Written by Star Evening
Editor/ Chen Dengxin
排版/ Annalee
On April 16, the Three Sheep Network officially opened the "Three Sheep Theater" account, and Brother Xiao Yang also decided to share the cake of the short play.
The direct short drama is earthy and refreshing, and it can be called a natural explosion, so it is not surprising that there are more and more entrants. After the first year of explosion, in addition to the quantifiable sharing of revenue and traffic income, the potential marketing value behind the short drama has also been seen by more and more brands.
In less than a year, the brand's marketing has evolved from implanting brands or products to short drama plots to directly customizing title brand short dramas, from product promotion to bringing goods in one go, greatly shortening the conversion link, so it has attracted a large number of brands to rush in.
At the same time, short drama experts such as "Jiang Seventeen", "Wild Heart", and "Witch Tsukino" also took advantage of the opportunity to focus on the customized short drama track, broadening the space for commercial realization.
In the past 2023, the box office revenue of national micro-short dramas will reach 50% of the annual revenue of national cinema films, that is, 25 billion yuan to 30 billion yuan. This year, the short drama market, which continues to attract large manufacturers and capital to enter the game, will continue to serve as a new position for brand content marketing, exchanging "top" for growth.
As soon as the skit sounded, there were ten thousand taels of gold
"Laughing at you won't make me better, I can only be a little princess by relying on my parents, and if I want to be a queen, I have to rely on myself. If you have this time to compete with me, you might as well study the product. After a cool heroine's speech, followed by a big close-up of Huaxizi's products, this is a picture in the short drama "Shining Sister" promoted by the Douyin short drama area, and it is also the implantation technique used by many short dramas.
"Over the Mountains and Mountains to Love You", which ranks first on the most popular list of Douyin short dramas, has been updated for eight episodes and has received a total of 363 million views. In this drama, it is full of the implantation of the Pechoin Frame Cream gift box, whether it is a gift brought by the male protagonist when he first met the female protagonist or a gift prepared by the female protagonist for American customers, it is this gift box.
Among them, episode 6 is the one with the highest number of likes, and the heroine also used this product before returning as an heir, with the line "There are so many people in the inheritance ceremony tomorrow, I have to apply this Pechoin frame face light line cream, quickly fade lines, and take out the best state tomorrow." It is not difficult to see that this short drama is a customized short drama of Pechoin, focusing on the effect of product promotion.
There are more and more brand-made skits
There are many similar short dramas, and the brands involved are also covered from beauty and snacks to daily chemicals and Internet companies. According to the "2023 China Online Audiovisual Development Research Report", 1 billion people in China watch short videos, and more than half of them have watched micro-short dramas. Compared with the product placement or interstitial ads that appear in traditional film and television dramas, brand-customized short dramas are more acceptable.
"The short video is fast-paced, and the cool points are particularly dense, even if a few seconds of advertising in the middle doesn't really affect the perception. 35-year-old Qiu Li has become a lover of short dramas since last year, in her own words, after watching too many short dramas, there is no way to watch normal length film and television dramas, "There are a lot of implants in TV series, movies, and variety shows, and I have to read for dozens of seconds at every turn, and the speed of short dramas is much faster." The most important thing is that many short dramas themselves are dirty and embarrassing, so when the implant appears, it doesn't seem to be as abrupt as it appears in film and television dramas. ”
In Qiu Li's view, when the sensory stimulation brought by the skit is large enough, the impact of advertising placement becomes minimal. Moreover, the audience of short dramas and short video audiences are highly overlapping, and the latter has long been accustomed to the situation of advertising placement in short video content in long-term use.
From the perspective of communication forms, poster advertisements rely on visuals, article advertisements rely on vision and reading, and short video advertisements rely on visuals, reading and hearing, which can bring a more immersive experience, so the placement of short drama advertisements is naturally more inclusive.
Brands appear collectively: face brushing, marketing, conversion
After several years of exploration, paid short dramas have entered an explosive growth cycle. According to Detaven data, a total of 705 new micro-short dramas will be released in the first three quarters of 2023, an increase of 55.3% compared with 454 new dramas in the whole year of 2022. Many viewers also found that Liu Yun, Xu Mengjie, Yang Rong and other film and television drama stars have appeared in short dramas, and the economic benefits and influence that short dramas can produce continue to expand.
For brands, the traffic and influence generated by short dramas in the market is the best marketing effect. Customized short dramas can not only play a role in publicity, but also rely on Douyin and Kuaishou's own e-commerce systems to promote the rapid transformation of brands and unlock new ways to play brand marketing.
The number of stars appearing in skits has increased
According to incomplete statistics from the zinc scale, in 2023, the brands that will launch customized short dramas on Douyin include Internet companies such as Taote, JD.com, Tmall, Meituan, Quark, etc., as well as consumer goods companies such as Marubeni, Sprite, Proya, Han Shu, Chabaidao, C Coffee, and Heilan Home.
