Source: Karth Data
"Xin Xuan is not as profitable as everyone understands!"
A week after the end of the 38th promotion, Kuaishou's head anchor Simba suddenly announced that he would fade out of the live broadcast room with goods. Previously, he completed the premiere of the Year of the Dragon, and third-party data showed that nearly 200 products were put on the shelves of this live broadcast, with cumulative sales of more than 540 million yuan.
According to Simba's public expenditures, Xinxuan has to pay more than 1.1 billion yuan in salaries to 4,860 employees every year, more than 200 million yuan in rent, utilities, and more than 2 billion yuan in profits for the platform. Under the superposition of these expenses, Simba feels that after a year, "basically play for nothing". After thinking about it, he decided to settle for two years to study artificial intelligence.
Coincidentally, the anchor @crazyXiaoyangge, who has more than 100 million followers on Douyin, also mentioned that he will continue to reduce live broadcasts with goods and do more entertainment live broadcasts and other work, such as electronic music festivals, music festivals, film and television projects, and even offline physical stores selected by Xiao Yang. Prior to this, Brother Xiao Yang also appeared on Weibo hot search because he fell out of the "TOP20 Monthly List of Douyin Anchors with Goods", and his explanation was that "the number of live broadcasts with goods has decreased".
For super anchors, it is not uncommon to "stop broadcasting" or "broadcast less", Simba and Li Jiaqi have disappeared for several months, Luo Yonghao retired as early as June 2022, turned around and started a business, and basically only broadcast live once a week.
Two years ago, Karth also analyzed the phenomenon of super anchors reducing the frequency of live broadcasts and the "great retreat" of first-line anchors, and tried to explain the reasons. The highlight of the recent "retirement" news is that the anchor himself said that he would "reduce the live broadcast", which is equivalent to an "official announcement".
Why do the big anchors who have achieved the advancement of their lives and careers with live broadcasts "retire" one after another? Are they forced to do so or a strategic shift? When the live broadcast e-commerce industry enters the deep water area, how do leading companies aim at the opportunities of the next era?
Escaping from the deep water, the "Little Yang Brothers" explored a new path
Simba's "retirement" has been planned for a long time.
After the "Sugar Water Bird's Nest" incident at the end of 2020, Simba was banned from the platform for a short period of time, and only restarted in March of the following year. It was also from this year that Xin Xuan accelerated the "de-Simbaization".
In 2023, Simba will almost only broadcast at important promotion nodes such as 618, Double 11, and New Year's Festival.
In a live broadcast in March this year, when talking about future planning, Simba said that there is nothing that can excite him in the live broadcast track, so he wants to suspend the live broadcast and precipitate two years to learn artificial intelligence.
Xinxuan Group is a leading company in the live broadcast e-commerce industry, according to public data, its total GMV will exceed 50 billion in 2023, and the total GMV in the five years from 2018 to 2023 will exceed 200 billion.
Simba was able to "leave" the live broadcast room with confidence, also because he supported reliable new anchors to undertake traffic and take on great responsibilities.
Simba began to train apprentices very early, and frequently broadcast live broadcasts with apprentices (Zhao Mengche, Dandan, Shi Da Meimei, etc.) to attract traffic for them, among them, the female disciple @DanDan has accumulated 95 million fans, which is the second largest IP with fans on the Kuaishou platform, second only to Simba.
Screenshot of Zhao Mengche, Dandan, and Shi Da's beautiful Kuaishou homepage
In the same month, Brother Yang, who is regarded as the "second Simba" by some media, also announced in a live broadcast that he would stop broadcasting for 2-3 weeks, in order to "concentrate on filming film and television films".
Brother Xiao Yang also revealed that this year, he will reduce the number of live broadcasts, and will focus more on self-operated brands and company affairs, and will continue to organize activities such as electronic music festivals and music festivals. Previously, Three Sheep Group had announced that it would hold the "DXYG-VAC" electronic music festival in Hefei in May, and 17,000 tickets were sold out in 30 seconds.
According to statistics, the frequency of Xiao Yang's live broadcast this year is about once a week, and in February this year, it will only be broadcast on February 2, February 3 and February 29, and there will only be one live broadcast with goods, and the rest will be entertainment live broadcasts. During the 38th Festival promotion, Brother Xiao Yang conducted a special live broadcast of beauty and clothing on March 2, with nearly 40 million viewers and an estimated GMV of between 50 million and 75 million.
