Reborn in 08, a heretical cultivator starting a business

Chapter 230 Alibaba's shady moves, Weibo launch!
"This is where cooperation is possible!"

"But how to actually proceed is another matter."

Zhou Ping frowned: "Texas Instruments' arrogance, and whether or not they recognize the Eastern market, are all problems."

"Chairman Wang immediately presented me with a hellish problem!"

The assistant smiled and said, "The capable should do more. Chairman Wang has high hopes for you."

"Well, no matter what, the first task has to be done well for Chairman Wang. My reputation still has some value."

"I've arranged to meet Roddy Lambert, the vice president of Texas Instruments, for drinks."

“Okay, boss,” the assistant replied with a smile.

The assistant also wanted to personally witness the birth of a great collaboration and the birth of a great brand.

It's easy to imagine that if Future OS really does reach a strategic partnership with Texas Instruments, the future of both Future OS and Future Mobile will be limitless!

It can completely replicate the iPhone's success!
Alibaba headquarters.

Ning Fengze, holding the investigation results, entered the small conference room with a complicated expression:

"Chairman, after three weeks of investigation, we have reached a conclusion regarding Vipshop's subsidy fraud."

"Okay, how is it? Is it serious?"

Jack was full of anticipation.

Ning Fengze, however, had a complicated expression: "Hmm... it's much milder than we imagined."

"What happened?" Jack Ma's expression was rather grim.

"Chairman, according to our three-week investigation, Vipshop's subsidy fraud does exist, but the proportion is very low, only about 2%."

"The remaining 98% of the orders are almost all genuine orders."

"And many of these 2% of fraudulent subsidy orders were also individual acts of purchasing goods on behalf of relatives in the countryside."

"The remaining professional intermediaries only account for 1% of those engaging in large-scale subsidy fraud!"

"So low?" Jack Ma wanted to curse. His happy expression turned sour.

"How could this be?"

"Didn't we say before that subsidy fraud accounted for as much as 10%?"

Ning Fengze said helplessly: "The fraudulent activities related to the home appliance subsidy program in rural areas did reach 10%. However, this 10% was mainly concentrated offline."

"For example, there's the practice of fraudulently obtaining subsidies by collecting people's household registration books and ID cards, colluding with merchants to conduct fake transactions, and then defrauding them. This is a common, serious, and egregious form of subsidy fraud."

"But the problem is that those involved are all small offline supermarkets. Online, small C2C businesses might still be able to do this."

“But a large B2C platform like Vipshop is either officially operated by Future Technology or a brand-owned direct store; it would never do something like this.”

Jack Ma nodded: "That's true. Unless Vipshop and those appliance brand direct stores have gone crazy, they wouldn't fabricate subsidies out of thin air. Besides, logistics can't be faked. Fake shipments and fake transactions are all difficult. Even Haier RRS wouldn't dare to do that."

"Yes, the second type of deception is the substitution of products that are not eligible for rural subsidies. Offline merchants attach the identification cards of products eligible for rural subsidies to products that are not eligible for rural subsidies and sell them to defraud subsidies. This is also very common."

"But this tactic works offline, but it won't work online."

"For the same reason, neither Vipshop platform nor brand merchants would do this; it's not worth it."

"There's also the common practice of raising prices first and then offering subsidies, which is also prevalent offline. Vipshop's prices have always been very stable. So many competitors are watching them closely. If Vipshop dares to raise prices first and then offer subsidies, even if we don't report them, JD.com would have reported them long ago!"

"How dare they do that?"

Jack Ma nodded: "As the only online pilot platform for the home appliance subsidy program in rural areas, Vipshop is directly in the spotlight and under the scrutiny of all its competitors, so it certainly doesn't dare to raise prices first and then make up for the shortfall."

Ning Fengze continued, "There are also cases of collusion to defraud subsidies. People sell their personal information to merchants for small favors. Merchants then use this information to collude with auditors to apply for subsidies for sales orders that are not actually eligible for the rural appliance subsidy program, thereby defrauding the subsidies."

"This kind of behavior is not uncommon, but it mainly occurs offline."

“Vipshop would never do that, unless Wang Junshan wants to get in.”

"That leaves only one last method: fraudulently obtaining subsidies by misappropriating information."

"Urban consumers who do not meet the eligibility criteria for the rural appliance subsidy program place orders using the ID cards of relatives in rural towns. The appliances are then delivered directly to the relatives' homes in the towns and then transported back to the city."

"But these are all individual behaviors, the proportion is very small, and if you really try to investigate them, you can't."

"The whole process is generally compliant. In the end, the relative can say, 'I bought it, but I didn't like using it, so I resold it to a relative or gave it to a relative. What can you do about it?'"

Jack Ma sighed: "This kind of individual behavior falls into a gray area, and it is indeed difficult to make a typical example of it."

