Text | Everyday people are often petite
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In March 2020, Zhao Yuanyuan, who claimed to have created li jiaqi, Wei Ya and other head anchors, left Ali when the live broadcast was at its peak and announced that he had started a business.
Prior to that, Zhao Yuanyuan's title was the head of Taobao Live Broadcasting and a senior expert in Alibaba's content e-commerce business unit. He claims to be the driving force behind Li Jiaqi and Wei Ya. The outside world has always regarded him as an important figure in the period of accelerated development of Taobao's live broadcasting business.
However, three months later, Zhao Yuanyuan made waves again.
On June 29, Alibaba issued an internal letter saying that Zhao Yuanyuan (Zhao Yang) used the convenience of his position to seek improper benefits for his associates and partners, accepting gifts and hospitality. According to the company's disciplinary regulations, they will be dismissed and never hired.
However, at 6 o'clock on the night of Ali's announcement, Zhao Yuanyuan posted a "ten melon map" without explanation on Weibo, which was suspected of responding.
Zhao Yuanyuan participated in an event as the head of Taobao live broadcast operations/source network
"Qualifying" led Taobao Live to break the game
At the end of 2017, Zhao Yuanyuan joined Alibaba. At this time, it is in the starting stage of the Taobao live broadcast project, and in the following three years, Taobao live broadcasting is in a period of rapid development, and the e-commerce live broadcasting industry has ushered in a spurt of development.
In fact, Zhao Yuanyuan did not enter the Taobao live broadcast business line from the beginning. He once said in an interview that he did not want to go to the marketing department, only wanted to make products, so he entered the Taobao heart choice in the testing stage.
In this lifestyle self-operated brand launched by Taobao, Zhao Yuanyuan is responsible for going to the factory to select goods and talk about cooperation with designers; listing goods and participating in double eleven double twelve. He describes his job as "learning how to become a qualified Taobao shopkeeper." ”
According to Alibaba's internal notice, since January 2018, Zhao Yang has been the business leader of Taobao Live UGC & Channel Operation. Seven months later, he found a breakthrough – qualifying.
Competitions are held on a fixed day of the month according to the product category. Merchants and streamers with high volume will greatly increase their exposure, and the final list will stay on the home page for up to three weeks.
In July 2018, the turnover of the third qualifying tournament exceeded 400 million yuan. Two months later, the turnover doubled. In 2018, the Taobao live broadcast platform carried more than 100 billion yuan of goods, a year-on-year growth rate of nearly 400%, and the annual income of 81 anchors exceeded 100 million yuan. Taobao live broadcast ushered in an outbreak.
Viavia and Li Jiaqi sat firmly in the position of "one sister" and "one brother" of Taobao Live through qualifying, while Zhao Yuanyuan has since been known as the behind-the-scenes promoter of the two head anchors, Wei Ya and Li Jiaqi "the man behind it".
Taobao Live's two head anchors Wei Ya Li Jiaqi / Source Network
During this period, Zhao Yuanyuan, who is responsible for the operation of Taobao Live UGC & Channel, got acquainted with the head of a Taobao live broadcasting agency.
Ali's internal notice shows that in January 2019, the agency applied to enter the clothing live broadcast base, Zhao Yang's second-level subordinates rejected the application of the agency in accordance with the rules, and Zhao Yang proposed to modify the original rules on the grounds that the business of the level of the institutional development base business can better cooperate with the platform, and clearly required the subordinates to approve the application. The agency was successfully settled.
In April 2019, Zhao Yang arranged for his girlfriend to join the agency with a high salary through the head of the above-mentioned live broadcasting agency. By October 2019, his girlfriend had received hundreds of thousands of yuan in salary from the agency, compared with less than 7,000 yuan per month when he previously worked for another live broadcasting agency.
From advertisers to influencers
During Ali's tenure, Zhao Yuanyuan did not give up building personal IP.
In the second half of 2019, he attended various forums, gave speeches, and introduced himself as the head of Taobao Live Broadcasting. In the public eye, Zhao Yuanyuan has been tying himself with the label of "Taobao Live Broadcasting Leader".
However, Alibaba's internal letter shows that his position is the business leader of Taobao Live UGC and channel operation. Ali's internal employees also said that the real person in charge of Taobao Live is Yu Feng, general manager of Taobao's content e-commerce business unit.
