Topics related to "stopping updates at station B" once again rushed to the top of the hot search.
▲ Picture source: Screenshot of hot search on Weibo
On April 24, the UP owner "Muyu Shuixin" with tens of millions of fans at Station B responded to the rumors of the suspension of updates: "There is no suspension of updates, and we are still working hard." "But it is indeed difficult. So far in 2023, more than four I haven’t received any advertisements for a month, and Bilibili’s creative incentives are not enough to pay the office rent.”
▲ Picture source: Screenshot of the UP main dynamic of station B
From the beginning of the month to the present, the topic of "Station B stop and update" has been continuously fermented, triggering heated discussions across the Internet.
However, some UP owners did not really stop updating, such as "-LKs-" with 3.12 million fans, released the "Stop Update Explanation" on March 30: it is not a family problem, not a health problem, not an emotional problem, nor is there no topic selection or I don't want to make videos anymore, I just want to take a vacation.
And on March 31, "Xu Dawang, who relies on his face for food" with 3.84 million fans, also released a "Temporarily Suspended" video. Firstly, "I really don't make money", and secondly, "I'm a little tired, I want to take a long vacation for myself." Take a break", "I will continue to make videos after a period of rest."
Perhaps it was a coincidence that these top UP owners "stopped updating" one after another, which also aroused speculation from many media and netizens, and there were hot searches for stopping updating.
"-LKs-" then responded, "This year, the development of this channel is normal, and the income is not less than last year."
Although the temporary suspension is due to personal reasons, it also reflects some problems in the platform ecology, such as the reduction of platform creation incentives and the reduction of advertising orders. with.
On the other hand, according to media reports, according to the estimated value analysis of YouTube channel, Li Ziqi’s monthly video playback volume can still generate 785,000 yuan in advertising revenue after more than a year of suspension, with an estimated daily income of 17,417.5 yuan and an annual income of 6,357,387.5 yuan. Yuan.
▲ Image source: Weibo@会火
The two form a sharp contrast.
Can you support yourself and support your team by doing self-media? What is the current state of Internet advertising? From station B to the entire self-media ecology and video industry, what problems have been reflected? Watermelon Data chatted with several advertisers, media, and creators, hoping to bring some thoughts to everyone.
1.
Is it getting more and more difficult to stop updating from Station B to stop updating from We Media?
There are very few people who truly "generate power for love" and "not for fame and fortune" in self-media. After all, only by giving positive feedback can they have the motivation to continue to create.
The reason for the interruption of the UP master is more because of "making ends meet".
As the UP owner of tens of millions of fans "Muyu Shuixin" said, "I haven't received an advertisement for more than four months, and the creative incentives of station B are not enough to pay the office rent."
For most self-media creators, advertising and platform creation incentives are the main source of income. Of course, some live broadcasts, paid for knowledge, and connected to local businesses are another matter.
(1) Big manufacturers reduce costs and increase efficiency, and platform creation incentives are reduced
When Bilibili first launched creative incentives in 2018, as long as UP makes good content, it can have good creative benefits. According to the actual measurement of many UP masters, the reward for every 1,000 views in the early stage is about 3 yuan.
In March last year, Station B adjusted its creative incentives, and many UP owners found that their creative incentives began to decrease. By the beginning of this year, some UP masters even reported that the creative incentives had dropped to less than 1/3 of the original.
That is to say, if the video has 1 million plays a month, the income is less than 1,000 yuan. However, there are not many UP masters who can reach one million plays, which shows that the creative income is minimal.
In March of this year, Station B announced its financial report showing that the cost of revenue sharing is the incentive or sharing for UP owners in the live broadcast and advertising business, reaching 9.1 billion yuan, an increase of 17.9%.
Although the platform’s rewards for UP owners have increased, the income of UP owners has not increased.
Under the "cost reduction and efficiency increase" of major factories, this is the case at station B, and the creative income of other platforms is also so low that it can be ignored.
The blogger "Maomao Wandering in Tibet" with 350,000 fans on Douyin said in an interview with Watermelon Data that the platform's creation share revenue is very small.
