China travel is popular at home and abroad, and Chinese special forces travel has made overseas experts famous

Why can a group of foreigners traveling to China make "China travel" a hot topic on social media at home and abroad? This article will take you to explore the reasons. Of course, this article is recommended for companies or individual business owners who often post short videos on new media platforms.

A group of foreigners traveling to China not only created popular online memes through their various activities, but also made "China travel" sweep the social media at home and abroad.

"Bao Bao Xiong" is an American whose real name is Paul. When he walks with his family through the streets and alleys of China, he often has nonsensical conversations.

Bao Bao Xiong: "Is Shanghai a city?"

Sister: "What a city!"

Bao Bao Xiong: "Sister, is the Great Wall beautiful?"

Sister: “Beautiful!”

Bao Bao Xiong: "Sisters, is it city-like to watch the sunset together?"

Family members: “City!”

The magical conversation between the two made "city or not city" quickly ferment into a hot Internet meme. "City", which originally means city, has also become a new synonym for "foreign style".

After China implemented a 144-hour transit visa-free policy for many countries, foreign tourists flocked to China. Many of them embarked on "special forces-style" travel and shared what they saw and heard on social media at home and abroad.

As of press time, there are more than 36,000 works on the TikTok topic "chinatravel", and a large number of videos have emerged in the past month.

From the Bund in Shanghai to Hongyadong in Chongqing, foreigners raised their phones to record their journeys, checked in at landmark buildings in major tourist cities in China, and shared their feelings about traveling to China. A video with millions of views was born.

There are also experts who have opened up a second battlefield on the Chinese Internet.

Jack from the UK told the editorial department of Xinbang that he and his wife Paige started updating travel content in 2023 and officially became full-time travel bloggers in January this year.

The “China travel” video series has brought rapid growth to their overseas accounts “jackaynsley” and “Jack Aynsley Travel” and the domestic account “Jack & Paige, the Wine Fairy Couple” (hereinafter referred to as the Wine Fairy Couple) . In the past month, the total number of followers of the accounts across the entire network has increased by 200,000.

"The Hutchinsons" (hereinafter referred to as "Hutchinsons"), also from the UK, are also full-time travel bloggers. Chris and Tamera sold their property in the UK and started traveling around the world with their three daughters. They are well-known among netizens in China for their extraordinary sense of relaxation, and have attracted 500,000 fans on Douyin in half a year.

As traffic has been rolling in, many overseas influencers have signed contracts with Chinese MCNs to focus on the operation of Chinese social media platforms. In 2019, the editorial department of Xinbang discussed the phenomenon of "college entrance examination immigration" of Internet celebrities - overseas influencers became popular on foreign platforms and found a second spring in their careers by settling in Chinese platforms.

Now, five years have passed, and MCN has begun to re-examine the business of overseas influencers.

1. China travel has become a hot topic both at home and abroad. How did foreigners become so popular?

“Amazing!”

This is an adjective that foreign travel bloggers often use after coming to China, and it also sets the main theme of the "China travel" series of videos - contrast and shock.

On overseas social media, simply showing the true face of China is enough to attract millions of netizens.

The "Wine Immortal Couple" believes that the core of "China travel" content is to showcase the true beauty of China. Netizens like to read bloggers share their first impressions of China. "I fell in love with China when I arrived in March."

Before the topic of "China travel" became popular, many foreign netizens learned about China from foreign media and found it difficult to understand the real life and overall picture of China.

Therefore, when travel bloggers came to China, many of them exclaimed, “This is different from what I imagined.”

From the environment and infrastructure to the food and scenery, the high-speed rail and mobile payment, pancakes and beautiful rivers and mountains that are taken for granted by domestic netizens have astonished foreign netizens time and time again.

Foreign bloggers’ posts about China continue to attract praise from foreign netizens, which not only breaks the prejudice of foreigners against China, but also makes “China travel” the password for overseas traffic.

However, these contents do not have much appeal to Chinese netizens. Therefore, if foreigners want to have fun on the Chinese Internet, they still have to rely on "playing with memes + making things happen."

Although it was not the first time that "Bao Bao Xiong" came to China, he created the hot meme "city not city" when "China travel" was popular, and stood out among a group of foreign bloggers.

"Baobao Xiong" mentioned in an interview with the Morning News that the popularity of the phrase "city not city" was completely accidental. "I was just playing a meme with my friends at first and posted the meme video online . I didn't expect it to quickly become a hot topic and spread widely."

He also revealed: "The deep meaning of city cannot be expressed in words. In my mind, city is a place that brings you a lot of stimulation and excitement, just like those moments in life that make you happy, and the beauty that you will never forget in your heart. So, anything that can give you this feeling is city."

This casual phrase helped "Bao Bao Xiong" gain many videos with over a million likes, and his account quickly gained followers. According to data tools from New List, "Bao Bao Xiong" gained over 660,000 followers across the entire network in the past month, including over 570,000 on Douyin and nearly 90,000 on Bilibili.

Another song that became popular unexpectedly was "The Hutchinsons are such a relaxed family."

