After leveraging He Zhiyu's name, the other party waived a portion of the commission.
Chen Pingjiang didn't waste any more words and signed the contract on the spot, paying a deposit of one month's rent and six months' rent upfront.
"This feels like such a rip-off. Once I make money, I'll have to get a plot of land and build my own building."
The one-thousand-square-meter office area looked spacious, but not much was left after accounting for meeting rooms and offices.
And Chen Pingjiang's several companies would have to share this space.
Miaochá, needing to open branches and even a flagship store in the bustling city center, undoubtedly required a prominent storefront.
There weren't many office staff, as store employees worked at various branches.
The main focus was still on Renrenwang.
After sorting everything out, Chen Pingjiang returned to Innovation Park 202 and announced the news.
"We haven't been in the Innovation Park for long, have we? We have to move again. Can we not go, Boss? It's more comfortable staying at school."
"The company is growing too fast; we really need a foothold in the city. Every time the station managers from Xianning University City come for a meeting, they have to cross the entire Dongjiang City."
Wan Yuqian, however, was indifferent:
"I've already graduated anyway, so I can work in the city."
Chen Pingjiang interrupted everyone's chatter, cleared his throat, and said,
"Where you work will be based on proximity and convenience. But we need a large number of technical staff, and all future hires will work in the city."
Renrenwang still had a large number of university students, mostly from Cai Da and surrounding universities, so it was naturally impossible to have all of them work in the city.
Thanks to the immense popularity of the Miaochá project, Renrenwang's tight cash flow situation had finally improved.
The milk tea project was a very competent cash cow.
And due to the popularity of the Campus Brand Ambassador Competition, Renrenwang's advertising sales had been doing well since the start of the year, with advertising revenue up over 80% compared to the previous quarter.
Most importantly, it boosted sales of some of Renrenwang's virtual products.
Renren Waimai also performed well; its innovative delivery method was subtly changing students' lifestyles, and its profits were decent.
Looking at the millions lying in the account, Chen Pingjiang thought,
"I've never fought such a rich battle before."
"Next, Miaochá needs to gradually complete its layout in two university towns. The most crucial step is to enter densely populated commercial districts to elevate the brand image."
"Wan needs to fully staff the catering company's team."
"After this brand ambassador competition, Renrenwang will expand beyond campuses, and then we will place advertisements in places like subway and bus stations."
Miao Bingwei then said,
"'Parking Frenzy' mini-game is largely finished. Should we launch it together with this promotion?"
Chen Pingjiang's eyes lit up at the sound.
After waiting for almost half a year, "Parking Frenzy" was finally nearing completion.
"While we have time, let's test it internally first, as a trial run, right? If the results are good, we can launch it during the lull after the brand ambassador competition."
The entire R&D team had painstakingly developed it for about half a year, and "Parking Frenzy" was quite complete now.
Some gameplay elements had been restored, and the scene design was somewhat cartoonish.
The game started by giving players a regular parking lot with three standard parking spaces and one 'love' parking space, along with a used Alto and starting funds.
Players could earn income by parking and issuing tickets in the game.
After earning income, they could buy their dream car; the more expensive the car, the higher its earning potential per minute.
All employees at Renrenwang had known for a while that the technical department was developing a mini-game called "Parking Frenzy," but initially hadn't paid much attention until they got their hands on it and found it genuinely interesting.
Miao Bingwei shared the "Parking Frenzy" gameplay in the company's internal QQ group.
"Park your car in a friend's parking space to earn money based on the car's earning ability per minute. After 12 consecutive hours of parking, income will no longer increase. This income will only be added to your total cash amount once you move your car from the space.
If you find your parking space occupied by someone else, you can 'ticket' that car and choose to confiscate all or half of its income. You can only park your car in a friend's space. Your own private parking spaces are for earning money!"
Many were eager to try it and started playing.
"So this game relies on constantly parking and ticketing to earn money and change cars?"
"Hmm, it seems so. There are also modification shops and item shops here, and it looks like modifications can slightly increase parking income."
"I want to buy a BMW 730 and a Porsche 911, so cool!"
"A used Alto only earns 5 yuan per minute, but the best Porsche 911 earns 30 yuan per minute, which is over 40,000 yuan a day."
"My ranking here shows #1 among friends, wahahaha."
"Damn, we all started playing at the same time, why do you have so much money?"
"..."
This type of mini-game was new to most people.
Unlike popular games like CS and World of Warcraft, this was a new social game.
It increased game interaction between people in an entertaining way.
No download was required; players could simply open Renrenwang to play and didn't need to spend long hours in front of a computer.
