if the supply chain does not share private domain? Current traffic diversion and one-item-one-code technologies make it easy to connect with C-end, but activating users and turning them into active fans is very difficult. Connecting with users means establishing online relationships. However, activating users requires offline relationships and community relationships. Therefore, only a three-dimensional connection (offline, community, and online) can activate private domain. Hence, only small b is destined to be the source of private domain. Back to the question in this section: With whom to share private domain? If it is a chain business, such as McDonald's, then the brand and stores (small b) naturally share private domain due to franchise relationships. Chain businesses' private domain operations are currently very good, perfectly shared, precisely because of sharing. If the distributor is the operating entity, such as Beijing distributor Gao Jingjing, then the distributor (B) and stores (small b) share private domain. If it is a brand's distribution system, then the brand, distributor, and stores (small b) share private domain among the three parties. 05 Shared Private Domain and Private Domain Marketing From an online perspective, it is basically a traffic system and transaction perspective. This perspective greatly influences the private domain perspective, making it narrow. If private domain is expanded to a marketing perspective, its value will be greatly amplified. Beijing distributor Gao Jingjing said in the live stream, reaching tens of thousands of users through private domain is extremely valuable for new product promotion. This is a marketing perspective. In fact, because of private domain, brands and distributors reach the C-end, and the channel not only has push power but also pull power, changing the channel's marketing logic. When introducing the marketing perspective of private domain, its value is reflected across the entire domain, with effects possibly offline, on platforms, in communities; possibly 2C or 2B; possibly transactional or brand-related. 06 Shared Private Domain and Profit-Sharing System Small b is the only source of large private domain traffic; everything else is pseudo-private domain. Exclusive private domain naturally has no profit-sharing issues. Shared private domain, without a reasonable profit-sharing system, is destined to fail. Private domain traffic cannot bypass small b, but the path for transactions and delivery should be as short as possible. If transactions bypass small b, how does small b get a share? Small b is the source of traffic, so regardless of whether transactions and delivery go through small b, they must share profits. Otherwise, it cannot be called shared private domain. Some say, will small b become a 'rentier class'? I think it is possible. Rentier income is also the return for small b's management of user relationships. Chain businesses handle shared private domain well, and their profit-sharing is no different from traditional offline. When brands and distributors get involved in shared private domain, the profit-sharing system becomes crucial. Of course, the premise of profit-sharing is increment. Without increment, there is no new source of profit. What kind of profit-sharing system to establish is a new topic. Source: Teacher Liu's Digital New Marketing (ID: liuchunxiong1964) -END-