Dong Yuhui topped Douyin with the new "first brother", the "sweetness and troubles" of Dongfang selection

Author | Mia

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According to the Douyin live broadcast list in January 2024, Dong Yuhui's live broadcast room "Walking with Hui" reached the top and became the new first brother with goods, with a total of 15.0847 million pieces of goods on Douyin in January and a total sales of 889 million yuan, beating the crazy Brother Yang who ranked sixth.

At the same time, the turmoil of right and wrong has not left. Recently, Yang Fan, a humanities and arts blogger with millions of fans, posted a video saying that Dong Dong, the anchor of "Walking with Hui", explained that Michelangelo's content, structure, and terminology were almost exactly the same as the video he released earlier, with a 90% overlap, and he also used the wrong sculpture example in the video.

Dong Dong said during the live broadcast that some teachers' works may be used when explaining art, but they have no intention of offending, and they can communicate in time if they have any questions, and they are suspected of responding to plagiarism. From the "small composition" incident to the "plagiarism" turmoil, "knowledge live broadcast" urgently needs to be standardized and reshaped.

At present, Dong Yuhui's new performance has surpassed Dongfang Selection. Dongfang Selection, which ranked first last month, slipped to fourth this month. Dongfang Selection Main Account (557 million yuan) and Dongfang Selection Beautiful Life entered the top 20 of the monthly list, ranking fourth and 13th respectively, with total sales of nearly 800 million yuan, down by about one-third from the previous month.

The top stream of flowing water, the tik of iron. How far can this new "first brother" go?

"Walking with Hui" brings goods culture: selling "People's Literature" and selling movie tickets

The external environment is conducive to the rise of "walking with Hui": the former "first brother" crazy Brother Yang frequently reversed, last year from the insured contract to vulgar goods, a number of suppliers were ordered to rectify by the Municipal Supervision Bureau, this year's recent "Wang Hai reported that Brother Xiao Yang brought goods fake Wuchang rice", sliced overturned, and used "Wuliangye" as a gimmick when bringing "national cup wine", which was questioned for suspected false propaganda and controversy;

The new account is fresh and attractive, and the small composition turmoil has aroused empathy among workers, and this incident is essentially equivalent to the "abuse of fans" and "purification" in the fan circle, which further enhances the cohesion and loyalty of the "mother-in-law", and its considerable purchasing power has also been vigorously released in the first three live broadcasts.

After flying solo, did "Walking with Hui" divert the fans of the main number, and what is the difference between it and Dongfang Selection?

The answer to all this was found in the live broadcast in the last month: in the first month of broadcasting, the number of its fans has exceeded 15.794 million, reaching half of Dongfang Selection, and the latter has lost fans slightly. According to statistics, in the second half of January, Dongfang Selection had a total of 196 million views, with an average daily sales of only 10 million to 25 million yuan, while 424 million people poured into the live broadcast room of "Walking with Hui" during the same period, with an average daily sales of 25 million to 50.05 million yuan. The gap between the two will gradually narrow, and the "siphon effect" may be unavoidable. "Walking with Hui" has made a distinction between modes, emphasizing more intellectual and cultural colors, and being more "exclusive" and "pet fans".

Previously, Yu Minhong once said: "Don't set yourself a sales task." Don't care too much about sales, you have to care about culture, and spread culture for netizens. And Dong Yuhui mentioned: "We will maintain the original intention of bringing agricultural products under the strategic guidance of Mr. Yu Minhong." It will also explore the possibilities of books, culture, and tourism, and a series of strategic deployments will be launched after the year. All of the above has been reflected in the new live broadcast room.

At present, there are more than 70 people in the "Walking with Hui" team, and some employees are also directly selected from the East, which will inevitably be compared with the main number by the outside world. From the selection of products, including agricultural products, to the visual and operation mode of the live broadcast room, there are still certain overlaps and similarities between "Walking with Hui" and Dongfang Selection.

