Tik Tok video slicing and selling products has become a new era of micro-business

In the Douyin ecosystem, live streaming slicing is becoming an emerging business model. This article deeply analyzes the industry chain of live streaming slicing videos and reveals the business logic and profit distribution mechanism behind it.

You may not have watched Luo Yonghao’s live broadcast, but you have probably seen a lot of Luo Yonghao’s live broadcast clips on Douyin.

It's not just Luo Yonghao, there are also other Douyin live streaming rooms with large traffic such as Li Dan, Wei Xue, Gu Qianqian, etc. Their live streaming short videos have made their presence felt throughout the entire network.

Some people joke that this type of slicing video is "electronic psoriasis" because once you accidentally watch it, you will see similar slicing videos endlessly.

Zhiwei observed that these accounts that posted live slicing videos had many similarities.

In terms of content, sliced ​​videos often select the most interesting clips of the live broadcast, delete some pauses and interjections, and add fancy words and special effects. It is obvious that they have been carefully edited rather than just a random video.

These accounts as a whole also have very obvious traces of operation. One account only publishes a live broadcast slice of one blogger, and the update frequency is very high. The latest live broadcast can also be cut out in time. In the same time period, the content released by the same type of slice accounts is also similar.

Obviously, live streaming is not just an accidental behavior of individual bloggers, but an organized and disciplined content matrix that has been ignored on social media platforms.

Why can the live streaming clips of big anchors also become a content category? The live streaming clips flying all over the sky actually involve many interests and have formed two industrial chains.

The first type is driven by bloggers + MCN, opening up live broadcast slice authorization and earning commission fees.

Zhiwei learned from Li Dan's official operations department that to obtain Li Dan's live streaming authorization, that is, to be able to use, edit, and publish Li Dan's live streaming clips, the Douyin account must have 1,000 followers and open e-commerce permissions, and the Xiaohongshu account must have 1,000 followers and open a small list. The threshold for this authorization is extremely low, in order to increase sales and allow these accounts to bring goods.

Therefore, the content format of these sliced ​​video accounts is basically that there is a small yellow car in the lower left corner of each video. For example, if you click on a slice of Li Dan's live broadcast, you can directly buy the beef crispy and "Young People's New Knowledge" that Li Dan has introduced in his live broadcast room. During the period when the anchor is not broadcasting and selling goods, these sliced ​​video accounts can, on the one hand, build momentum for the anchor by repeating the previous live broadcast content, and on the other hand, they can help the anchor continue to sell goods, so as to gain both attention and sales revenue.

Li Dan's operation told Zhiwei that they would provide product links, and the products in the sliced ​​video account would be limited to the official range. In terms of specific income, after Douyin authorized and brought products, 6% tax and 10% platform fee would be deducted when settling commissions, and the rest would be split 50-50 between Li Dan's official organization and the account, and settled once a month. The same is true for Xiaohongshu, except that the platform fee is 20%.

The other party added that after authorization, the income will first go to the anchor's organization, and then the account will be settled the following month. "The specific settlement date will be signed later in the contract."

Zhiwei saw that the names of the accounts that have obtained Li Dan's authorization and started normal operations are similar, such as @旦小店精華@李旦解忧小店@李旦直播间高能投稿, etc. In September 2024, Li Dan authorized the full channel of the live slicing business to Jiaogepengyou, and the MCN agency names listed on the homepages of the above accounts are now "Jiaogepengyou Distribution". Li Dan even said during the live broadcast that if everyone wants to earn some pocket money part-time, they can contact his assistant to ask about the specific matters of slicing and editing.

Therefore, in this industrial chain, live streaming slices are a tool for selling goods. The bloggers who operate these accounts can be regarded as matrix accounts incubated by large anchor companies themselves, and all content is for the purpose of selling goods.

It is worth mentioning that there are already some public platforms for live streaming slice authorization of big anchors. Slice authorization of some big Douyin bloggers can be applied directly on the platform, and the entry threshold and profit sharing ratio are also clearly stated.

Take the slice authorization mechanism of @李李李婉君 on the Chanxuan platform as an example. The blogger's share ratio is 60%, and the average commission of the product is 12%. According to the formula provided by the official customer service to Zhiwei, the money that can be earned by distributing a 100 yuan product is:

(100*12% (commission ratio) - 100*12% (commission ratio) * 10% (TikTok technical service fee ratio)) * 60% (sharing ratio) = (12-1.2) * 0.6 = 6.48 yuan

Image source: Chanxuan

However, slicing is not an easy way to make money. The Chanxuan platform posted a statement requiring that the Douyin account applying for slicing must have more than 1,000 followers, more than 500 valid followers and open a showcase. Moreover, if the total payment amount is less than 500 yuan within 30 days after authorization, it will be refunded.

