McDonald’s is entering the skit industry. Do restaurant brands need to follow suit?

McDonald's launched the brand's first self-produced short drama "Reborn: I Practicing Magic in McDonald's" to promote its "Kitchen Cooked for You" concept and attract the attention of young consumers in the highly competitive fast-moving consumer goods market.

Yesterday, McDonald's launched the brand's first self-produced short drama - "Reborn: I Practicing Magic in McDonald's", with a total length of about 5 minutes. It was divided into three episodes and broadcast on WeChat Video Account, namely "I Was Reborn Because I Forgot the Lyrics", "The Boss's 10 Million" and "She Uses Magic to Control the Boss", starring Tong Mo'nan, who is known as the "Industry Dark Light".

1. What does McDonald’s want to express by making a skit?

The plot tells the story of a talk show host who fainted at a performance and was accidentally reborn as an employee of McDonald's. In the McDonald's kitchen, Tong Mo-nan not only directly transferred to the role of "Wang Ma" in the skit by making complaints, but also cleverly integrated McDonald's products and brand promotion content. For example, when the "boss" praised the fragrance of the heroine, Tong Mo-nan immediately responded: "That's not her smell, it's the delicious magic of McDonald's. Why? Because I make everything fresh."

The hottest magic of Tucao is used to grasp the hot topic of the boss's love brain as the big framework, interspersed with the fresh, warm and thoughtful service of McDonald's. Although the content is likely to be Tucao as "not funny", it is still effective in conveying the mind. Only one hour after it was launched, the number of views on all platforms exceeded 10 million.

This is the first time that McDonald's has "moved" the kitchen from behind the scenes to the front stage. In the short film, we can see how McDonald's employees make hamburgers and serve meals, which is to convey the idea of ​​"made for you". It is reported that this model is unique to McDonald's. The "made for you kitchen" insists on instant preparation and instant enjoyment, which enables customers to match and serve meals according to their needs after placing an order.

At the same time as the release of the short drama, starting yesterday, more than 6,000 restaurants across the country will also simultaneously start using "Kitchen Made for You" plate liners, takeaway bag sealing stickers and special stickers.

Zhang Jiayin, CEO of McDonald's China, said: "McDonald's China launched the 'made for you' kitchen model in 2006, and has always insisted on providing 'hot and fresh deliciousness' to every customer. The short play "Rebirth: I Practice Magic at McDonald's" is aimed at allowing more consumers to understand and experience McDonald's unique kitchen model."

2. Short play + brand, catering is just beginning

McDonald's entry into the short drama market was unexpected, but it was also reasonable. According to the "2023-2024 China Micro-Short Drama Market Research Report" released by iMedia Consulting, the domestic micro-short drama market size in 2023 is 37.39 billion yuan, up 267.65% year-on-year from 10.17 billion yuan in 2022. It is expected that the scale of China's micro-short drama market will exceed 100 billion yuan in 2027.

In the past two years, the trend of short dramas has been so strong that many cosmetics brands have used the money originally invested in TV dramas to make short dramas. However, catering brands have not yet started making short dramas on a large scale, and only some tea brands are relatively active.

During the 2022 Spring Festival, Shuyi Shaoxiancao launched a customized micro-film "Fourteen", which is 160 seconds long. Through different stories, the film shows the process of mutual companionship and common growth between Shuyi Shaoxiancao and consumers in the 14 years since its establishment, and also conveys the beautiful vision that Shuyi Shaoxiancao will always accompany consumers.

Cha Baidao's customized drama "Love Has 100 Fresh Ways" continues the "dominant boss falls in love with Cinderella" routine in terms of content, with an independent story in each episode, and each episode is four or five minutes on average. Cha Baidao products are implanted in scenes to achieve exposure of stores and products. The overall video exposure exceeded 140 million, and the number of interactive people reached 2.72 million.

The reason is actually the audience problem. The audience of fast food and tea drinks is relatively young, so using short dramas to spread information is also in line with the information acceptance habits of young people. However, other catering brands target all age groups, and short dramas cannot penetrate all age groups, but will have a low cost-effectiveness. In addition, in the catering industry, many bosses have the mentality that products are more important than marketing.

But in fact, the value of marketing for catering brands is far more than promoting brand concepts. More importantly, it is about creating new scenarios. Unlike clothes and cosmetics, as long as you are attracted to them, no matter if you have them at home, you will want to buy them and try them. Catering is a stock business. A person can only eat three meals a day, plus afternoon tea and supper. For a long time, everyone is fighting for the share of the main meal.

But the popularity of milk tea and coffee has brought new life to the catering industry, and players have seen new time periods and new possibilities. When these scenes are discovered, how can they be introduced to consumers? Short dramas are actually one of the best aids. Life-style content makes it easier for consumers to accept and be influenced. In fact, brands using short dramas to convey a lifestyle is not just about products and brands.

Text｜Tiana
This article is written by the author [Morketing] of Operation Party, WeChat public account: [Morketing]. It is originally created/authorized to be published on Operation Party. Reproduction without permission is prohibited.

The title image is from Unsplash, based on the CC0 protocol.