In March, the creation income of Douyin platform was less than 370 yuan. The video account has just recently launched a creative sharing plan. Mao Mao joined it on April 17. Currently, the video account has 560,000 fans, but the income is only one or two dollars a day.
But for the vast majority of creators, platform incentives are not the main thing. Creator Tang Xiaoxiao said, "Even when the platform's traffic revenue was at its peak, I didn't think about making money from it."
Whether it is a head creator or a mid-waist creator, the single income of advertisers is their main source of income.
The top creator’s advertisements cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, and even the tail creator’s advertisements cost over a hundred yuan. In comparison, the platform’s creative revenue share is negligible.
(2) Advertisements are reduced, and media platforms are changing
Affected by the epidemic, China's Internet advertising market will also fluctuate in 2022.
According to the "2022 China Internet Advertising Data Report" released by Zhongguancun Interactive Marketing Laboratory, China's Internet advertising revenue will decline for the first time in the past seven years in 2022, a year-on-year decrease of 6.38%.
▲ Image source: "2022 China Internet Advertising Data Report"
The media Frog Brother and Watermelon Data said that the budgets of most advertisers have been reduced. Tang Xiaoxiao also said that advertising revenue this year is indeed not as good as before, and the brand side does not dare to spend money, and the advertising budget must be reduced.
The reduction in the investment of brands and advertisers has directly led to a reduction in the income of many creators.
Not long ago, Jiang Chacha posted on her official account "This year, kols with millions of fans will not receive advertisements", sharing a lot of information she obtained, saying that the income of many leading self-media has declined severely this year.
▲ Image source: "Chachajiang" public account
In the next day's tweet, feedback from several leading bloggers was added.
▲ Image source: "Chachajiang" public account
If it is because of the track problem, Xu Dawang’s game area and Muyu Shuixin’s film and television category cannot receive advertisements, but in Jiang Chacha’s chat screenshots, many fashion beauty bloggers have not received advertisements for a long time, and even expressed , "On this track, only super-headed people can make money, and everyone else can't even drink soup."
The economic market is going down, industry demand is weak, advertisers' budgets are shrinking, and the self-media industry is involving, and there are too many monks and too few food, which has led to a reduction in the income of many creators.
In addition, changes in the form of content and changes in media platforms have also caused the Internet advertising market to begin to shift.
According to the 51st "Statistical Report on Internet Development in China" released by the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC), as of December 2022, the number of Internet users in my country has reached 1.067 billion, and the number of short video users has exceeded one billion for the first time, reaching 10.12 billion. billion, and the number of webcast users reached 751 million.
With the development of the industry, the content of short videos has been continuously enriched, which has driven the growth of user scale and enhanced stickiness, and has become the main source of mobile Internet traffic growth.
Where the traffic is, the advertiser's budget will be spent.
The "2022 China Internet Advertising Data Report" shows that short videos have shown significant growth in both media platforms and advertising forms, indicating that the structure of Internet video advertising is tilting towards short videos. In 2022, the only short video platform that will achieve market size growth will increase from 81.1 billion yuan to 85.85 billion yuan (an increase of 5.86%).
▲ Image source: "2022 China Internet Advertising Data Report"
Frog told Watermelon Data that most of the budgets of beauty advertisers they serve are still on Douyin. Firstly, Douyin has a lot of traffic. Therefore, most brands are still willing to spend their advertising budget on Douyin.
Xiaoq, another media company mainly engaged in public account business, also admitted that many Party A have needs for other platforms, and the most frequently asked one is Douyin.
Our statistical analysis found that in 2022, the number of original advertising articles on official accounts will decrease by 20.72% compared with 2021, which also reflects the current trend.
Not only has there been a change from graphics to video, but also long and short videos have shown major changes.
Station B, which focuses on long videos, will increase the layout of short content in 2022. Station B’s 2022 financial report pointed out that in 2022, the volume of story-mode broadcasts on Station B will increase by 175% year-on-year.
