Stronger by Paying Salaries and I Have 1 Billion Employees

On November 20th, WeChat released version 4.5, adding new features like a real-time walkie-talkie, multi-person voice chats, QR codes, and navigation. Penguin Maps was integrated into the WeChat application ecosystem for the first time.

Meanwhile, after two months of development, Lashou Network followed Meituan and Dianping in successfully launching a scan feature and a QR code system for redeeming Group Buy vouchers.

A whole new era had begun!

But the Group Buy market landscape was also changing dramatically. Dianping and Meituan held firm in the top two spots. After integrating Nuomi Network’s resources, Kuai Pao surpassed Lashou Network in just three months to claim third place in the industry.

Lashou Network, on the other hand, was relegated to last place!

According to an analysis report from a third-party data agency, the total transaction volume for the national Group Buy market in October was 4.6 billion. Of this, Dianping accounted for 1.14 billion, Meituan for 1.02 billion, Kuai Pao for 930 million, and Lashou Network for 650 million.

When Qian Du acquired Lashou, its monthly transaction volume was already over 600 million.

In other words, in the three months since Gong Zhenbing took over Lashou Network, he had poured a cumulative 60 million into marketing, yet their market share hadn’t changed at all.

"Qian Du is a technology-driven company. From Li Yanhong on down, none of them understand management or business. The fates of Lashou Network and DiDi Dache were sealed from the start—they’re guaranteed to lose!"

Shan Jiawei, the head of Kuai Pao’s Group Buy division, commented bluntly on Weibo.

Li Yanhong, conscious of his status, couldn’t personally get involved. Gong Zhenbing, however, had no such reservations and immediately fired back, "Kuai Pao’s Group Buy business isn’t even number one in the market yet, so don’t act like some big shot telling everyone how it’s done. Besides, are you even qualified?"

"It’s still better than being a copycat," Shan Jiawei retorted mockingly.

Seeing this, Wang Xin of Meituan and Zhang Tao of Dianping looked embarrassed. That bastard Shan Jiawei had just insulted both of them, too.

But Meituan and Dianping couldn’t refute it, because they really had copied it.

They had no choice. A QR code-based Group Buy voucher combined with a scanning feature could easily increase redemption speeds by more than tenfold. It was hugely beneficial for users, merchants, and the platform alike. They had to copy it!

Additionally, the promotional campaign for the movie *Lost in Thailand*, starring Xu Zheng and Wang Baoqiang, had begun.

After some thought, Pei Yi immediately bet on this film. He finalized a ticket subsidy campaign with Guangxian Media. Based on a 60-40 funding split, they lowered the ticket price for *Lost in Thailand* on the Kuai Pao platform to 9.9 yuan each.

The campaign would run from December 6th to December 12th!

From November 25th to December 5th, users could get a puzzle piece by either ordering food delivery or redeeming a Group Buy order. Collecting all nine pieces would allow them to redeem a free movie voucher worth 60 yuan.

For a time, Kuai Pao’s daily active users and user stickiness increased significantly.

Under Chen Yansen’s direction, Pei Yi proposed the ’T-shaped Strategy.’ This plan treated Group Buy as the horizontal bar of the ’T,’ while service categories like food delivery, movies, hotel & travel, and local life services were the vertical lines, thus forming the ’T’ shape.

Anything and everything could be a Group Buy!

With the help of Shan Jiawei, Zhang Xuhao, and others, Pei Yi extended Kuai Pao’s business footprint into all sorts of industries.

From food to leisure and entertainment, beauty and hair salons, massages and foot spas, attraction tickets, hotels and B&Bs, and vacation travel, all the way to doctor’s appointments and medicine, movie showtimes, and ride-hailing—the categories were comprehensive and all-encompassing.

In contrast, Lashou Network and Dianping’s businesses were concentrated on food and leisure/entertainment. Their categories were limited, and their ecosystems were incomplete.

Meituan was a step ahead, having already expanded into movies, hotel & travel, and food delivery. From a business model perspective, it posed the greatest threat to Kuai Pao.

After receiving the industry report for October, both Zhang Tao and Gong Zhenbing became determined to accelerate the expansion of their respective platforms’ business boundaries and find new points of profit growth.

And so, online ticketing became the core battleground for everyone to fight for market share, attract users, and increase platform visibility and user stickiness.

Meituan partnered with Huayi Brothers to lower the presale ticket price for *Back to 1942* to 9.9 yuan, also giving it preferential treatment with traffic resources.

Lashou Network chose *The Last Supper* as its deep collaborative partner, with tickets also priced at 9.9 yuan.

Dianping’s subsidy strategy was different. Zhang Tao didn’t sign an exclusive agreement with any single distribution or production company, instead adopting an equal-opportunity approach.

However, because they lacked an external source for part of the subsidy, Dianping had to pay out of its own pocket. For every 9.9 yuan ticket sold, they had to bear an additional 8 to 10 yuan in costs compared to Kuai Pao, Meituan, and Lashou Network.

In the first half of the year, the lowest movie ticket price was 19.9 yuan. In the second half, it dropped to 9.9 yuan.

More and more people started going to the movies, and the box office exploded!

...

...

「Xucheng, Zhuxianzhuang Science and Technology Park.」

Chen Yansen sat in his office, fanning out a stack of movie tickets. His gaze swept over them before he finally picked out two for *Cold War* and two for *The Bourne Legacy*, tossing the tickets for *Tai Chi Hero* that Ye Qiuping had shoved at him directly to the side.

He knew Ye Qiuping’s character and intentions like the back of his hand, and he was well aware that he absolutely could not give this woman even a sliver of hope.

’Want President Chen to see a movie with her? Not a chance! Boss Chen could, at best, tolerate having a bowl of sweet soup with her once in a while.’

’Now, only Kuai Pao, Meituan, Dianping, and Lashou Network remained in the Group Buy race. Besides competing on product experience and after-sales quality, things like new-customer subsidies, existing-customer discounts, and repeat purchase frequency were also of utmost importance.’

’Their internal strengths had to be solid, but their external game couldn’t fall behind either.’

’Pei Yi’s operational style was growing more and more composed. He was skilled with conventional methods, but he was also wickedly good at playing dirty.’

Chen Yansen wasn’t the least bit worried about the development of the food delivery and Group Buy businesses. With Pei Yi, Shan Jiawei, and Zhang Xuhao holding down the fort, never mind the likes of Zhang Tao and Gong Zhenbing—even Wang Xin and Wang Huiwen would have a hard time fending them off.