From the perspective of effect, according to Kuaishou's Q3 financial report, the commercial customized short drama "Beauty Comes True" launched in the summer brought 1.09 billion exposure to the title party Tmall Global, and also drove Kuaishou's online marketing service revenue of 14.69 billion yuan in the third quarter, a year-on-year increase of 26.7%.
At the same time, according to Douyin's 2023 beauty sales data, the top ten beauty brands Zhonghan Shu topped the Douyin beauty sales list with a GMV (total turnover) of 3.34 billion yuan, nearly 1 billion yuan more than L'Oreal, which ranked second. In 2022, Han Shu will still be outside the top 20 on the list, and the reason for this is that Han Shu has cooperated with MCN institutions to launch a series of customized short dramas and hit a blockbuster.
However, in addition to some well-known brands and companies that "brush their faces" in the skit, there are also some brands that are not well known to the audience who have rushed out with the power of the skit. For example, Dafeixin, a hair loss and growth brand under Shandong Zhendong Anxin Biopharmaceutical Co., Ltd., a listed pharmaceutical company, has exceeded 900 million views in the short drama "Let Love Start from the Beginning" in deep cooperation with "Bankrupt Sisters and Brothers", and its brand recognition has leaped.
Zinc Scale interviewed Colin, a brand owner who has repeatedly launched customized short dramas, and she talked about the reasons why brands choose to launch short dramas and the common methods: "Short dramas have a tight plot rhythm, which can continue to attract users to watch, and brands can also use this to carry out high-frequency face brushing and increase exposure. Generally, the proportion of implanted content in a short drama is an implantation point per episode, and the content and type of short drama are combined. After repeating a few episodes, users will naturally remember the brand's core marketing points. In addition to emphasizing the brand mentality, direct implantation of specific products in short dramas, with the brand's marketing rhythm, adjustment and replacement of implanted products, can also achieve conversion. ”
According to a set of data summarized in the "2024 China Online Audiovisual Research Report", the proportion of users who regularly watch micro-short dramas has surpassed variety shows, as high as 39.9%, second only to long-form video dramas and movies. This means that the short drama market in 2024 will still be an important topic in the marketing plans of major brands.
Many parties work together to dig gold, and everyone wants to share the cake
With a wide audience coverage and high brand engagement, short video platforms are naturally making continuous efforts to shorten the conversion link from content to e-commerce, and also broaden the more conversion forms that short dramas can generate.
Entertainment Capital reported that Li Yuqian and Douyin expert Uncle Mo customized the short drama "Pearl Project" to Ou Shiman, which reached 520 million, bringing nearly 1.8 billion comprehensive exposure to the brand;
"Flash Marriage with Bigwigs in the Circle" launched by Nature Hall takes the content of the short drama as the core, plus interactive advertising, marketing account layout and fermentation, small blue word setting, etc., and finally the short drama viewers contributed 12% of the results of the live broadcast room transaction crowd;
Gu Yu also relied on short dramas such as "The New Year" to make the proportion of people who actively search for brands reach 35%, and the assets of private domain users and people with positive perceptions of brands have exceeded 300 million......
From the perspective of the specific empowerment of the platform, the liberalization of Douyin Mini Program access and the ecological construction of Douyin Mini Program short dramas have boosted the growth of the number of customers and the average daily consumption amount of the industry.
Colin further talked about the zinc scale: "The launch of short dramas is the transformation of the brand from sales to brand crowds through implantation, customization, and cooperation. At the same time, from the simplest and most direct hanging links and small blue word settings, a combination of gameplay such as slice drainage, plot number configuration, and live broadcast room undertaking has been derived. ”
In addition to a clear link, through the short drama platform, you can also find the crowd preferences, behavioral characteristics, content preferences, as well as transaction preferences and purchasing power portraits behind these content carriers, and brands can improve conversion efficiency based on these data.
Estimated size of the short drama market
Looking to the future, Colin mentioned that more and more brands will start to invest in short dramas. "Not just a single department, but now the market and e-commerce of some brands will have short drama marketing needs, corresponding to different demands. ”
From the perspective of categories, categories with high repurchase rates and wider users, such as beauty and skin care and daily chemicals, have shown a high degree of compatibility with short drama marketing. In addition, clothing, beverages, snacks and other categories are also very suitable for short drama marketing, and fresh categories and product concepts can quickly seize the minds of users with the help of short dramas.
From the price point of view, brands need to anchor the user base according to the price of the product and formulate short drama marketing gameplay. Different circles of users have different sensitivities to product prices, so they naturally need to adopt different marketing strategies. Specifically, the setting of multiple backgrounds, occupations, and scenes of short dramas has become an important way for brands to link target users.
In general, the content competition and traffic competition in the short drama market will also derive a series of commercial plays, and with the continuous opening of content themes, the continuous improvement of the professional level of entrants and the effective supervision of relevant departments, the joint efforts between all parties can also make the plate bigger.