At the 3.15 party broadcast by CCTV this year, the plum vegetable buckle meat that Crazy Brother Yang and his anchors had brought was exposed, and the Three Sheep Group said that it would pay consumers in advance, but the impact of the fermentation of relevant public opinion on its reputation was not small.
Recently, some consumers announced that they would sue the manufacturer of the three sheep network and the plum cabbage buckle meat, demanding a refund of 10 yuan, and at the same time compensating for mental damages of 1 yuan, and the case has been accepted by the relevant departments.
As the head anchor, Xiao Yang's brothers have enjoyed traffic dividends and fans, but they are also burdened with more pressure from public opinion, and they must always seek change to hedge their sense of crisis.
Brother Xiao Yang once said that now he is not only live streaming for himself, but also being pushed forward by the team behind him. Three Sheep Group currently has hundreds of full-time employees and more than 10,000 part-time editors online.
In a live broadcast in 2023, Brother Xiao Yang's speech also caused netizens to watch - "Don't make a fortune, what are you doing with such a fortune, I told you that making a small fortune is the fastest life, don't make a fortune! ”
Matrix, going overseas, variety shows: where do the head companies go?
If the first half of live broadcast e-commerce is the running of the business model and the creation of the personal IP of the big anchor, then the second half of the competition is to retain consumers for a long time through the advantages of supply chain and service.
Since the beginning of 2022, the head company has gradually moved away from the business model of relying only on one anchor to bring goods, and does not only rely on the traffic of a single platform, but "walks on multiple legs". At present, the business layout of leading companies in the industry outside the main live broadcast room, Karth believes that there are roughly four directions:
The first is to no longer rely on individual or celebrity IP to start the volume, mainly promote the store broadcast model, cultivate multi-platform, matrix live broadcast rooms, and even establish live broadcast rooms with institutional accounts to build the brand value of the group.
For example, since 2022, Meifang has successively opened new live broadcast rooms on Taobao @ All Girls, @所有女生的衣橱, supported new anchors, and opened social media accounts such as Xiaohongshu for anchors.
In addition to Meifang and Xinxuan, most leading companies choose to carry out normalized live broadcasts on multiple platforms.
Starting from Kuaishou in 2019, Yuanwang has successively incubated first-line anchors such as Yu Dagongzi and Xuebao, and signed contracts with stars such as Wang Zulan, Jia Nailiang, Cecilia Cheung and other stars to lay out Douyin live broadcasts, and in the second half of 2022, an institutional account was established on multiple platforms under the name of "Yuanwang XX Station", and a complete layout of new traffic platforms such as Douyin, Kuaishou, Taobao, Station B, and Xiaohongshu has been realized.
Making a friend has expanded horizontally from Douyin to Taobao, Jingdong and other platforms. In April 2020, Luo Yonghao started broadcasting on Douyin, making a friend, and gradually laid out a multi-category matrix account live broadcast room. On the eve of Double 11 in 2022, make a friend and enter Taobao, in May 2023, enter JD.com, and open a wine vertical live broadcast room on Taobao in October. By the end of 2023, Make a Friend has built 30 matrix live broadcast rooms. Its financial report shows that in 2023, the company will rely on the "Friends Cloud" platform to realize the digitization and intelligence of live broadcast e-commerce, and its net profit will increase by 6 times.
Similar to making friends, Dongfang Selection has already created a full-category live broadcast room.
In June 2022, at the beginning of Douyin's popularity, Dongfang Selection has established matrix accounts, including books, personal care and beauty, cultural and creative, mother and child and other fields. In January 2024, the new account that was independent from Dongfang Selection will be broadcast, and it will not directly use Dong Yuhui's personal name, but will be called @与辉 Walk , and adopt a new model of old bands, giving new anchors a lot of opportunities to perform.
@与辉同行 Screenshot of Douyin live broadcast
The second is to be a self-operated e-commerce platform, similar to Sam's Club.
Only 4 months after the establishment of Dongfang Selection, the company launched its own products, launched its own APP in less than half a year, and in July 2023, Dongfang Selection's own APP opened a live broadcast business.
What Dongfang Selection wants to create is an online version of the "Sam's" mall. Sun Dongxu, the former CEO of Oriental Selection, once explained during the live broadcast that the Oriental Selection APP has three positions, one is to be a platform for selecting good things, and the other is to continue to provide users with differentiated services through independent APP.
Yu Minhong revealed that as of January this year, the number of registered members of the Oriental Selection APP reached 3.6 million, and basically did not spend too much cost, and the paid members of the APP have approached 200,000, and the average monthly consumption of paid members is about 800 yuan.