Therefore, some people questioned the algorithm of station B. According to the "Ranjiyuan" report, "Tuan Yiji" posted a complaint on its Weibo account "tuanyiji", "If you do it seriously, there will be no traffic, but if you do it casually, the click-through rate will be higher. "
Tu An Yi Ji” had more than 1,600 video streams in less than half a minute on the homepage of Station B, while the video of 2.5 to 3 minutes had only about 100 push streams on Station B.
Watermelon data also observed that among the popular videos at station B, most of them are short videos of less than 2 minutes, or even tens of seconds.
▲ Image source: Screenshot of the homepage of Station B
As a Bilibili user commented, “Bilibili is becoming more and more short videos now, and high-quality content is basically unavailable. Every time I look at the rankings, most of the rankings on the whole station are funny life shorts within 1-3 minutes. Video, for people like me who like to watch long videos as electronic mustard, it is too uncomfortable."
Looking at it from a general perspective, it is not surprising that these UP masters have stopped updating.
From newspapers, magazines, and TV media to websites, blogs, Weibo, and public accounts, to today’s Douyin, Kuaishou, Xiaohongshu, and video accounts, the development and changes of different media have created changes in the advertising market and have also affected Changes in creation and income of creators.
2. Advertising puts more emphasis on effects
Which creators are more favored by advertisers?
Along with the changes in the advertising market, advertisers' cognition and delivery needs are also constantly changing.
QuestMobile pointed out in the "2022 China Internet Advertising Market Insights" that under the uncertain market environment, marketing resource investment is more concentrated, and the demand for sales conversion is further strengthened.
▲ Image source: "2022 China Internet Advertising Market Insights"
Xiaojian, the former head of KOL marketing at New Oxygen, told Watermelon Data that the awareness of many brands is slowly changing. In the past, brands rarely considered the data effects directly brought to the business, and many only looked at exposure. Now almost everyone needs to see the real data results when doing advertising, and not just look at very shallow indicators such as exposure.
Frog feels the same way. "I am more cautious when advertising. The main reason is that the traffic bonus is gone. Before, as long as the advertising is crazy, there will be output. This year, on the one hand, the rules of the platform have changed, and more attention has been paid to the content. On the other hand, the ratio of production to production has declined. Check the data more carefully.”
From traffic to retention, advertisers no longer blindly pursue exposure and become more pragmatic, spending money wisely.
When the creator Tang Xiaoxiao was in contact with the advertiser, he analyzed and summarized the three factors that the advertiser considers when selecting numbers:
(1) First of all, the effect is of course. If the account effect is good, advertisers are more willing to advertise. In the past, brands invested in many accounts at once, but now they may only select a few with good results;
(2) Risk is also an issue that advertisers consider, so now advertisers are more inclined to invest in small accounts, the cost is low, even if they step on the thunder, the loss is not large, and the overall risk is more controllable. We have accounts with more than 500,000 followers, and accounts with more than 300,000 followers. Recently, we found that the advertisements for the accounts with more than 300,000 followers are very stable, and the advertisements for the accounts with 500,000 followers are relatively few;
(3) Good content is a bonus item, and the advertisement also needs to be more stylish. If the content is too bad, the advertiser will feel that it has lowered the grade. Moreover, poor content generally means that the stickiness is not so good. Moreover, after we post an advertisement, it is usually forwarded in the circle of friends and spread to the private domain. Our private domain traffic is relatively large, so the overall effect is not bad. This is also an important reason why our advertisements are relatively stable.
Tang Xiaoxiao's point of view has also been verified in many media.
Xiaoq said frankly that the most concerned ones are the small and medium-sized ones. After all, the market is dominated by small and medium-sized customers, and big customers are hard to come by. Moreover, many big brands start testing from the small size.
"Any kind of blogger has his own target party, and the one that suits him is his own."
Xiaojian will take time and labor costs into consideration. With a large budget, investing in KOLs with relatively small volumes is too energy-intensive, but if it is more convenient, such as batch distribution, small and medium-sized bloggers’ risks are more dispersed, and the effect is more guaranteed, and he will choose to invest.