In interviews and at events, Zhao Yuanyuan often mentioned the experience of being an advertiser. He believes that the creativity and experience accumulated by his fifteen years of marketing experience are inseparable from the promotion of Taobao live broadcasting later.
Yuanyuan Zhao entered the advertising industry in 2003 and worked as a creative director at Ogilvy for four years. During this period, Zhao Yuanyuan created a personal public account "A Maverick Advertisement", which was later renamed "Zhao Yuanyuan". This public account is the first step in Zhao Yuanyuan's personal IP.
So far, Zhao Yuanyuan's public account still maintains the frequency of updating 1-2 times a week, with each article read in 50,000-100,000 and accumulating 300,000 fans.
The fixed columns of the public account include "Zhao Yuanyuan Talk Advertisement", "Case Review" and so on. With a stable update frequency, humorous language, and Ogilvy's brand blessing, Zhao Yuanyuan's public account has attracted a large number of fans in a short period of time. At the same time, he also answered questions and commented on platforms such as Weibo and Zhihu. Fans commented on his article, "full of dry goods and full of sincerity".
In addition to this, he also records short videos, gives lectures, and runs paid courses. Zhao Yuanyuan's personal brand has been successful in the short term.
After entering Ali, Zhao Yuanyuan's public account not only talked about advertising and marketing, but also began to talk about e-commerce live broadcasting. And this gave Zhao Yuanyuan the opportunity to take the opportunity to take up his position.
Zhao Yuanyuan public number series video program
Ali's internal notice said that in September 2019, Zhao Yang attended an external business conference in the name of the person in charge of Taobao Live broadcasting and collected a fee of 30,000 yuan when he was on a business trip. From 2018 to 2019, Zhao Yang accepted meals, accommodation and gifts provided by a number of live broadcasting institutions, with a cumulative amount of about 5800 yuan. At the same time, Zhao Yang provides part-time services for the main companies of a number of Taobao live content agencies.
Suddenly "dismissed by notice" before the live debut
In March 2020, Zhao Yuanyuan was revealed to be leaving Alibaba. In an interview with Sina Finance, he said that the news of his departure flowed out in advance, but his own startup was not ready, and the sudden exposure of the news disrupted all plans. Talking about the future business direction, he said that he will start a live broadcast marketing company with more content, try more marketing strategies, and bring fresh blood to the industry.
In the interview, Zhao Yuanyuan mentioned that his boss Yu Feng at Ali was very supportive of his entrepreneurship. "We can play a combination of inside and outside and explore how many possibilities there are for Taobao live broadcasting." The statement was interpreted by industry insiders as Ali will invest in Zhao Yuanyuan's live broadcast marketing company.
Half a month after the interview, Zhao Yuanyuan's Yuanqi culture was registered in Hangzhou. According to the information of Tianyancha, Zhao Yuanyuan holds 70% of the equity of Yuanqi Culture, with a subscription amount of 7 million yuan, and Ma Fei holds the remaining 30% of the equity. Hangzhou Yuanqi Culture's holding companies also include Shanghai Content E-commerce Research Center, Guangzhou Yuanqi Culture Communication and Dongyang Yuanqi Culture Development Co., Ltd
On May 27, Zhijiang Business School published an article "Professional 4A-level MCN Marketing Agency - Yuanqi Culture, Officially Settled in Zhijiang Accelerator", introducing that Yuanqi Culture was founded by Zhao Yang, with a start-up team of nearly 100 people, has completed the angel round of financing, and intends to launch a new round of financing. However, in many enterprise industrial and commercial information inquiry platforms, there is no financing information about Yuanqi culture.
Since then, Zhao Yuanyuanduo attended the event as the founder of Yuanqi Culture and the former head of Taobao live broadcast operation.
On June 26, Zhao Yuanyuan announced through his personal Weibo that he would conduct his first live broadcast on the old owner Taobao on July 1. He says he will explain the brand story, product philosophy and characteristics. Many fans expressed their support in the comment area.
But on the eve of Zhao Yuanyuan's July 1 live-streamed debut, on June 29, Alibaba reported that Zhao Yuanyuan, who had been out of office for three months, had committed corruption violations and dismissed him. After that, Zhao Yuanyuan quietly deleted his Weibo to promote live broadcasting.
Zhao Yuanyuan Weibo suspected response / image source network