At the same time, you must start posting videos 3 days after authorization, the number of videos updated per week cannot be less than 10, and you cannot stop posting for more than 3 days, and there must be no account violations. Therefore, for those who need to select materials and edit videos by themselves, this is not an easy business to enter.

What’s more, the share of the slice authorization of many big anchors is not that attractive. Someone who has worked with Wei Xue’s slice told Zhiwei that Wei Xue’s slice videos did not need authorization before, and she could earn 20 to 30 yuan per order. “Now that she has publicly opened up the authorization, the threshold has become higher and the commission has become less. She can only make 7 or 8 yuan per order.”

Image source: Chanxuan

The second industrial chain is to make money through information asymmetry centered around the business opportunities of live streaming sliced ​​videos.

"Suitable for mothers", "Come here if you want to make extra money", "Part-time job at zero cost", almost when the matter of making money by live streaming is mentioned, there are always many people sharing their money-making experiences.

Where there is demand, there is buying and selling. Zhiwei has observed that many accounts with IDs or homepages containing keywords such as "slice teaching" will "recruit disciples" by using sales pitches such as "I made 7,000 in a month".

However, their so-called teaching is not as simple as teaching editing and operation as imagined. According to some netizens who have found "teachers", these "teachers" basically sell courses, with prices ranging from three to four digits. The course content is roughly the so-called new media operation skills, and they mainly target the group of novices who know nothing about new media.

In other words, when these people tell you that there is a good project to make money by selling goods through live streaming sliced ​​videos, it is very likely that you are that good project in their eyes.

Zhiwei found a blogger who claimed to be able to take in apprentices. The blogger said that even novices with less than 1,000 fans could do it, and they had ways to do it. Zhiwei learned from the "open class" provided by the blogger that live streaming is actually only a part of their business, or one of the businesses used to attract traffic. What they really do is to incubate a large number of accounts to earn tuition fees and money from cooperating brands and advertisers.

The other party first made a promise, telling you how to make money by posting live streaming sliced ​​videos. The team told Zhiwei that as long as they used the AI ​​software they developed, they could make slices of short dramas and celebrity live streaming slices.

The revenue source of the short drama slices is to put a promotional link of the short drama under the video. The distributor of the short drama will give a commission ranging from 50 to 70 yuan. In addition, there is advertising income, which is 80 cents to 1 yuan per link. "If there are 1,000 views, 100 people are interested, 50 people watch the advertisement, and one person watches 5 links, the total revenue is 200 yuan."

But what they don’t tell you is that the conversion rate is actually nowhere near as high as they advertise.

Celebrity live streaming can earn commissions from the products of the small yellow car, and can also recruit apprentices and become agents. Short dramas can also be agents, or help short drama companies to promote. Putting the video into the team's AI software can even create a second creation with one click, and there is also an "exclusive algorithm strategy to remove duplicates", that is, to ensure the originality of their own content in the massive short drama slice video content, to avoid platform review.

To put it simply, this AI software uses technical means to turn other people's videos into its own "original videos" in order to gain competitiveness.

In short, the team claims that their AI software is designed for "new media entrepreneurship". It can be used for live streaming, AI photo accounts, AI naming accounts, AI name poetry accounts, AI unmanned live streaming accounts... The other party also promised that as long as you enter their system, "the first step is to do AI pictures and texts, the second step is to do short drama slicing, earning 3,000 yuan a month, the third step is to do unmanned live streaming, starting at 7,000 yuan a month, and finally operate multiple project accounts, plus be an agent, the income will exceed 10,000 yuan."

The team's open classes

We cannot be sure whether the actors who interacted were the team's own actors.

After the pie was drawn, the other party immediately came up with his own "guide price": 3,680 yuan.

The price includes training and the right to use AI software. The team also promised that Xiaohongshu merchants would split the profits 70% to 30% for each order of 200 yuan, with the team taking 3% and the individual taking 7%. "You can get your first pot of gold in seven days, earn back your tuition in half a month, and earn 7,000 to 8,000 yuan or even more than 10,000 yuan in the second month."

This familiar rhetoric seems to have been passed down from the era of micro-business. In the past, agents were recruited layer by layer to sell facial masks, and now agents are recruited to create self-media accounts.

In the past, they promoted the effectiveness of their facial masks. Now, they promote the effectiveness of their courses and so-called AI tools. They all tell you that you can make money by following them, and you can also become an agent and develop downlines.

From this perspective, nothing has changed. WeChat, which had booming traffic at that time, was just like Tik Tok, which has booming traffic now. It was packaged as a profitable facial mask at that time, just like it is now shaped into a profitable slice video with no investment.

The only difference is that the industry of slicing and selling goods videos has added a character who will always win. After all, no matter how much commission the person who cuts the live streaming slices can earn, the big anchors who have been relying on these videos to increase their presence on social platforms will not lose no matter how you calculate it.