Brother Frog also said that in Douyin, mid-waist bloggers are actually the favorite of advertisers.
"Generally, as long as the content of this kind of account owner is OK, the fans are very sticky. Whether it is carrying goods or carrying Taobao, the ability to search is very good. Moreover, some of this type of account owners offer very low prices, and the price is very high. Only some disguised, wiped Side, vlog, clip number, it’s not easy to cash in and no one will vote.”
In addition to paying attention to conversion effects, cost performance has also become an important consideration for advertisers. Now looking back at the content of Jiang Chacha’s tweets, it is not difficult to understand why many top bloggers cannot receive advertisements, and they have to lower their advertising bids.
Of course, when many creators receive advertisements, they also consider the fit between the brand and their own content. If the tonality does not match, or some are not even relevant, then consider the stickiness and feelings of fans, as well as the long-term value of the account. Those who do not consider accepting such advertisements. With limited ads, there are even fewer ads to choose from.
Since advertisers prefer small and medium-sized bloggers, and these bloggers are relatively large, how to stand out? Do you want to deepen the vertical category to make small and beautiful content?
Tang Xiaoxiao, who is in the middle waist, gave her answer:
"We have an account about writing, which is very vertical, and the reading volume is only one or two thousand, but 60% of the students are transformed from here, and occasionally we will push some books, and the transformation is not bad.
However, this is only for writing. Beyond this scope, such as selling skin care products, the effect is definitely not as good as my other accounts with more followers. That is to say, although precision fans convert well, the road is relatively narrow. Although fan powder conversion is poor, the road is wide and various types of advertisements can be accepted.
I don't think small and medium bloggers have to create small and beautiful content. Small means no traffic, and it's easy to give up. It is better to create content with its own characteristics in a large field, which is a more stable way. Of course, more importantly, depending on the blogger's own situation, no matter which one he does, I think there is a chance. "
KOLs and KOCs have different choices. Faced with different media platforms, brands also have their own priorities.
Xiaojian's launch is also based on the brand's overall strategic goals to choose suitable channels.
"The official account is expensive to read, but it can do in-depth transformation. It is suitable for products that need to be transformed through in-depth education and transformation links in the WeChat ecosystem; Xiaohongshu is the user's basic cognition of planting grass, and is more suitable for e-commerce products. Red Book sows grass to place orders on Taobao; Douyin has high cost-effective overall exposure, but the promotion content is relatively shallow, suitable for promotions with low user decision-making costs such as product promotion or APP downloads.”
But among all platforms, Xiaojian still prefers the official account, because the main transaction link of the product needs to be transformed through Qiwei + community, and the official account is relatively smooth.
Frog, on the other hand, will consider the combination of advertising and brand flagship stores. Whether it is short video planting or live broadcasting, it can attract users to the Douyin live broadcast room for conversion, and realize the integration of products and effects in the site.
Since the media is very popular, it can make money but it is not easy to make money. Faced with the intensification of industry involution and the industry changes brought about by AIGC, the road of self-media may be even more difficult.
Just recently, the State Administration for Market Regulation announced the "Internet Advertising Management Measures", which will be officially implemented on May 1, 2023.
The "WeChat Public Platform Operation Center" also issued the latest notice on this yesterday: Official account operators need to strictly review the published content to meet compliance requirements. Where goods or services are promoted in various forms, and purchase methods such as shopping links are added, the word "advertisement" shall be clearly marked. Subsequent platforms will also carry out special management of illegal marketing content.
▲ Picture source: Screenshot of public account
With the improvement of relevant laws and regulations, Internet advertising will become more standardized and strict, and various social platforms will also introduce corresponding management methods and governance measures, which put forward higher requirements for self-media and creators.
However, whether it is the change of content form, the change of media platform, or the innovation of technological tools, the improvement of laws and regulations, keeping pace with the times and following the trend may be the eternal change in response to changes.