In terms of differences, "Walking with Hui" is dominated by third-party brands, and there is no Dongfang selection of self-operated products, even on the third day of the broadcast, the lack of stock and the suspension of the broadcast have not changed this strategy. At present, the scope of its selection has been further expanded to down jackets, daily use, etc., in addition, the cultural color of the live broadcast room is heavier, considering Dong Yuhui's title of "Vice President of New Oriental Cultural Tourism Group", it is more likely to be biased towards the direction of cultural tourism that New Oriental focuses on in the future.

The premiere was full of literary and artistic sense, and the "Art Show" of the day included "Do You Want to Dance" by singing and dancing the New Pants Band, rope magic trick to tell the truth of life, as well as Chinese and English song singing, poetry recitation, piano performance and Chinese-English cultural dialogue. On the same day, we joined hands with Douyin's "Great Knowledge" and "National Good Books Program" to recommend many books such as "Juvenile China Geography", "Winter Pasture" and "Arctic Village Fairy Tale", and the lottery prizes also included Chi Zijian's signed book "The Right Bank of the Ergun River".

On the evening of January 23, Shi Zhanjun, editor-in-chief of "People's Literature", writers Liang Xiaosheng and Cai Chongda were guests in the "Walking with Hui" Douyin live broadcast room, and talked about "My Literary Road" with Yu Minhong and Dong Yuhui, with a total of 8.95 million viewers, with a maximum of more than 700,000 people online at the same time, and hundreds of millions of likes. Within four hours, "People's Literature" sold nearly one million copies, with a turnover of 17.85 million, which once exceeded the annual sales of "People's Literature" and also set a new record in the literary world.

Outside of literature is film. In this year's Spring Festival, "Walking with Hui" has become the main position for live broadcast selling movie tickets. In order to stimulate the enthusiasm for watching the movie, the "large ticket compensation + live broadcast ticket sales" was restarted again, on the evening of January 31, Andy Lau and Ning Hao brought the new film "Mr. Red Carpet" to the "Walking with Hui" live broadcast room, and had a one-and-a-half-hour special dialogue and exchange with Dong Yuhui.

On the same day, 19.9 yuan instead of 50 yuan vouchers were put on the shelves twice, and the 300,000 discount coupons on the shelves for the first time were sold out in 8 minutes of live broadcast, and when the live broadcast reached 50 minutes, the 300,000 coupons for additional sales were sold out in 2 minutes. A total of 600,000 discount coupons were sold, with a total transaction value of nearly 12 million. In the end, the total number of views of the whole live broadcast exceeded 40 million, and the number of likes in the live broadcast room was nearly 700 million.

On the evening of February 2, Zhang Yimou appeared in Dong Yuhui's live broadcast room to promote the platform of "Article 20" for his three Spring Festival files. Within an hour and a half of the broadcast, 700,000 vouchers were sold, followed by an additional 100,000 vouchers. By the end of the live broadcast, all 800,000 vouchers for "1 yuan instead of 15 yuan" had been sold out.

Considering the volume of the film itself and the cost of publicity, although the two live broadcasts cannot be compared with the number of 1.05 million copies sold in the live broadcast room of "Tang Detective 3" X Wei Ya in 2021, and the discount of 0.1 yuan to 39.9 yuan discount coupons, they also effectively stimulated the pre-sale.

As Dong Ping, the producer of "Mr. Red Carpet", Huanxi Media, said in an interview: "Cooperation with the head live broadcast room of the e-commerce platform is a win-win situation, today's e-commerce platform is no longer a pure selling platform, they need a good cultural experience environment, and the movie needs to let more audiences understand its connotation and charm." "The culture of bringing goods is in line with the standardized trend of live broadcast e-commerce in the second half, which is conducive to further strengthening the cultural personality of "walking with Hui" and enhancing the positive social value of the live broadcast room.

