Human flesh search business model "test the water" - Sina

The Business Model of Human Flesh Search Engine "Pilot Test" http://www.sina.com.cn May 3, 2008 01:44 AM China Business News

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Human Flesh Search Engine Business Model "Pilot Test"

Bo Huang, the programmer who founded Tagee Grassroots Expert Network (hereinafter referred to as "Tagee"), is trying to propose a brand-new commercial model for "human flesh search engine".

According to Bo Huang's vision, Tagee aims to solve problems that Google, Baidu, YAHOO and other search engines are powerless to address. Through the expertise domain (Tag cloud map) of Tagee experts, appropriate chat consultation personnel - Tagee grassroots experts can be found. Then, by using the interactive consultation method of online chatting, the consultant pays fees to the consultation provider to ensure that the questions raised by the consultant definitely get a response. The significance of the Tagee expert ranking is that the paying consultants directly evaluate the authority of the consultation provider in responding to certain issues, thereby providing selection criteria for subsequent other consultants.

Yahoo Zhishi, Baidu Zhidao, Sina Aiwen, Tianya Wenda and others are considered by Qi Dong to be broadly defined as "human flesh search engine" type Q&A websites, none of which currently have a fee-based model. While narrowly defined human flesh search engines may have extremely high browsing volumes and eye-catching attention in a short period of time, possessing the premise for embedding advertising models, the instability of topic creation and the relative difficulty of forming scale determine their inability to guarantee continuous commercial value.

In comparison, although Tagee Network (www.tagee.net) is still in its initial stage of creation, the fee-based model that Huang Bo plans to operate is indeed worth paying attention to.

"For ordinary Internet users, registration is free, as long as you have unique expertise in a certain area, it may bring you income from consulting fees, so attracting 'experts' to register on Tagee is not difficult. On the other hand, regarding the difficulty of Internet users being unwilling to pay for consultations, the fee-based model of Tagee can ensure that users get answers to their questions and try to ensure the quality of the answers. At the same time, it can also adopt a flexible way where the consulting expert gives up a relatively small amount of consulting fees, thereby helping the consultant solve practical problems and obtaining a higher amount of service fees," Huang Bo gave an example saying that if Internet users consult online lawyers on Tagee about divorce procedures and other issues, the lawyer can completely waive the consulting fee to win the trust of Internet users and strive to obtain the lawyer fee in the actual divorce service of the Internet user.

"Whether or not to charge fees is not simply determined by the business model. Those public and shared basic service facilities cannot possibly exist in a paid purchasing model. But conversely, personalized added value often suits the paid purchase business model most appropriately," said Qi Ping Jiang, Secretary General of the Information Center of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

According to Huang Bo's introduction, since March, two intermediary companies in Beijing and one venture capital company in Shanghai have approached him to submit the design plan of the Tagee network.

"'Human flesh search engine' is very likely to surround every Internet user in the near future," Huang Bo believes.