In 2019, some short video products have also undergone strategic adjustments and content operations, and have begun to draw another runway for the short video track.
Editor’s note: This article comes from WeChat public account “ Reading entertainment ” (ID : yiqiduyu), author: Lin Fujiko.
During this year, different platforms are exploring their own development routes, and try to differentiate as much as possible, and these explorations may also be Radically change the current short video form.
The Spring Festival holiday in 2020 has ushered in a collective outbreak of short videos.
In the past, there was a cooperation between CCTV and CCTV Spring Festival Gala, and Microvision issued an enlarged red envelope in exchange for the download of New Year’s Eve products. Later, a headline short video product was launched on “Aunt”, and it was discussed and watched by users. The method of live answering also returns to the short video market, so that the mass users affected by the epidemic can still feel a touch of leisure during the holiday.
The reason why the short videos are acting collectively at this time is that after the year of 2019, the short videos are ready to go.
The short video will “morph”
Speaking of short videos, it is no longer the original tool for making shorter videos, but a way for people to entertain. This change comes from the change in the content of short videos. By adding music elements and technology, Blessing, shooting short videos has become a gameplay, enhancing the entertainment sense of making short videos, and increasing the visibility of short video content.
In 2019, some short video products have also undergone strategic adjustments and content operations, and have begun to draw another runway for the short video track.
Since it proposed to invest 4 billion yuan to create mobile native variety IP in 2018, Watermelon Video has begun its strategy of doing short and long in order to establish its own uniqueness in the short video track. In 2019, Watermelon Video also launched four self-made variety shows “Number One Mission” and “Are you bad in exams? Does it matter?” “Uncle Xiaoguan” and “The Treasure of Three Treasures” opened the door to homemade content of short videos.
At the same time, Douyin will also be in 2019 Launched its own vertical screen micro variety show, and launched content support for micro variety shows, short dramas and short documentaries in October last year. At the end of 2019, it launched “Mr. Hee +”, “Looking for Dreams” and “Zero” “Three stars of the micro variety show; and the good-looking video that was officially launched at the end of 2017, also launched a self-made micro variety show” Hearts, You Who Look Good “in 2019. 
You can see from here, Short video products led by the headline system have begun to try to add long content to short videos, which may drive the entire short video field from short to long.
Since the rise of the short video field comes from vibrato and fast players, the most popular short video product forms in the past few years have focused on letting users enjoy the thrill of shooting + entertainment, but theAfter a battle for short video users, the short video track now has a relatively clear division of labor. There are fast hands, vibrato, and vibrato volcano versions that are perpendicular to short video entertainment. There are also watermelons that focus on short video distribution. Video, as well as good-looking videos and micro-views in between. And the trend of lengthening short videos in 2019 is most likely to cause competition among products focusing on short video distribution.
Judging from the current situation, products that take short video entertainment routes are almost difficult to compete with fast-hand vibrato. Regardless of the number of users or activity, the top two on the track let other players look at it, so The distribution of short videos is more likely to win the favor of users with differentiation, which is probably why late-looking videos and micro-views have added content channel sections in addition to short video entertainment.
The increase of long content reserves for multiple products in the field of short video, and the start of making long content, is itself changing the positioning of the term “short video” in the minds of the public, making short videos not only entertaining but also new. The entrance to information, during the Spring Festival this year, all short video products have added special areas or topics related to the epidemic, which also highlights this.
At the same time, the new player on the short video track in 2019-“National Team” Central Video, has strengthened the role of short video as a channel for information dissemination, especially during the Spring Festival this year. The 60 million “cloud supervisors” of Vulcan Mountain and Lei Shenshan Hospital’s slow live broadcast also changed the user’s perception of short video live broadcast, which are gradually expanding the function of “short video”.
In the short term, The growth momentum is more about user contention between short video products and cultivating users to generate new viewing habits, rather than directly replacing the role of long videos. Of course, the headline long video ambitions are indeed attracting the attention of You Aiteng. . However, compared with the impact on long videos, short video products have the information dissemination function of the previous portal site, which is undoubtedly a dimensionality reduction for news products that still use text as the main form of communication. This is also worth paying attention to when short videos open new runways A little bit.
A failed track “upgrade” and product differentiation go deeper
The trend of short videos becoming longer is unstoppable.In addition to more and more PGC long content on short video distribution platforms, Douyin Express also opened long video shooting permissions in 2019, increasing from the original 15-second limit to 60. Second, the original intention of this change is nothing more than to enrich the content pool and improve the content quality. After all, the phenomenon of homogenization of short video content has been increasing before this.obvious.
And regarding the rich content and improving the quality of content, the most fierce in the short content field in 2019 is Vlog. In April Douyin announced its entry into Vlog and launched the “Vlog Billion Traffic Support Plan”. In May, Goodlook launched the “Vlog Dandelion Plan” including 500 million cash subsidies, 2 billion traffic support and other measures. “Star Plan”, with 50 billion traffic exposures throughout the year and a special Vlog bonus of 100,000 yuan a month to motivate the UP host.
In September, Weibo also issued a Vlog call to launch a Vlog contest. Multiple platforms concentrated on Vlog, allowing this new short content form to develop rapidly.
A Vlog that meets the standards is itself Requires a certain length of support to allow creators to express more fully, coupled with a certain themed creative ideas, will make Vlog look more textured than short video content, which is also a point that touches many short video platforms I hope to use it to change the previous situation of excessive homogeneity, especially the good-looking video deliberately set up a section for Vlog, in order to use Vlog to become a hook for the product to attract new users.
However, judging from the current situation, the concept of Vlog introduced from overseas has encountered “water and soil” in China. Although some powerful Vloggers were born in each of the platforms, they did not form the ability to drive the entire market, including some of the top Vloggers are also cross-domain influencers. Approval.