In December 2023, they updated their global travel videos on Bilibili, recording the family's daily travels in countries such as Thailand and the Philippines. They also came to Shanghai for the first time because of a transit visa. However, their content was not memorable at that time, and the video playback times were concentrated between a few thousand and tens of thousands.

It was not until March this year that the "Hutchinsons" began their three-month trip across China, and the family of five began to appear on the streets of the country dragging large and small bags.

The "sense of relaxation" they exuded during their travels attracted people's attention. Gradually, netizens began to encounter them, take photos and post them online, sparking a photo contest across the entire network to see who would come across "such a relaxed family".

As passers-by watched, the video they recorded on Bilibili about their trip to Guangzhou, the first stop of their China tour, successfully exceeded one million views. The traffic of their Douyin account, which started operating in March, also soared, with the number of followers increasing to 500,000 in the past three months.

The birth of a hot meme is a rare opportunity. In addition to the mystery of traffic, foreign bloggers are also strengthening their personalities through differentiated content.

For example, the "Jiuxian Couple" completed the cold start of their domestic social media account by "taking a standing ticket to Xinjiang". The first video recording a 32-hour train ride was played more than 500,000 times on Bilibili, and they also earned a new nickname, "Tieding (Butt) Couple".

In addition, they continue to strengthen the "wine" element and the characteristics of "social bull" in their accounts. They will go to Beijing Hutongs to drink with strange uncles, and they will also shuttle through Shanghai alleys and chat with passers-by. Many netizens have successfully attracted their casual and relaxed personality.

It is observed that among this group of overseas travel bloggers, there are no top influencers with over one million fans . They gain more attention through the hot topic of "China travel". After the popularity gradually faded, the speed at which their social media accounts at home and abroad increase in fans is also slowing down.

In order to maintain this wave of popularity, overseas influencers need to not only continue to output differentiated content, but also travel to China frequently to accumulate materials, and a 144-hour visa is obviously not enough.

2. After many years, the trend of signing overseas talents has returned

The emergence of MCN has directly helped overseas travel bloggers solve the pain point of visas.

Da Mu is the head of overseas KOL operations at an MCN. His organization has been focusing on overseas KOL signing business since last year and is responsible for the Chinese social media operations of foreign bloggers. They found that many bloggers wanted to transform and shoot more videos about China, but the biggest problem was that the visa time was insufficient. MCN can help influencers apply for visas of up to three months, which has become an advantage in attracting overseas influencers to sign contracts.

After solving the visa problem, MCN has abundant business resources, opening up new soil for commercialization for overseas talents.

It has been observed that overseas bloggers' travel content has natural commercial implantation points, such as the payment software used when first entering China, the translator used when speaking different languages, the hotels stayed in when traveling, the Chinese food tried for the first time, and the food, clothing, housing and transportation in life.

It seems a bit "artificial" for a Chinese expert to praise the convenience of mobile payment in a video, but it would be reasonable for a foreigner to be surprised and amazed after using mobile payment.

Da Mu revealed that some brands have recently favored overseas influencers, and reinvestment is also very common. When an overseas influencer he managed had about 200,000 fans, the number of views for each advertisement remained above 2 million. Even for very awkward advertising placements, the data was very impressive.

Public data shows that many overseas celebrities who have become popular recently have signed contracts with domestic MCN agencies. In fact, seven or eight years ago, the business of signing contracts with overseas celebrities was very hot.

The Foreigner Research Association, founded in 2017, has several influencers with millions of fans who speak fluent Chinese; overseas influencers such as Gavin, the fake smile boy, have been trending on domestic social media; after the American talent "Bart" joined Douyin in 2018, his fans exceeded 10 million in 10 months.

Whether it is incubating IP or signing a contract, foreign bloggers with different languages, images and cultures seem to have their own traffic passwords. However, in 2020, some overseas influencers' Chinese social media accounts have shown a trend of losing followers, and even stopped updating.

Huo Huo, the founder of MCN, revealed that in 2020, he gave up the overseas talent operation track he had been engaged in for five or six years, because many foreign accounts have poor monetization capabilities. An overseas talent account has millions of followers, and each advertisement is quoted at tens of thousands of yuan. If he takes two or three advertisements a month, he needs to find a team of three or four people to cooperate, which is not cost-effective considering the labor costs.

In Huo Huo's opinion, the biggest difficulty for overseas talents to enter domestic social platforms is that their speed of learning Chinese culture cannot keep up with the speed of development of the Chinese Internet . Only if they truly love Chinese culture can they continue to move forward.

Today, the business of signing and incubating overseas talents has experienced a cycle of ups and downs and has once again been targeted by MCNs.

Da Mu believes that the difference between now and before is that the domestic and international environment has undergone tremendous changes. What foreigners saw when they came to China ten years ago is completely different from what it is now. Other countries' curiosity about China has led to the popularity of "China travel" and also brought new opportunities for MCN.

"In the future, this track may become more segmented, such as those who specialize in exploring stores, reviewing hotels, or focusing on checking in at tourist attractions. In the long run, overseas influencers who have developed well in China have essentially regarded themselves as Chinese bloggers."

Author: Bamboo; Editor: Truffle

WeChat public account: "New Ranking (ID: newrankcn)"