The valuation of Oriental Selection fell by nearly seventy percent: sweetness and trouble

Although Yu Minhong used the method of "opening a new account" to resolve the "small composition turmoil" and open the second growth curve, he still needs to face various challenges, including how to promote Dongfang Selection's stock price to return to the peak, deeply bind Dong Yuhui, who is valued at more than $1 billion in personal IP by the outside world, and how to tap new growth space in the face of increasingly fierce competition, including diversion and competition from Hui's peers.

On January 29, Oriental Selection announced its financial report for the 2024 fiscal year (June 1, 2023 - November 30, 2023). According to the data, Dongfang Selection achieved revenue of 2.795 billion yuan within 6 months, a year-on-year increase of 34.4%, and a net profit of 249 million yuan, a significant decrease of 57.4% year-on-year. Oriental Selection's share price then fell.

In January last year, the company's share price climbed to HK$75.5, and after March, it hovered between HK$30 and HK$40 for a long time, falling into a long downturn. The "small composition turmoil" caused the share price of Oriental Selection to fall all the way to HK$26.25 on December 15. On January 29, Oriental Selection had dropped to HK$20.95 per share, and on February 1, Hong Kong shareholder Fang Xuan opened up 6.74% to HK$24.550, with the latest total market value of HK$24.96 billion, down nearly seventy percent from its peak.

After the market value plummeted, Yu Minhong came to the rescue. On January 31, Oriental Selection (01797. HK) and New Oriental (NYSE: EDU) jointly announced that the board of directors of Oriental Selection and the board of directors of New Oriental have each approved the termination of the subscription agreement and entered into a termination agreement, and New Oriental and Yu Minhong have each committed to purchase a total of HK$700 million worth of Oriental Selection shares on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange at market price.

Judging from the financial report, the latest sales and marketing expenses of Oriental Selection increased from 227.8 million yuan in the same period to 559.5 million yuan, an increase of nearly 1.5 times. Douyin's traffic support stage has passed, and the cost of buying volume is bound to rise sharply.

Dongfang Selection's commitment to building a "self-operated product platform" rather than a pure MCN also led to higher costs, with a total revenue cost of RMB1.7 billion during the period, an increase of 55% year-on-year, due to the increase in inventory costs and transportation costs of self-operated products due to the substantial growth of business.

The question that the capital market is most concerned about is, with the increase in the right to speak, will Dong Yuhui stay forever? Previously, it was reported that Jingdong and other platforms were actively recruiting Dong Yuhui, which cast a layer of uncertainty over the future.

Yu Minhong publicly stated at the earnings conference that there was no board of directors with Hui, but only one general manager and executive director, all of whom were Dong Yuhui. Although the main body of the new account is wholly owned by New Oriental, Yu Minhong once said in the live broadcast that Dong Yuhui's personal account is owned by him personally, and it also belongs to him after leaving the company.

In the small essay turmoil, Dongfang Selection claimed that "the recent outbreak of public opinion has exposed the conflict between Dongfang Selection's two models, the Internet celebrity model and the product route, and said that sticking to the product route is the best choice for Dongfang Selection to respond to doubts." ”

Fully letting go is conducive to improving their self-management decision-making power. The comprehensive crushing from on-site viewing to GMV fully proves that the emotional stickiness of the "Internet celebrity mode" live broadcast is significantly higher. Dong Yuhui gave full play to his personal IP appeal in the new account, which is conducive to promoting the performance and stock price of Dongfang Selection. The uncertainty lies in whether the Internet celebrity can become popular, Dong Yuhui's whereabouts after "high merit covers the master", and the maintenance of common ideals, and the loosening of the super-head anchor and the small-scale "solo flight" will also directly affect the performance of Dongfang Selection.

The feud between the overhead anchor and the company has been staged countless times. Dong Yuhui and Yu Minhong, will they finally move towards a good story of each other's achievements, or do they know why they should end up today?