Text | Zhao Er's knife
"Mimeng earned more than 100 million yuan from 2 short dramas during a winter vacation" ......
"A couple makes more than 400 million dollars a month when they make short plays" ......
After the Spring Festival in 2024, the national heated discussion caused by short dramas is still continuing, and the "myth of wealth creation" is widely spread, and the rumors of a daily flow of more than 10 million and a monthly income of 400 million have also made the short drama fever high. At the same time, the trend of standardization and high-quality short dramas is becoming more and more obvious: from last year's short dramas in the overseas market "blossoming inside the wall and fragrant outside the wall", to the continued popularity in the domestic market in 2024, short dramas, as a rising star in the content industry, have reached a "critical moment".
If the upward trend continues, it is likely to become another major form of online content after online dramas, online universities and online comprehensives, and if the chaos in the industry intensifies, it may also usher in an unprecedented moment of strong supervision. Judging from the trends of the short drama industry in the past year or so, the industry very much hopes that short dramas can embark on the road of sustainable development, after all, short dramas can make many film and television practitioners "make money".
The short drama craze has also been transmitted to the online audio-visual conference, which is known as the vane of the industry. From March 28th to March 30th, at the 11th China Network Audiovisual Conference held in Chengdu, almost all the "short dramas" can be seen from the main forum to the sub-forums From industry executives to long and short video platforms, from traditional film and television companies to new production forces and MCN institutions, all parties in the industry express their opinions around short dramas, and their views also have their own confrontations, but from this lively scene, we can actually see the development trajectory of short dramas for a long time.
There is a consensus on the present and future of short dramas
As we all know, the reason why the short drama industry has grown from small to large is inseparable from the help of the platform. So, how does the platform see the current short drama market, and what aspects will it exert in the future? This is undoubtedly the most direct "baton" for short drama practitioners.
Zhang Fuping, vice president and editor-in-chief of Douyin Group, said that small short dramas are also a big industry, and the micro short drama industry has been moving towards good content, new themes, and scale, and Douyin will continue to fulfill its responsibilities and work with all parties in the industry to promote the high-quality development of the industry. At the "Micro Short Drama Creation Forum and Boutique Screening Ceremony", Wang Chen, the person in charge of Douyin short dramas, summarized the vibrant scene of the short drama industry - active users, rapid growth, accelerated entry, ecological prosperity, good dramas on stage, and continuous explosions. It is reported that Douyin and Stephen Chow jointly launched the "9527 Theater", and the new drama "Afternoon Rose" announced this time was produced by Li Ruotong. As part of the "Chenxing Project", in the future, Douyin will join hands with more industry celebrities and well-known institutions to create high-quality theater IPs and bring creative innovation to micro-short dramas.
In fact, this also represents the threshold that short dramas must cross after their extensive growth in the past year or so. If you want sustainable development, you must standardize and comply, which is why short dramas must be "high-quality".
Yu Ke, head of the Drama Business Center of the Kuaishou Entertainment Business Department, also mentioned at the "Short Video and Live Broadcast Empowerment Industry High-quality Development Forum" that Kuaishou short dramas adhere to the principles of "micro" but not weak, "short" but not shallow, and "drama" quality, and are committed to continuing to make "high-quality and valuable" micro-short dramas, and insisting on "creating high-quality products". In terms of content creation, from the refreshing stories that pursued reversal in the early days to the high-quality dramas that highlight social value today, popular short dramas that closely follow the social hotspots and the pulse of the times are emerging in Kuaishou.
Li La, deputy general manager of Tencent's online video platform operation department, emphasized in his speech that Tencent Video micro-short dramas adhere to the principle of "refinement as a ruler", continue to innovate in diversified themes and innovative brands, and create a number of high-quality projects with a bumper harvest at the box office and word-of-mouth. In the future, Tencent Video will continue to explore the creation of AIGC short dramas, help technological development and production capacity upgrades, and promote the industry level in multiple dimensions.
In addition, Zhou Qiu, the person in charge of Mango TV's Damang Plan Studio, proposed that the "Damang Plan" be high-quality, innovative and large-scale, and launched the ten themes of "Strategic Cooperation of 100 Boutique Micro-short Dramas", striving to break through the circle and meet diversified needs.
Liu Huabo, the person in charge of Youku's account sharing and short drama, shared the judgment and evaluation methods of the content and script, one is to find the core selling point, the longboard should be prominent, and the story should be extreme; the second is to grasp the main contradictions, and the confrontation between the characters should be hierarchical, and a good short drama will often start from the distinct character contradictions and confrontations; the third is to evaluate the integrity of the content and whether there are explosive famous scenes; in addition, the production level also includes the evaluation of the main creative team and the evaluation of the finished project.