Moreover, the phenomenon of homogenization in the field of Vlog content has also become increasingly apparent. Most Vlog creators focus on recording their own lives: travel, food, fitness, shopping, except for the protagonist, there is no difference in Vlog on the market. Lack of sufficient internal expression, only simple fresh pictures and records of petty bourgeois life, which makes viewers unavoidable aesthetic fatigue, and this has fallen into the content dilemma of the previous short video platform-although the content quality may be higher, but rich The degree has not changed much.
This is probably a failed attempt of the short video platform in 2019.
But in addition to Vlog, each platform is also looking for a new direction of differentiation, and further combined with its own advantages to promote different tonality and characteristics between platforms.
A fast hand mainly based on old iron culture and funny content. In 2019, it launched the “Educational Eco-Partner Program” to provide sophisticated video coaching and tens of billions of traffic support for short video knowledge producers. The result is that in 2019, the average daily total of broadcast short video works in education is over 2.2 billion, and the authors of short education videos are over 990,000.
On the fast hand, some people not only teach dance, photography, calligraphy and other hobbies, but also users learn fast maintenance, driving, clothing design, etc. This is the fast hand outside the three agricultural knowledge On the advantages.
In addition, at the music level, Kuaishou also launched the “Music Liaoyuan Project” with QQ Music, Cool Dog Music, Cool Me Music, and National K Song in 2019. Helping the musicians on the Kuaishou platform grow and expand, which also further enriches Kuaishou’s content pool and makes Kuaishou seem to have achieved multi-faceted flowering.
And Douyin also has educational content At the level of action, for example, at last year’s Douyin Creators Conference, it was announced that the collection function will be launched. Creators can publish related video content under the same collection. This function will be the first to be open to educational content creators. However, in the search for differentiation, Douyin has paid more attention to micro-drama, micro-variety and short documentary. For this reason, it has launched the “Jusha Project”.
In the micro-variety that was launched on Douyin at the end of 2019, the vertical screen reality TV show “Return to Zero” featuring Zhang Yixing received a score of 8.2 on Douban, and a total of 230 million platform playback The new look and feel of the vertical screen variety that it brings really has a taste that is unique to the mobile terminal, which undoubtedly has also established a new barrier for Douyin.
Like the popular “Return Zero “, as the director system is Yan Min, the former director of” Extreme Challenge “. The shooting team and post-editing are also well-known production companies in the industry. The use of high-quality production teams in the industry is why” Return to Zero “opened the vertical screen variety show There may not be many short video platforms that can do this for micro variety shows and find a truly suitable team.
Microvision on the other side has a different path, not withinLet’s start with, but make a difference from the gameplay. In 2019, we obtained the 30-second video sharing permission of WeChat circle of friends. The videos taken by users in WeChat can be shared to the circle of friends, and the duration is longer than 15 seconds of WeChat circle of friends. This is actually what we want WeChat to do with WeChat. The trip to social express is also a way of thinking to use the advantages of the group to establish its own differentiation.
Of course, in addition to the above products in their efforts to find a breakthrough in their own content differentiation, good-looking video also proposed in 2018 to focus on the three areas of parent-child, games, and music, but it may just take into account the development level of the platform With the limitation of strategy, it has no obvious action in 2019. However, in general, the short video track in 2019 attaches more importance to differentiated development in order to gather users who are suitable for the tone of their platform.
The first mover enlarges the move, and the later move quickly follow up
If the short video is a vertical in-depth, then the live broadcast is a horizontal expansion of the short video. After a few years in the form of short video + live broadcast, the short video live broadcast in 2019 has new trends and some unexpected results.
Firstly, the fastest player involved in short video + live broadcast. In July 2019, he released a “big move” and released data on game live broadcast on the platform. The data shows that there are more than 35 million daily live users of mobile live games on the fast hand station. At that time, Douyu lived at 15 million a day, and Huya lived at 11 million a day. The sum of the two could not defeat the “new player” fast player.
After this, the 2019 League of Legends S9 Global Finals was broadcast live, and it also gained a total of 74 million viewers. During S9, the three LPL teams FPX, IG, and RNG announced their presence in the fast hands. European e-sports club Fnatic has also settled in the fast players, further using the e-sports resources to strengthen the fast players’ appeal to game users.
By the end of November last year, the fast hand The number of daily live game users reached 51 million. In less than half a year, the growth rate of daily live games of fast-handed games reached 45.7%, and once again surpassed other game live broadcast platforms. Such strength is unexpected. In addition to the live broadcast of games, as mentioned earlier, today’s fast players have already been deployed in multiple areas, so like education live broadcasts, they have also achieved a daily average of over 20 million live broadcast reviews.
As the closest form of entertainment to money, live broadcast has a closer relationship with bringing goods from birth. It will be broadcast live in 2019.
At the same time, Douyin will also be in 2019 Launched its own vertical screen micro variety show, and launched content support for micro variety shows, short dramas and short documentaries in October last year. At the end of 2019, it launched “Mr. Hee +”, “Looking for Dreams” and “Zero” “Three stars of the micro variety show; and the good-looking video that was officially launched at the end of 2017, also launched a self-made micro variety show” Hearts, You Who Look Good “in 2019. In the short term, The growth momentum is more about user contention between short video products and cultivating users to generate new viewing habits, rather than directly replacing the role of long videos. Of course, the headline long video ambitions are indeed attracting the attention of You Aiteng. . However, compared with the impact on long videos, short video products have the information dissemination function of the previous portal site, which is undoubtedly a dimensionality reduction for news products that still use text as the main form of communication. This is also worth paying attention to when short videos open new runways A little bit.