Rhino Entertainment Original
Text|Fangzheng Editor|Park Fang
Is this year's variety show investment still cold?
As we all know, in the past 2022, the topic of "variety show investment is difficult" has been talked about for a whole year, and the phenomenon of popular variety shows becoming naked, the sharp reduction of comprehensive N generation gold owners, and the difficulty of platform projects have made practitioners sigh that winter has arrived.
2023 may be an inflection point for recovery.
On the one hand, the new comprehensive project said no to the naked broadcast. Since the beginning of the year, most of the "comprehensive generation" in Q1 have almost found the title, and many new comprehensive have achieved outstanding investment results, "Northeast Transfer Student-Lao Tie We Are Coming", "Our Folk Song 2022" and "Infinite Beyond Class" have attracted more than 5 sponsorships, and "Farm" and "Our Inn" have been favored by 4 brands.
On the other hand, the projects that have been cold in the past have solved the sponsorship crisis this year. For example, "Happy Departure", which was struggling to find a gold owner last year, soared from 2 sponsorships in the first season to 8 in the second season; "Half-Acquainted Lovers" walked out of last year's naked broadcast circle, and the second season of continuing the high reputation attracted 4 brands to compete for investment; "Time Concert", which won only one title in the first season, has also risen to 4 sponsorships this year.
Of course, the industry's concerns remain. First, the phenomenon of "comprehensive N generation sponsorship" that was hotly discussed in the industry last year has not disappeared, and the number of sponsorships in "Detective 8" has continued to be reduced from 7 in the previous season to 2. Second, the basic posture of the brand side to tighten their pockets and put cautiously has not changed, and the projects that stick to tradition can no longer enter their eyes.
But overall, Rhino Jun is still very optimistic about this year's variety show investment. The retreat of the epidemic has helped all fields of the entertainment industry to recover, which not only solved the difficulties in promoting variety show projects, but more importantly, it led to the transformation of advertisers' advertising mentality. A more "certain" variety show market is pulling back the attention of advertisers.
The dawn is dawning
New comprehensive investment attraction "more blossoms"
Variety show investment is returning to a stable period.
This manifests itself on multiple levels.
The first gratifying change is that the phenomenon of variety show nudity (0 sponsorship) has been greatly reduced, especially the new variety project has also collectively bid farewell to nakedness. According to the preliminary statistics of Rhino Jun, the 11 "comprehensive generation" projects currently broadcast in Q1 have received at least one sponsorship. (See table below)
You know, in the past, because the new comprehensive project has not been tested by the market, it is often difficult for them to persuade the financial owner to put it at ease due to the unstable ROI. But since Q1 this year, the gold owners seem to have a preference for new variety shows.
The second key change is that advertisers have significantly increased their investment in new variety shows, and the overall investment attraction of new variety projects has "blossomed at multiple points", and the number of investment in many programs is better than that of the N generation. (Among the 11 popular "Generation Series" projects, as many as 7 programs have more than 3 sponsorships)
For example, "Northeast Transfer Student - Old Iron We Are Coming", which pioneered the online drama derivative variety show, just started broadcasting and won 7 sponsorships such as Ariwan and Onion Mate with "hilarious content". Folk songs are often regarded as commercial insulators, but "We Folk 2022", which focuses on folk elements, actually attracted 6 gold owners such as Du Xiaoman and FAW Toyota, and the investment situation far exceeded expectations.
Also very attractive is the "topic making machine" "Infinite Beyond Class", Junlebao, Samsung mobile phone and other 5 brands are all big customers who have cooperated with Zhejiang TV for many years. "Let's Farm" and "Our Inn" have attracted 4 brands to compete for investment, and the title merchants Genki Forest and Jin Dian are all big money owners who have made generous money on variety shows. And the smaller production volume of "Started! New Life" and "Chaoyang Song Center" are also lucky to be favored by 3 brands.
The third change is that the brands that once "left" from the variety show field are also regaining confidence in the variety show market, which is concentrated in two aspects.
The first is the return of large customers.
In previous years, due to the epidemic, the promotion of variety show projects was blocked, and major customers who had killed in the variety show marketing industry chose to "transfer the battlefield". For example, in the first two years, Genki Forest appropriated its marketing budget to hot dramas. And this year, Genki Forest returned to the variety show industry and titled "Let's Farm", and 58.com brought "Start Work!" after many years! "New Life" fought in the variety show circle again, all of which conveyed the signal of the change in the direction of variety show investment.
The second is the resurgence of sponsorship of waist brands.