Previously, Reading Entertainment had written about the similarities and differences between vertical screen short dramas and horizontal screen short dramas, and through this audio-visual conference, it can be clearly felt that although the content cognition and business logic of short dramas are still very different on various platforms, a consensus has been formed on the pursuit of high-quality short drama creation.
Short dramas fall in love with travel, and strong combination requires the creator's whimsy
Why are short dramas so popular? It is inseparable from the innovation of creative thinking, reversal + spectacle is the success rule of short drama creators, and there are indeed many short dramas that do not hesitate to lower their creative standards and requirements for the sake of traffic and eyeballs, which is also an important reason why the short drama industry has been repeatedly criticized and blamed.
So, under the creative logic of "reversal + spectacle", how to realize the high-quality short drama? At the audio-visual conference, all parties also believe that the combination of cultural tourism and short drama may be an important direction. In January 2024, the State Administration of Radio and Television issued a notice on the creation plan of "Follow the Micro Short Drama to Travel", encouraging the integration of "micro short drama + cultural tourism" to promote consumption and promote the innovation of the genre of micro short drama. This has also directly prompted all parties in the industry and local cultural and tourism departments to take frequent actions in "micro-short dramas + cultural tourism".
Wang Chen, the person in charge of Douyin short dramas, mentioned that the "Chenxing Project" takes the promotion of traditional culture and telling good life stories as the creative standard and direction, such as "Beyond! Ajuan", "Farewell to the New Year", "My Way Home is Windy", and will make full efforts in the content track in the future, providing more good stories for all audiences in the emotional, suspenseful, youth, national style and other tracks, and jointly creating a 9527 comedy label with Stephen Chow, and exclusively creating a boutique IP.
Kuaishou also said at the conference that it would actively respond to the new model of "micro-short drama + cultural tourism" proposed by the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, and promote the high-quality content plan of cultural tourism micro-short dramas. Taking advantage of the online popularity of micro-short dramas, Kuaishou short dramas will play a combination of "content + traffic + commodities", empower the value of the city's cultural tourism industry with "traffic incentives + live broadcast e-commerce", and create a new trend of following micro-short dramas to check in and consume all over the country.
Tencent Video also proposed on relevant forums that it will upgrade the existing micro-short drama IP plan "Mars Project" and launch the Urban Mars Plan, aiming to contribute to the new model of micro-short drama + cultural and tourism integration. Tencent Video's high-quality micro-short drama base will soon be launched in Shanxi, aiming to empower the innovative development of cultural tourism with the construction of the base, and drive the transformation and upgrading of the micro-short drama industry with the development of the cultural tourism industry.
In addition, in this audio-visual conference, you can also see the figure of cultural tourism in various places, Chengdu Cultural Tourism, Beijing Tongzhou, Pixian County, etc. are also recommending their respective location advantages and cultural tourism resources. At the forum on the innovation and development of micro-short dramas and international communication, a special "city producer" publicity module was set up, and representatives from local radio and television departments and cultural and tourism departments vividly showed the industry the characteristic cultural tourism content and innovative exploration of their respective cities. For example, Linping District of Hangzhou City has made every effort to build a "1113" micro-short drama industry development system, and built a five-in-one micro-short drama industry chain of "writing, shooting, broadcasting, commenting, and investing"; Anhui has actively supported film and television production institutions to create excellent micro-short dramas with the theme of "following micro-short dramas to Jianghuai", and created a number of cultural tourism IPs with cultural characteristics.
It can be seen that a large wave of micro-short dramas related to cultural tourism will emerge in the future. However, how to combine cultural tourism resources with the watchability of short dramas is also a great test of the creative skills of short drama creators, and it is also expected that these micro-short dramas with local characteristics and cultural elements can be welcomed by users.
Creators have something to say that they want to be closer to the money
The audio-visual conference also attracted the participation of many short drama creators, who also shared the present and future of short dramas, as well as their creation.
Well-known filmmakers Wang Jing and Zeng Zhiwei also participated in the discussion of micro-short dramas at the audio-visual conference, and believed that short dramas should become one of the important exports of Hong Kong's entertainment industry.
In the sharing, Wang Jing said that he has tried in the field of micro-short dramas, and he said that the creation of micro-short dramas and comedy movies have similarities, and they must be intensively buried in the plot and laughter in 100 minutes, so that the audience feels good-looking. Zeng Zhiwei recalled his 50-year film career, the emergence of TV series, online movies, online dramas and other content forms, many talented creators have emerged, and they have cultivated talents for the entertainment industry, so he will be "the first to jump out to support these people", no matter how the content duration and screen format change, it is always "content is king", and the rest is just the progress of the times and technology.
