But if you observe many business models carefully, you will find something very interesting:
The businesses that truly make money are often not selling products, but rather leveraging human nature.
Why do people engage in impulse buying?
Why do people spend money for the sake of face?
Why do people still spend money in certain situations, even when they know it's not cost-effective?
Because people have desires, vanity, anxiety, and also comparisons.
Whoever can understand these things clearly will find it easier to make money.
But just understanding human nature is not enough.
Many people can actually understand opportunities, but those who can make big money often have another characteristic:
Dare to gamble.
Once you identify a matter, you dare to bet on it.
In the history of Chinese business, if you want to find a businessman who understands human nature and dares to gamble, a name is often mentioned -
Shi Yuzhu.
His experience is actually very much like a business novel.
When he was young, he was a tech entrepreneur.
In the 1990s, when computers were just starting to become popular in China, there was a big problem:
Computers have poor support for Chinese.
Many people find it very troublesome to even input Chinese when using computers.
So Shi Yuzhu seized this opportunity and created a product - the Giant Han Card.
This product was in high demand at the time and quickly sold out.
Not long after, he earned his first pot of gold in life, and the company also grew rapidly.
At that time, Shi Yuzhu was only in his thirties and had already become a star entrepreneur in the eyes of the media.
But many entrepreneurs, after earning their first pot of gold, will have an idea:
Since it has already succeeded, can we do something even bigger?
Shi Yuzhu also thought this way at the time.
So he made a very bold decision:
Build a particularly large landmark building - the Giant Building.
This decision is essentially a gamble.
At the beginning, the scale of this project was actually not that exaggerated.
But as the plan keeps changing, the building is designed higher and higher, and the investment also becomes larger.
Problems slowly began to emerge.
The Giant Company originally made software, and cash flow was not that stable.
But this project is like a bottomless pit, requiring continuous investment.
The project was delayed repeatedly, and costs kept rising.
The final result is:
The funding chain broke.
The Giant Building was left unfinished, and the company fell into serious crisis.
Shi Yuzhu, once hailed as a genius entrepreneur by the media, suddenly became a heavily indebted entrepreneur.
Many people felt at that time:
This person may not be able to turn over anymore.
But a few years later, he returned to the business stage.
And this time, the product he made is something almost all Chinese people have heard of -
Brain Platinum.
Many people's first reaction when they saw the Brain Platinum advertisement was:
Why is it so rustic?
Two old men and women dancing on TV, repeatedly saying one thing:
"No gifts for the festival this year, only Brain Platinum for gifts."
The advertisement was simple to the point of being absurd.
But it was such an advertisement that allowed Brain Platinum to sell for many years.
Why?
Because Shi Yuzhu is actually not selling health products.
What he is selling is the human relationship society of the Chinese.
In China, during New Year and festivals, visiting relatives and friends, and paying respects to elders, almost all revolve around one thing:
Gift-giving.
Many times you don't want to buy a gift, but you just don't know what to give.
Brain Platinum did something very clever:
Turning oneself into the "standard answer for gift-giving."
So although many people complain about the rustic ads, when it comes to buying gifts, they still tend to buy a box.
This is human nature.
Later, Shi Yuzhu entered a completely different industry -
Online games.
He made a very famous game:
Journey.
This game had a very special design at the time:
The game is free.
In that era, most online games were charged by time.
But the journey is different.
You can play for free, but if you want to get stronger, you need to buy equipment and items.
There are many mechanisms in the game:
Ranking
National War
Guild
Equipment gap
These things appear to be gameplay, but in essence, they all stimulate one thing:
The human desire for victory and vanity.
When others have better equipment than you, you will want to catch up.
When others rank higher than you, you will want to surpass them.
When you become the strongest player in the server, you will also gain a strong sense of presence.
Thus, a situation will arise:
Most players actually don't spend much money.
But there will always be a small number of people who keep recharging for face, ranking, and status.
Some recharge tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, or even more.
So later many people summarized the business model of the journey as actually one sentence:
Let a few people spend a lot of money.
If you look at Shi Yuzhu's business experiences over the years together, you will actually find a very obvious common point.
Whether it's Brain Platinum or the journey.
What he does is never just a product.
What he is selling is human nature.
Brain Platinum captures:
The pressure of gift-giving in a society of human relationships.
The journey captures:
The desire for victory and vanity of men.
So many people later commented on Shi Yuzhu that he might not be the most tech-savvy entrepreneur.
But he has a particularly strong ability:
Especially good at studying people.
He knows why people will spend money.
And he knows what kind of design is most likely to get people hooked.
In a sense, what he sells has never been just a product.
What he sells has always been:
Human nature.