I think that the "micro-business brand" Fan Meilin titled "Sister Lang 1" once became a classic case in the industry, but in the past two years, waist brands have almost collectively withdrawn from the variety show sponsorship industry, but now, we have seen the figure of Arivan, Oxygen Diary, Aiyisheng and other waist brands in "Northeast Trainee-Lao Tie We Are Coming".
Concerns remain
Comprehensive N generation "some people rejoice, some people worry"
The situation of the N generation is more complicated.
First of all, what is more exciting is that last year's projects that attracted cold investment have survived the difficulties this year, and many of them have the potential to become the most dynamic comprehensive N generation in the current market.
The most typical is "Happy Departure 2". Last season, Daqian Pictures only pulled 2 sponsors when operating the project, but I didn't expect to re-employ the boy group "Fancy Bringing Goods" (cooking noodles in the wild, writing theme songs, etc.) to directly bring the attention of the Wugu Dojo. Perhaps seeing the cargo power of this group of old fast men, the number of sponsorships from "Happy Departure 2" directly soared to 8, and even the old customer Wugu Dojo was squeezed out of the title position by the "big money" Dove.
"Half-Acquainted Lovers" and "Time Concert" are representatives of the market volume based on hard word-of-mouth, the former was once used as an example by the industry because of last year's full naked broadcast, and the latter had a very good reputation but only pulled a title throughout the process. In the second quarter of this year, "Half-Mature Lovers 2" joined hands with 4 brands such as Zhixuan to fight a turnaround battle, and "Time Concert 2", which has been fully upgraded in cast, has successively been favored by big customers such as Junlebao Jianol and Pinduoduo.
It can be seen that the above shows that have done two seasons are all standing tall in the market because they play sufficiently differentiated content, and they are all expected to be promoted to evergreen comprehensive N-generation projects. In contrast, some comprehensive N generations who have a longer life span than them are becoming more and more difficult to get rid of the fate of "lack of investment". (See table below)
Last year's "Great Detective", which was often used as an example, this year's investment number further dropped sharply from 7 to 2, which is not the same as the gold-absorbing power of Ming Detective in its heyday. According to industry insiders, the dismal number of clicks in the late stage of last season's show affected the investment of this season, and this program, which had a high viewing threshold, is no longer Mango's trump card project.
Similar to "Detective", there are also "Wife's Romantic Trip" and "The Strongest Brain", these comprehensive N generations have driven a large number of brands to launch enthusiasm, but now the sponsorship of "Wife's Romantic Trip 6" has been sharply reduced to 3, and "The Strongest Brain 10" only has a QQ star title, which makes people worry about whether they can have the next season.
A new phenomenon that has also emerged this year is that many shows have encountered the embarrassing scene of advertisers "withdrawing", which can't help but make us worry about the loyalty of related brands to launch variety shows in the future.
According to observation and comparison, Rhino Jun found that programs such as "Open Mai Tonight" and "Our Inn" have encountered the situation of "withdrawal of sponsorship". "Open Mai Tonight" was originally 3 sponsors when it started, but the latest issue only retained the title of Yue Xianhuo, and several other sponsoring brands have been covered by mosaic, I don't know if it's because the brand side is not satisfied with the popularity of the program, or the cooperation of several parties has something unexpected.
Increments can be expected
Big projects to be broadcast "raise the ceiling"
But this year's variety show investment is picking up as a whole.
Although many of the variety shows mentioned above are still "dropping sponsorship", compared with the collective misery of last year's "naked broadcasting", most of this year's projects will at least not fall into the situation of no soup to drink.
The recent new trends released by some large projects to be broadcast also indicate that the incremental space for investment in variety shows this year is far more than in the past few years. Let's start with a "very good number".
Just recently, the ""Riding the Wind and Waves 4" investment promotion case released by the well-known brand service organization "Xutong Media" has aroused heated discussions on social platforms, because the investment promotion case clearly pointed out that the exclusive naming fee of this season's "Sister Lang" was priced at "500 million".
As we all know, last season's "Sister Lang" caused Wang Xinling's phenomenal popularity, which proved the IP's ability to be popular, so we can see the naming fee of this season's "500 million" volume. You know, the last time we saw the number of show asking prices, it is estimated that it has to be traced back to the era of "variety show gold owners crazy money" many years ago.
From this point of view, because Q1 generally lacks S+ projects with super heads, it is difficult to assert that "investment has picked up". But as the platforms come up with ace projects in the coming months, we will follow up and observe at that time, and it is estimated that the conclusions will be clearer.
In any case, the variety show market, which has been cold for several years, needs positive news and signals too much. As far as the projects released by various platforms in Q1 are concerned, there is no shortage of exploratory "good content" in the current market. With the recovery of the entertainment industry in many aspects, we hope that more "good content" will be rewarded at the commercial level in the future.