Dengfeng International represents the film industry's efforts in the field of short dramas. Dengfeng International is the producer of series of films such as "The Wandering Earth", and its first suspense-themed micro-short drama "Autumn Cicada in the Hidden World" cooperated with Douyin adopts the form of vertical screen shooting. Liu Kailuo, partner and president of Beijing Dengfeng International Culture Communication Co., Ltd., mentioned that as a traditional film and television company, they wanted to boldly explore the innovation of vertical screen format, and the micro-short drama "Autumn Cicada of the Hidden World" not only pursued refinement in modeling, camera movement, light and shadow, but also pioneered the use of split-screen narrative techniques with a sense of comics. Li Dongxue said that the creation of micro-short dramas should be seen in small ways, and what should be condensed should be the essence, no matter how big or small the screen is, there is no difference in front of creation, facing the current audience with innovative thinking, and actively creating high-quality micro-short dramas that meet the pulse of the new era.
In addition, Du Hao, the chief producer of "Provoking", Li Xinbo, the director of "Anti-Fraud Storm", Lin Qing, the director of "Blind Heart", Pan Yanqian, the director of "My Name is Zhao Wudi", Tang Shiyi, the director of "Accept It", and Zhou Xiao, the director of "Give Her a Handle", also discussed at this audio-visual conference, among them, Pan Yanqian shared some thoughts in the creation of "My Name is Zhao Wudi" in the sharing, Pan Yanqian introduced that she entered the short video track from making film and television content, and was creating "My Name is Zhao Wudi" At the time, there weren't enough reversals, but they used elements of anime in the creation, and they didn't expect to be so successful.
The reason why short dramas can make many once unknown creators soar and attract traditional film and television companies to enter may be an important reason for the proximity to money. Compared with the business logic and return cycle of traditional film and television creation, the business model of short dramas is simple and clear, and the return is fast and convenient. I also hope that they can bring more high-quality content, and they can also cooperate with cultural tourism around the country to "become bigger and stronger".
Behind the heat and controversy, the data is really powerful
The business logic of short dramas and account-sharing dramas, movies and cloud theaters is similar, they are all directly facing users, and users express their support for short dramas by paying and watching advertisements. The short drama craze of the audio-visual conference, as well as the national attention boom formed by the past short dramas, are inseparable from strong data performance.
According to the "Research Report on the Development of Online Audiovisual in China (2024)", the number of online micro-short dramas on key networks has doubled, and the user stickiness of micro-short dramas has grown rapidly. Users who regularly watch micro-short dramas account for 39.9%, second only to TV dramas, online dramas, movies, and online movies. 31.9% of users have paid for short drama content.
In terms of Douyin, in 2023, the number of paid users of Douyin short dramas will increase by 3 times, the average daily playback volume will increase by 1 times compared with 2022, and there will be 12 short dramas with more than 1 billion playbacks, just during the Spring Festival this year, there will be 8 high-quality micro-short dramas with more than 100 million views on the Douyin platform;Kuaishou revealed that as of the beginning of 2024, the total number of short dramas on Kuaishou Xingmang short dramas will be nearly 1,000, of which more than 300 short dramas will be played more than 100 million, and in the fourth quarter of 2023, the average daily DAU of Kuaishou short dramas will reach 270 million, and the number of users who watch more than 10 episodes per day will reach 94 million, a year-on-year increase of more than 50%。 According to the "Tencent Video Micro Short Drama Annual Report", users have gradually developed the mentality of watching micro short dramas on Tencent Video, maintained high quality and steady growth in high-quality content, and doubled the box office for three consecutive years.
Vertical and horizontal short dramas took off at the same time, which also attracted the intervention of many platforms that seemed to have nothing to do with short dramas. For example, Taobao revealed at the audiovisual conference that in the second half of 2023, Taobao began to explore short dramas, based on the characteristics of e-commerce, focusing on brand customized dramas. Up to now, more than 20 brand short dramas have been launched on Taobao, and more brand short dramas will be created in combination with commercial brands in the future.
Indeed, the huge traffic and users of short dramas have attracted the favor of many advertisers, and Douyin Kuaishou and Taobao also have plans to cooperate with brands to customize short dramas, which makes the commercial value of the short drama track more recognized. In addition, iQiyi, which was relatively conservative in the field of short dramas before, has emerged hot micro-short dramas such as "Young Master and Me" and "Don't Panic King", which shows that the platform battle around micro-short dramas has actually just begun.
Brief summary:
Theme, creation, shooting, post-production, paid or advertising mode, operation, combination of culture and tourism...... At the just-concluded China Network Audiovisual Conference, short dramas can be said to be "hot out of the sky", and they are also the most controversial form of entertainment content, which is also considered by some practitioners to be sitting on the crater, but from the perspective of industry policy and the strategic direction of the platform, short dramas are not roasted on the fire, but because of the innovative form and the favor of users plus the light business model, it is so popular. All parties in the industry also hope that the popularity of short dramas can continue to be maintained, which is also our expectation as observers for the short drama track.
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