The shopping spree of June is long gone. There are only words like "exhaustion", "lying flat", "retirement" and so on, which are constantly used to describe the state of major super head anchors in the mid-year promotion this year.
Just the day before June this year, on May 31, Qianyu (Hangzhou) Entertainment Media Co., Ltd., which had created the famous "Weiya Carnival", was deregistered.
Correspondingly, the long-lost name "Wei Ya" has appeared in the public eye again.
On June 17, the "first lesson of entrepreneurship" of Zhejiang's platform economy sponsored by Hangzhou Municipal Administration for Market Regulation and Hangzhou Qiantang District People's Government was officially launched. The purpose of this "course" is to accelerate the cultivation of high-level innovative talents through the 100 entrepreneurial mentor program and the platform economy training base.
In the guest list, there is a familiar figure that has been mentioned repeatedly: Wei Ya. At the scene, Wei Ya, as the co-founder of Qianxun (Hangzhou) Culture Media Co., Ltd., commented on the first batch of typical cases of platform economy entrepreneurship selected in Zhejiang Province.
Wei Ya/Source: 36 Krypton
Although Wei Ya stopped live streaming and brought goods, she did not fall. She not only bets on the skit track, but also appears at official events, and the humble direction behind her shows everywhere that the myth of the wealth of the female overlord continues.
Wei Ya changed careers
Many people say that Wei Ya has changed careers.
From a clothing store owner to the first female anchor on Taobao, and then to a mentor with goods, and now she is about to embark on the road of short dramas to bring goods, Wei Ya's identity is changing rapidly in the near future.
Specifically, in May this year, Wei Ya's representative Qianxun went out of the circle in the "618 E-commerce Promotion" with "live broadcast + short drama", and integrated the short drama into the live broadcast with "The 37th Sole Pet of Mr. Bee", betting on short dramas and testing the water for big promotions.
Qianxun released the event preview in the form of a short drama / Source: Douyin @Bee Surprise Club
The group that is familiar with Wei Ya may not be unfamiliar with the actors who starred in this short video, they are the resident anchors of the Bee Surprise Club Kaizi, Wukong, Xuexue and others.
At the same time, Beijing Qianmeng Culture Film and Television Production Co., Ltd. was also announced. The controlling shareholder of this company is Qianyue Culture, a subsidiary of Qianxun, holding up to 60% of the shares, and the partner is Zong Shuai, who served as the co-general manager of Huayi Brothers Brokerage, and Meng Yang Culture, a subsidiary of Zong Shuai, holds 40% of the shares in Beijing Qianmeng.
Shareholder information of Beijing Qianmeng Culture Film and Television Production Co., Ltd. / Source: Tianyancha
According to the poster information, Qianmeng Culture will start filming three short dramas "Stand-in Boyfriend", "My Family Has a Male Nanny" and "Don't Fall in Love with My Brother" in mid-to-late June, and even the name of Dong Haifeng, chairman of Qianxun, the man behind Wei Ya, also appears in the list of producers of these three short dramas.
The name of Dong Haifeng, chairman of Qianxun, appeared on the posters of the three short dramas as a producer
The operation of the traffic password of a series of short dramas such as "fast pace, cool plot, and reversal" confirmed the outside world's speculation that "Wei Ya and his wife entered the short drama world". It can be said that Qianxun's business territory has expanded again and again.
In fact, Qianxun realized early on that the power of just relying on the "first sister with goods" alone is always limited and unstable. Therefore, with the appeal of Wei Ya, Qianxun has created a "live broadcast business territory" of the whole industry chain. The company's main business includes the incubation of online celebrity anchors, the production and delivery of short video content, global content marketing, etc., and later expanded to digital intelligence supply chain, IP commercialization, talent training, AI digital human and other fields.
After the termination of Wei Ya's personal career with goods, Qianxun has been operating as usual, has been operating in the direction of diversification, and has quickly incubated many live broadcast rooms with outstanding performance.