Ning Fengze nodded: "That leaves only the last possibility: professional intermediary organizations using information to fraudulently obtain subsidies."

"They bought a lot of information from ordinary people. Urban residents would ask them to place orders on their behalf. They would handle the whole process. After the people received the goods, they would be responsible for transporting them to consumers in the city and making a profit from the price difference."

"This is definitely illegal, but the scale is very small, only about 1%."

"Even including individual fraudulent subsidy claims, it only accounts for 2%."

"Trying to bring down Vipshop using this is as difficult as climbing to the sky."

Jack Ma became melancholy:
"Only 2%, how could that possibly be moved to Vipshop? 10% would be more like it!"

Proportion is very important!
A 2% percentage is negligible, and the authorities probably won't even care.

There is no such thing as complete compliance in this world.

If the water is clear, there will be no fish.

However, Vipshop's online subsidy fraud only accounts for 2%, which is simply not enough.

Even if Alibaba reports it, Vipshop will not be affected.

At this moment, Zhao Deyu, president of Taobao Mall, smiled:
“Chairman, you said it yourself, 2% is not enough, but 10% would be about right.”

"What do you mean?" Jack Ma couldn't help but ask.

Zhao Deyu chuckled: "As the saying goes, it takes only a mouth to spread rumors, but it takes a lot of legwork to refute them."

"It is a fact that online subsidies for home appliances can be as high as 10%."

"It is also a fact that Vipshop participated in the subsidy fraud."

"We just need to combine the two to mislead the public into believing that Vipshop is involved in fraudulent subsidy schemes, amounting to as much as 10%!"

"Why not just increase the publicity?"

"???" Jack Ma was stunned.

"!!!" Ning Fengze's expression was even more incredible:

"Old Liu, you've taken the art of journalism to its extreme!"

"Amazing, absolutely amazing!"

"Both news items are true, and they can completely mislead the public into believing that Vipshop is fraudulently obtaining subsidies of up to 10%!"

"Once this image is ingrained in people's minds, it will be useless for Vipshop to try to refute it. The public won't believe it."

"On the contrary, the public will be outraged and condemn Vipshop."

"Then Vipshop's reputation will be ruined!"

"Based on public opinion management, the authorities will also conduct a thorough investigation into Vipshop."

"No business is without problems."

"Once an investigation is launched, it will definitely uncover the truth."

"Even if it is eventually found that Vipshop's subsidy fraud rate is only 2%, it is still subsidy fraud, and that is a fact."

"The public often doesn't admit they're wrong, much less apologize. Instead, they become even more convinced that Vipshop is a platform for fraudulent subsidies and will continue to kick them while they're down."

"In this way, Vipshop's reputation will be ruined, and that will be the opportunity for Taobao Mall to take its place!" Ning Fengze couldn't help but applaud: "Old Zhao, your move is shameless, ruthless, and sharp!"

"Absolutely amazing!"

"Vipshop will suffer heavy losses!"

Jack Ma was quite satisfied: "I'll leave the specifics of how to do it to you."

"Don't worry, Chairman, I will arrange it properly."

Ning Fengze and Zhao Deyu exchanged a glance and both smiled.

It is true that when you think there is no way out, you will find another village when you turn around.

Sometimes the truth doesn't matter.

The result is not important.

The key is the smear campaign, making Vipshop a pariah, hated by everyone.

Wang Junshan was unaware of Alibaba's questionable actions.

Instead, he went to the Wanwang Building and headed straight to Weibo's headquarters to attend a high-level meeting.

Wang Yufei, the "Jia Zong" recruited by Sina, successfully joined the Future Investment Department three weeks ago.

Now, he serves as an investor and advisor to Weibo.

Of course, Wang Yufei's twenty trusted employees also joined the company at the same time.

Most of these employees came from Sina.

Some of them were elites from Sina's wireless business unit, all of whom were Wang Yufei's capable assistants.

The other part consists of elites poached by Wang Yufei from Sina's blog division; they are all experts in the content field.

With the addition of these people, coupled with Wang Yufei's strong integration capabilities, Weibo has developed rapidly in the past three weeks.

Wang Junshan asked, "How are the plans for launching Weibo going?"

Wang Yufei replied, "Twenty days ago, Weibo started internal testing within the group and fixed many bugs. Now everything is normal."

"The Celebrity Hundreds and Thousands Project is currently being carried out intensively. We have already signed 63 first- and second-tier celebrities. Although we are still a bit short of the goal of 100 or 1,000 celebrities, we are accelerating the process."

"More than 30 of them are brand ambassadors for major brands."

Wang Junshan was not surprised.

These brands are all partners of Vipshop, and they will cooperate to join Weibo out of respect for Vipshop!
As a brand ambassador, I naturally joined Weibo at the brand's invitation to cooperate with the brand in promotion.

