【Lieyun Network (WeChat: ilieyun) Beijing】 April 5 report (text/ Sheng Jiaying)
"In order to incense my family, I became a member of Heavenly Thoughts." "Painted a villa for a deceased relative." Some netizens broke the news, "In order to hit the list, I recharged 5,000 yuan." ”
These all happen on the cloud memorial platform.
Since the beginning of the epidemic, online festival sweeping has been vigorously promoted. The 2022 Qingming Festival festival festival cleaning work video teleconference held by the Ministry of Civil Affairs also stressed many times: vigorously promote civilized low-carbon sacrifice sweeping methods such as online sacrifice sweeping, flower sacrifice sweeping, and family memorial service.
On the first day of the Qingming Festival holiday, a total of 6.95 million people visited the online sacrifice sweeping platforms in 2304 online festival sweeping platforms across the country, an increase of 275.7% over the same period last year. Correspondingly, funeral service agencies in various places received a total of 5.83 million people, about 1.23 million vehicles, and 320,000 staff members participating in service guarantees, which decreased by 69.8%, 62.5% and 12.5% respectively over the same period last year.
However, the modes of "hitting the list" and "brushing gifts" in the live broadcast room also appear on the cloud memorial platform.
Hit the list, VR, brush the plane... Fancy cloud festival sweep
Since the beginning of the epidemic, the popularity of Qingming "cloud sacrifice" has remained high, and in March and April last year alone, the online blessing of a cloud sacrifice platform on Weibo reached 130 million times.
With the recurrence of the epidemic before the Qingming Festival this year, the "Cloud Sacrifice" once again stood in the C position, and each platform was carefully considered in form.
For example, the Xin Ji Dian App is a typical Internet model, where users can create memorials for free, but they need to pay for incense, candles, flowers, offerings, etc. In addition, a "Supreme Memorial Hall" that includes functions such as "exclusive music" and "exclusive commemorative skin" is charged 270 yuan a year and 1440 yuan for 10 years. If you want to hang a lantern on the memorial, it costs 28 yuan for seven days and 288 yuan for permanent lighting.
Xin Ji Dian also put the "hit the list" and "brush gift" mode in the charging service, every relative and friend in the memorial hall to buy the sacrifice supplies will appear in the bottom scrolling, "so-and-so gave a villa set", "so-and-so gave lcd TV", the memorial hall other relatives and friends can see.
Among the many offerings, there are also luxury yachts, luxury villas, luxury planes. One of the most expensive is the luxury plane, which costs 288 yuan.
The more worshippers there are, the more expensive they are, and the higher the filial piety value and the ranking of the memorial hall. Some netizens once broke the news that in order to show their filial piety, they once spent 5,000 yuan to "hit the list".
Commemorative Treasure, Wynn Memorial and Deceased Family Affection Online also have similar ranking functions.
According to the official website of Xin ji dian, the number of users of its platform has exceeded 2 million, the number of museums has reached 110,000, and the number of worships has exceeded 6.95 million.
Si Nian Tang adopts the mode of "circle of friends fission", for users who need to hold memorial services, publish obituary, and receive condolences, the platform has launched the "Online Spirit Hall" function, the user creates an exclusive spirit hall, shares this to the circle of friends, relatives and friends can present the deceased through the spirit hall to offer bangs, flowers, wreaths, sacrifices and tributes to the deceased. It can also meet the needs of users to view the gift list and withdraw the gift money.
Fushouyuan International Group, the "first mainland funeral stock", integrates VR, AI and other technologies into the cloud memorial platform. As early as a few years ago, Fushouyuan International created a simulated cemetery through VR technology and realized "virtual tomb sweeping".
In addition, its cloud memorial platform can also upload life story databases, build online memorials for the deceased, and provide old photo restoration services, life micro-film planning and production, etc.
According to the 2020 data of Shanghai Fushouyuan Cemetery, the traffic of the online sacrifice platform during the Qingming Period alone exceeded 120,000 times.
In addition, on some platforms, there are also many Qing Dynasty sacrifice sweeping packages, the price is about 200-1000 yuan, including different packages, wiping tombstones, offering flowers, incense, and silent mourning can be found to be carried out on behalf of others.
There is even a 5,000-priced sacrifice sweeping service, and its business introduction says that Shandong Linyi Qingming Festival can provide a series of services such as sending flowers, wiping tombstones, pouring wine, chatting, etc.
Cloud festival sweeps down the business economy
According to the "2016-2021 China Funeral Service Industry Market Operation and Industry Development Trend Research Report", the annual death population in the mainland is about 10 million, bringing the overall sales of the funeral industry more than 200 billion yuan.
The China Funeral Association has predicted that the consumption of China's funeral industry will reach 1 trillion yuan by 2023.
Under the trillion market, many enterprises have seen the "business opportunities". Especially with the entry of new technologies such as 5G networks and live video into the sinking market, the Internet funeral industry has seen the phenomenon of "centralized entrepreneurship".
The more typical of this wave of entrepreneurship is the funeral e-commerce that claims to "make everyone die". In 2014, it received millions of angel round financing from Zhen Fund.
This type of funeral e-commerce mainly adopts the O2O model of "offline chain + online e-commerce". However, with the demise of O2O, the other side also announced the failure of the project in early 2017, and there are also many Internet funeral platforms such as "One Empty Network" and "Enhua Love".
The failure of these Internet funeral platforms was, on the one hand, the promotion and marketing costs were too high, on the other hand, the acceptance of online funerals by consumers at that time was not high, and the supervision of relevant business licenses was also very strict.
However, after the epidemic, the demand for cloud memorial platforms has surged, and consumer acceptance has also increased.
According to a survey, 15.6% of people said that cloud sacrifice should be widely promoted, 65% said they would like to try or understand, and only 4% would not choose this way.
According to the data of Paradise Memorial Network, the number of website users born in the 50s and 60s has exceeded 70%, 20% of the post-70s and post-80s, and only 10% of the post-90s in the main force of the Internet.
And it is worth mentioning that the annual fixed memorial as a circular consumption has replaced other links and become the key growth point of the entire funeral market after the sale and purchase of cemeteries. Taking Fushouyuan International Group as an example, 83.8% of Fushouyuan's revenue comes from cemetery services, and the gross profit margin of the business is as high as more than 80%.
Many online memorial self-operated platforms came into being.
The Paradise Memorial Network has created more than 40 sub-stations at home and abroad, and the number of museums built in 2016 exceeded 5 million; according to the China Sacrifice Network page, its resident users currently reach more than 4.28 million; the genealogy record memorial network has accumulated more than 500 million worships.
With the development of the economy and the changes of the times, people's demand for funerals has extended from the initial rigid demand at the physical level to a richer spiritual demand.
Although the form of sacrifice and sweeping has changed accordingly, what has not changed is infinite remembrance. "Cloud sacrifice" is not only an emergency move in a special period, but also a new way of sacrifice and sweeping in the "Internet +" era. Paying homage to loved ones in your own way, whether it is a live sacrifice or an online sacrifice, the intention is more important than the form.