However, being a self-operated e-commerce platform is destined to be a road with more time and higher labor costs, which will increase the pressure on profitability.
According to the latest financial report, as of November 30, 2023, the total number of Dongfang Selection's self-operated products and live broadcast e-commerce team has reached 1,587 people, of which 643 are in the supply chain and product team. A series of actions from the supply chain to personnel expansion have made Dongfang Selection's revenue cost grow rapidly, while the gross profit margin has shrunk rapidly. During the period from June 1 to November 30, 2023, the gross profit margin of its self-operated products and live streaming e-commerce segment was 32.9%, compared with 42.5% in the same period last year.
The third is to go to sea, jump from domestic to international platforms, and seek greater market increment.
Overseas, making a friend is the earliest, and Xin Xuan and the three sheep seem to be more efficient.
In May 2023, Xinxuan Group officially landed overseas with Thailand as a starting point, and during the live broadcast, the Simba team put on the shelves local Thai specialties such as fruits, skin care products, and latex pillows. Third-party data shows that the sales volume exceeded 830 million yuan.
Xin Xuan went overseas to find a low-cost supply chain and cooperated with local suppliers and brands, while Three Sheep chose a new mass consumer market.
Live broadcast organizations such as Three Sheep regard Tiktok as the first position to go to sea. As a product of ByteDance, TikTok has become one of the most visited social platforms in the world. As of the end of 2023, TikTok has more than 1.677 billion users, of which 1.1 billion are monthly active users.
In terms of market selection, both Brother Yang and Simba will take Southeast Asia as their first stop to go to sea. In January 2024, Three Sheep Network cooperated with Singaporean local talent @shop with sasax to complete the first live broadcast to sell its own brand Xiaoyang selection and cooperative brands, setting a new record for TikTok's e-commerce sector in Singapore, but the specific number was not announced.
It's not hard to see why it's targeting Southeast Asia, where the number of users is large enough and the acceptance of the live streaming model is high.
In 2021, Tiktok began to test the waters of e-commerce in Indonesia, and then launched its business in Southeast Asian countries such as Thailand and Malaysia. According to the data released by Yipit Data, TikTok's global e-commerce GMV in 2023 will be about 13.6 billion US dollars, of which Southeast Asia will contribute more than 90%, of which Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, and Malaysia will account for 28%, 22%, 17%, 12%, and 11% of the GMV respectively.
But in the face of an uncontrollable global market, doing live streaming on TikTok also faces many challenges.
According to the statistics of the FastMoss Research Institute, 80% of e-commerce sales on TikTok are linked by influencers, and only 20% are live streaming and shopping malls. Especially after leaving the Southeast Asian market and entering the U.S. market, the acceptance of live streaming will be lower. In addition, live broadcast institutions also face localization problems such as cross-border efficiency management.
The fourth is to make content to explore and expand the influence of IP, and find business growth points other than live broadcasting.
In the past 4 years, it has also tried to produce variety shows around Li Jiaqi's IP and the live broadcast industry, and has reaped some results, such as "All Girls' Offer", "All Girls' Anchors", "Naiva Family's School Diary", etc., with a Douban score of no less than 7.5;
Source: Douban
In 2023, Yuanwang Technology and Haixi Media will jointly produce the variety show "Let's Farm the Land", showing the farm operation process from farming, harvesting to sales, and the public reputation is still good. This year, Yuanwang announced that it would invest more in variety shows and short dramas. At present, Yuanwang still has 20 programs to be launched, such as "Please Start Broadcasting Now" and "Top Chef", and has completed more than 20 short dramas in the field of short dramas, and is doing more content development for reserve IP.
The fifth is to expand from To C to To B business and be a technical service provider for enterprises.
Humility goes earlier and more consistently on this path. In 2019, Qianxun independently developed the first industry SaaS service platform, Lingke, and in 2023, Qianxun released a new AI intelligent version of the Lingke system to help the live broadcast room and brands increase sales and strengthen business compliance. In August of the same year, Qianxun launched the AI digital human live broadcast service, trying to solve the pain points of excellent anchors that are difficult to replicate and high live broadcast operating costs for enterprises.
After the wave of the live broadcast e-commerce industry receded, the big anchors who became entrepreneurs stood in a higher and more dangerous position, and the exam questions they had to face changed. It is the general trend for the head anchor to fade out of the live broadcast room, and at the same time, more new anchors are still queuing up to "get on top". Will there be a dark horse in 2024?