Screenshot of the Qianxun anchor matrix / Source: Qianxun official website
In particular, the deeds of investing in two listed companies, Giant Biotech and Delmar, have also made this company earn enough eyeballs. Both companies have been Qianxun's co-customers. Moreover, this makes people realize that Qianxun is not just an MCN that only cultivates Internet celebrities to bring goods.
Wei Ya herself, who is hidden from public view, has also been busy.
It wasn't until later that she made a big impression with two public appearances.
The first time is in April 2023, Wei Ya appeared in Hangzhou, as the "chief tutor" of Zhejiang Century-old Brand Research Institute and Guochao College, sharing with you "How to use live broadcast e-commerce to empower time-honored brands". This is Wei Ya's most high-profile appearance after retiring from the live broadcast room.
Wei Ya appeared at the 2023 Time-honored Brand Carnival / Source: Jimu News
The other time is that in June 2024, Wei Ya will appear in the "first lesson of entrepreneurship" of Zhejiang's platform economy. It is interesting to note that this is an entrepreneurial event with an officially hosted background.
Xu Zhiyuan once asked Wei Ya at her peak, do you think you are a legend? Are you in a state of eternal anxiety?
Wei Ya denied it. She replied that I was reflecting, that I would always live in a very oppressive environment, that I was nervous, that I was afraid that I was not doing right, that I was not doing enough.
Let a person who can't be idle feel extremely anxious. "At this age, I feel that I am in the entrepreneurial period, I want to fight, I want to stand up and run, I feel that I have to be worthy of myself, I don't want to leave regrets, I feel that I didn't work hard at that time."
The team's previous evaluation of Wei Ya was: She is a very boring person, she works all day long, except for work or work.
For Wei Ya, this is another kind of proof.
In fact, in addition to things related to live broadcasts, Wei Ya has long been paying attention to other aspects, in order to hope that her content can be richer. It's no wonder that some media even described her as a kidnapped person. But in her opinion, "being needed" is very important.
Wei Ya is evaluated as being able to turn a high degree of boredom into a joy of life. However, for micro individuals, any industry has a boring period, and live streaming is no exception.
Now, live streaming has entered a cooling-off period and a mature period, and Wei Ya, who has retreated into the background, may have been thinking about it for a long time:
How can economic factors such as information, goods, capital, talent, and technology be reintegrated?
What is the new model? Will it be a short drama with goods?
The live broadcast room has long been not the most important battlefield
The live broadcast environment has changed, and in order to understand the embarrassment that the head anchor is currently in with live streaming, it is necessary to figure out the starting point of this business model.
The earlier live broadcast was known to help brands sell things, but it was actually "helping consumers buy goods".
Among them, the biggest feature of the head anchor is that it has the bargaining power and expands the consumer surplus.
They can bargain from the perspective of consumers, and the lower the price, the more people will come in the live broadcast room to buy.
On April 25, 2021, in Hefei, in the live broadcast room built by the Swan Lake Hotel, Wei Ya is promoting a voice mouse to fans/Source: Visual China
Further asked, why can the head anchor bargain?
This is because we are in a buyer's market economy with excess production capacity and diversified consumption. The starting point of this business model is a special kind of "altruistic thinking", which is to benefit the consumer. Consumers trust the top anchors, and they can reduce the cost of shopping decisions.
So why are brands willing to do this?
Because being able to be in the live broadcast room is also a kind of publicity. The more people who pay attention, the higher the advertising value, especially in the stock economy stage, through network effects, the brand can generate value spillover.
It can be seen that live streaming is largely a "fan economy".
But now, the head anchors who dominated the scene in the early days are gradually retiring, and even the "Guangdong couple" who are at the top of the list of goods can be said to be far from last year. Nowadays, it has become a trend of the emergence of the whole ecological anchor group.