It was acceptable to men, women, adults, and children alike.
After playing for a while, Chen Pingjiang turned to Miao Bingwei next to him and asked,
"Do you have a plan for future version updates?"
Miao Bingwei nodded,
"Currently, the best car in the game is only the Porsche 911. In future versions, we will update with more supercars and luxury cars, launch more modification kits, and try to add other gameplay, but the core gameplay of parking and ticketing will not change."
Chen Pingjiang wasn't surprised by this.
He smiled and said,
"The office space I rented in the city this time is intended to hire a batch of game developers. The 'Renren Farm' project can be developed. 'Parking Frenzy' is just a warm-up."
"Soon, our competitors like Xiaonei Wang and QQ will also follow suit and launch their 'Parking Frenzy' mini-games. What we need to do is update our versions faster than them every time, always staying ahead."
"Once this game is launched, Renrenwang will effectively be developing both the Dongjiang market and the national market simultaneously. You need to be prepared on the server side."
The mission of "Parking Frenzy" was merely to help Renrenwang open up the national market and quickly establish a foothold.
To make a bigger breakthrough, they still had to rely on the nationwide hit, "Stealing Vegetables."
After all, "Stealing Vegetables" was a household name back then, with many elderly people unable to resist getting up in the middle of the night to harvest crops.
That was truly a nationwide sensation.
In comparison, "Parking Frenzy" was still a bit lacking.
The inherent disadvantage of social games was their short lifespan and poor replayability; they rose and fell with social interaction.
Version updates couldn't be endless.
When more players found it boring and quit, it would in turn lead other friends to quit with them.
With fewer people playing, the game's life would naturally come to an end.
So Chen Pingjiang didn't plan to rely on one game for life; he just needed to continuously develop new games.
"In short, everyone should first complete the internal testing of the game during this period, and all other supporting promotional copy and marketing plans must be ready. The sales department also needs to pursue targeted advertising partnerships."
Li Xi looked stunned, still a bit slow to react:
"Boss, are we doing advertising partnerships in the same way as before?"
Chen Pingjiang shook his head,
"Of course not. Social games have a natural advantage with built-in advertising; players are all over the country. Previous advertising slots were on the Renrenwang homepage or secondary pages. This time, the advertising slots are limited to within the 'Parking Frenzy' game itself."
"We're not directly displaying ads to users, but rather placing them in the form of in-game items. This will forcibly increase user recall as they continuously use these items. For example, some branded vehicles in our 'Parking Frenzy' mini-game are common products in real life, which is equivalent to moving offline products online."
This was a pretty clever move, Li Xi thought, something only his boss could come up with.
Thinking about it, it was true; it was easy to remember certain car brands while playing the game.
"Boss, do you mean we need to negotiate with all the car manufacturers whose cars appear in the game?"
After asking this question, Li Xi felt a bit daunted.
Even though he had cooperated with large enterprises like New Oriental, working with car manufacturers, especially through product placement, was a first for both him and Renrenwang.
Seeing this, Miao Bingwei asked with some concern,
"Our opponents are nationally and even globally renowned car manufacturers. In comparison, Renrenwang is still very small. Will they be willing to cooperate with us, or will they turn around and demand copyright fees?"
Chen Pingjiang, however, dismissed it,
"Go talk to each one. Whether it's Chery, Xiali, Geely, or Volkswagen, none are impossible to talk to. Even if we can't close a deal, we must get an authorization letter from them to prevent them from suing us for infringement later. This work needs to be done before the game launches.
For those willing to advertise in our game, the technical department will boost the simulation accuracy to at least 80%. For those unwilling, we won't force them; we'll just make their cars look a bit uglier. Once the game becomes popular, I believe they won't be able to stand it themselves."
Everyone couldn't help but smile, and even Li Xi's worries lessened somewhat.
Indeed.
The initiative was in Renrenwang's hands.
If they wanted to talk, they could.
Renrenwang wouldn't be the one losing out if they didn't.
When the game eventually launched and became a hit.
For an Audi A6, BMW 730, or Mercedes-Benz E, all in the same BBA tier, those willing to advertise would have their cars drawn handsomely, even with bigger wheels.
Those unwilling?
Too bad, they'd be lucky to have a primary school artist draw it for them.
And if they were still unwilling, their car might not even be included in the game at all.
By then, if the Audi A6 and BMW 730 were in the game, but the Mercedes-Benz E wasn't, it would naturally have a disadvantage compared to its competitors.
Indeed, Renrenwang wouldn't need to rush; the Mercedes-Benz E company itself wouldn't be able to stand it.
(End of this chapter)
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