This demonstrates the platform's strength!
Vipshop has now completely surpassed JD.com and Taobao Mall in 2010, and its influence is enormous.

As soon as Weibo entered its internal testing phase and Future Technology extended an invitation, a large number of brands immediately joined Weibo!

With brands already on board, brand ambassadors naturally have to follow in the footsteps of their sponsors.

Wang Yufei said, "There are also about thirty celebrities and more than two hundred famous people. These are all the results of our Celebrity Development Team's efforts over this period of time. In the next few days, we will continue to promote the Celebrity Hundred and Thousand Plan."

"Very good, your efficiency is very high!" Wang Junshan was very satisfied.

This is the kind of efficiency a large corporation should have.

"We have to thank Manager Tao for this. For the past three weeks, Manager Tao has personally led the celebrity outreach team to connect with and negotiate with celebrities," Wang Yufei said with a smile.

"Many celebrities, upon hearing that Weibo is the Chinese version of Twitter, with future technological developments, a PC version built into WeChat with hundreds of millions of monthly active users, and the opportunity to gain followers, are optimistic about Weibo's prospects. In addition, there are signing fees, although not high, they are happy to join Weibo."

"Our Future Technology, combined with WeChat's more than 1.3 million monthly active users, is the highest guarantee."

"Most celebrities are willing to stay here."

"But there are some celebrities, especially top-tier celebrities, who have a high attitude but low awareness and cannot see the development and future of Weibo."

"When the team members couldn't handle it, Manager Tao personally stepped in, flying around everywhere and overcoming many tough challenges. We're still working hard to move forward."

"I've been in Hengdian for the past few days and have negotiated deals with several big stars!"

"Manager Tao is a capable general!" Wang Junshan said with a smile.

No wonder we didn't see Operations Manager Tao Cheng at this meeting.

So he went to personally meet with the celebrity!
Tang Jinghe hired Tao Cheng because she valued his strong execution skills and hard work.

However, it would be inappropriate to put Tao Cheng in charge of Weibo operations.

This guy is a pragmatic general, not a marshal!
But now things are different. Wang Yufei is the marshal, and Tao Cheng is his right-hand man, responsible for the specific execution.

perfect!

Wang Junshan originally planned to change Tao Cheng's position, but now it seems that being a supervisor is not bad either.

If you have the title of Weibo operations manager, it will be easy to contact celebrities.

For ordinary employees of the Weibo celebrity expansion team, those big-name celebrities are high and mighty and they don't even look at them.

However, we have to take Tao Cheng, the Weibo operations manager, seriously.

Even top-tier celebrities have to give him some face.

Tao Cheng represents not only Weibo, but also the management team of Future Technology!

And currying favor with the powerful is a basic skill for celebrities.

"Thanks to Supervisor Tao, he was very efficient and worked very well with me. When he gets back, I'll personally treat him to drinks!"

Upon hearing this, Wang Junshan couldn't help but look at Wang Yufei with newfound respect.

This person is very good at handling things.

After joining Future Technology, he did not form cliques or compete with people like Tao Cheng.

Instead, they gave Tao Cheng a high position and praised him.

This put Wang Junshan at ease.

The fear is that the company's internal structure will resemble that of some enterprises, where a business unit can be divided into N factions, fighting amongst themselves, hindering each other, and creating chaos, resulting in no achievements being made.

Like Baidu in its previous life, it divided itself into N teams just to develop large AI models, and developed several products, but none of them lived up to expectations.

As a startup, Future Technology prioritizes efficiency, but they lack the time and capital to allow internal strife, which ultimately led to the failure of their Weibo account.

"Chairman, Manager Tao and his team are very efficient."

"It is estimated that by March 15, 80 celebrities will have joined Weibo, mainly first- and second-tier celebrities."

"The number of celebrities who have joined Weibo can reach four hundred."

"Our initial plan is for Weibo to officially launch on March 14th!"

"March 14th!" Wang Junshan laughed: "Are you planning to take advantage of the situation?"

“Yes!” Wang Yufei nodded: “The March 15th Gala’s crackdown on counterfeits is a great opportunity.”

"We went live a day in advance to generate buzz and get users' attention."

"Once the 315 Gala airs, we can simultaneously update the trending topics on Weibo, igniting public opinion. We can definitely become an overnight sensation through this!"

“Very good.” Wang Junshan was very satisfied: “The 315 anti-counterfeiting campaign is the biggest highlight. Many people don’t watch the live broadcast of the gala, but read the news and discuss it on Weibo. That’s great.”

"Yes, the 315 Gala can attract public attention, make people find Weibo interesting, and encourage them to discuss and express their opinions."

"You can also follow celebrities and famous people to start the celebrity follower growth mode."

(End of this chapter)