"Guangdong couple" Zheng Jianpeng and Yan Zhen
After all, the sales model of "the lowest price on the whole network" of the top anchor's live broadcast is based on the unprofitable situation of the manufacturer, and it is difficult to continue. That's why countless merchants will jump out and spit out bitterness: sell more thanks to more.
We saw that in addition to Wei Ya, Brother Xiao Yang also stepped into the skit and greatly reduced the number of shows. Especially in this year's 618, the marketing of merchants has also turned to a new direction - customized short dramas.
The short drama brings goods, and it seems to be a new traffic outlet. From last year to this year, contrary to the cooling situation of live streaming, short dramas have been in a hot stage, especially after the emergence of popular paid short dramas, which have become an obvious traffic weapon. According to iiMedia Consulting data, in 2023, the size of China's micro-short drama market will reach 37.39 billion yuan, an increase of 267.65% year-on-year, and it is predicted to exceed 50 billion yuan in 2024 and 100 billion yuan in 2027.
From 2020 to 2027, China's micro-short drama market size and forecast/Source: iiMedia Consulting
However, it just looks fierce, but the profitability of this kind of simple paid short drama is not strong, because the cost of "streaming" is very high.
Short drama is another profit model - using the short drama plot to improve the exposure and conversion rate of goods, extend the distribution of benefits in the industrial chain, and maximize the value of traffic.
To put it simply, its commercialization idea basically replicates the short video model, forming an entrance to aggregate consumers.
Compared with live broadcasting, the cost of bringing goods for short dramas may be lower, after all, there is no sky-high pit fee. In order to plant grass and customize low-cost shooting for brand marketing, once it becomes a hit, it will have the opportunity to easily leverage hundreds of millions of playbacks.
In the face of such a piece of fat, the keen giants will certainly not miss the layout and collectively bet on the skit.
Douyin and Kuaishou, as short video content platforms themselves, have long occupied most of the short drama industry, and they have already reflected their own commercial value in the traffic aggregation and transformation of short dramas. The short dramas that Wei Ya's company wants to shoot are also planned to be launched on platforms such as Douyin.
At the same time, shelf e-commerce companies that lack native content fields are also working hard, such as Taobao directly released the "10 billion Taoju plan". Overall, the focus of Taobao short dramas is still on e-commerce. Taobao has opened a short drama section called "Theater" on the live broadcast interface, which is used to broadcast all kinds of short drama content. When the plot is played, there will be "Baby mentioned by TA" in the lower left corner, and clicking on it is the product link.
Source: Screenshot of Taobao's "Theater" section page
Jingdong is also making continuous efforts in the short drama track, but it does not have a special short drama section, but is mixed in other information streams. For example, the latest short drama launched during Jingdong 618,You need to search in the search box"6" to see,The main dissemination is the discount information of Jingdong home appliances。
Pinduoduo also mixes short dramas with goods in the short drama information flow, and recommends them to interested users through big data.
In this situation, the live broadcast room is no longer the most important battlefield for the head anchor who holds the capital. Therefore, even if Wei Ya makes a comeback, it may be difficult for "Wei Ya's woman" to wait until she makes a comeback in the live broadcast room.
That's how fast things are changing on the internet. But what remains unchanged is the anxiety of traffic, everyone is actively looking for a field that can carry content in the e-commerce ecosystem, and they will not miss any wind and grass.
Nowadays, the micro-short drama market has entered the "filing era". After June this year, the "New Regulations on the Most Stringent Short Dramas" were implemented, and micro-short dramas were subject to classified and hierarchical review, and micro-short dramas that have not been reviewed and filed are not allowed to be disseminated online.
The skit is not easy to do, and Wei Ya is also groping. The Bee Surprise Club, which is closely related to her, recently launched a short drama with the theme of "Boss", but the current data is bleak. However, as long as there is capital to chase the wind and grab traffic, this unknown battle will continue to be fought.