Baidu's number one public relations officer, became a Douyin influencer for 7 days

During the Labor Day holiday, Baidu's number one public relations figure became popular. But later, things took a turn for the worse, and the short videos in her account were directly cleared. From starting to work as a personal IP to suddenly clearing the account content, what exactly did Qu Jing go through? What kind of industry thinking is hidden behind Baidu's number one public relations figure working as a personal IP? Let's talk about this topic today.

During the May Day holiday, Baidu's vice president and public relations chief Qu Jing began posting short videos on Douyin in her personal capacity.

As of press time, "I am Qu Jing" has released a total of 5 videos and has 950,000 fans.

Just when the outside world was speculating whether another corporate internet celebrity was about to be born, at noon on May 7, all the videos of "I am Qu Jing" were suddenly cleared.

01 A well-prepared attempt: Baidu's PR boss starts working on TikTok

It seems that Ni Jing's creation of a Douyin account was not her personal behavior.

Not only did Niu Jing clearly state her identity as "Baidu's vice president and number one public relations officer" in every video, she also stated in the comment section that recording TikTok is one of her jobs, "My job is public relations, and short videos are my basic work."

The technical details of video shooting, lighting, etc. in her personal account also prove that Qu Jing was well prepared.

According to reliable sources, Qu Jing did not create Tik Tok on a whim, but had a plan and purpose. Qu Jing also sought out masters and took classes everywhere and studied for a long time.

On May 1, Qu Jing released her first video titled "An employee is on a business trip, her boyfriend wants to break up with her, what should the boss do?" and made several sharp remarks:

Why should I consider the employee's family? I'm not her mother-in-law.
You don't have to take on important work, but you won't have anything to do when the salary increases.
Our relationship is just an employment relationship, and what I consider is whether he can deliver results to me in a timely manner.

These sharp remarks made Qu Jing's first video receive over 5,000 likes and also became a hot topic on Weibo. The cumulative number of views of related topics exceeded 100 million.

As it became a hot topic, controversy also followed.

Some people, from the perspective of employees, think that Qu Jing "has low emotional intelligence" and "a company without humanistic care has no meaning to exist"; some people, from the perspective of the company, think that "the atmosphere created by such values ​​is not necessarily a harmonious atmosphere."

There are negative reviews and there are positive reviews.

Many netizens commented: "Anyone who has worked should know how rare it is to have a leader who is impartial and fair in his work", "It's easy to follow her, just do the job for a penny."

Since then, Qu Jing has released a number of videos, covering many hot topics such as workers, women, and the workplace.

In the video, Qu Jing mostly has short hair, wears black clothes, and speaks very fast, giving off the image of a female career elite.

For the sake of work, she said she has never taken a New Year holiday, her cell phone is turned on 24 hours a day, she is available at any time, she goes to bed at one or two in the morning, and gets up at six or seven in the morning; facing the workplace, she said that if someone tries to slander her through illegal means, she has the ability to make the other person lose their job opportunities in this industry.

Perhaps in order to ease her somewhat cold image, Qu Jing also released a video on May 4 titled "Whoever earns more pays the bill, the vice president doesn't let employees pay the bill", saying that she often gives her subordinates very good gifts, including mobile phones, luxury bags, etc. At the same time, she emphasized that she would not let employees give gifts, and there is no need for employees to rush to pay the bill when dining out.

But perhaps because her other videos were too exaggerated, the negative feedback that Qu Jing received became increasingly severe.

Some netizens even believe that "Baidu's number one public relations officer will personally create Baidu's public relations crisis."

On May 7, related topics such as #Baidu Vice President’s account gained a million followers in 5 days because it was purchased# became a hot search on Weibo.

On the same day, the content of the account "I am Qu Jing" was cleared, and Baidu's number one public relations figure's attempt to become an Internet celebrity came to a temporary end.

02 She feels suffocated when being criticized. What’s her problem?

Why did Qu Jing start to develop her personal IP and eventually delete all her videos?

First, there may be problems with the topic itself.

As a senior executive of a large company, the opinions expressed by Qu Jing may be reasonable in certain scenarios, but when these opinions appear in the public space of Douyin, they appear too cold, not friendly enough, and arrogant.

In mass communication, "who speaks" and "whom to speak to" are very important. When Qu Jing became an Internet celebrity, she used the identity of Baidu's public relations number one rather than an individual, and the target of her speech was the public rather than employees, which meant that some topics were destined to be controversial.

Some industry insiders believe that if Qu Jing were a business training instructor or a female growth blogger, her videos could be used to sell courses, but Qu Jing herself said that there is a risk of causing a public relations crisis.

Looking at the comment section of Qu Jing's account, it can be found that the largest number of comments are that Qu Jing "feels suffocated" and that Baidu "has no human touch."

After the incident fermented, many self-media began to criticize Qu Jing's views and even questioned Baidu's values.

Second, there are questions about the source of the Douyin account’s fans.

Because she was suspected that she did not gain nearly one million followers by relying on 5 videos, but directly purchased or changed the appearance of an old account that originally had more than 900,000 followers, many netizens criticized Ni Jing for "taking shortcuts" and "being dishonest."

Previously, many media outlets have cited Xin Dou's statistical analysis, which showed that before 2024, the content posted by the account "I am Qu Jing" was mostly clothing recommendation content. It was not until May 1, 2024, after clearing the previous content, that "I am Qu Jing" began to post content related to Qu Jing herself.

In addition, as early as 2022, the account had nearly one million followers.

When Qu Jing started posting content on this account on May 1, the account had 940,000 followers.

Third, Ni Jing’s public relations identity may not necessarily make her suitable for appearing on camera as an internet celebrity.

Some industry insiders believe that as Baidu's number one public relations officer, Qu Jing is not suitable to appear on camera. The value of a public relations job is to prevent the outside world from feeling that a company has a public relations officer. If a public relations officer appears on camera personally, various behaviors are particularly likely to be magnified.

Comments from Zou Zhendong, professor of the School of Journalism and Communication at Xiamen University, on WeChat Moments

The close relationship between public relations and the media means that Qu Jing is almost working under a magnifying glass, and small disputes can easily turn into major public opinions.

It is hard to say whether the reason why Qu Jing cleared the content of her account at noon on May 7 was unrelated to the fact that a large number of media outlets quickly followed up with the report and related negative topics became hot searches on Weibo.

Many people in the industry believe that the best option is for business owners to create personal IP.

Weibo CEO "Laiqujianzhi" commented that Baidu has realized the importance of a company having its own self-media matrix, and its reaction speed has surpassed many companies. "But the company's executives are unwilling to come forward, so the public relations department can only work hard."

So, is it wrong for Qu Jing to try to create a personal IP?

In my opinion, Baidu's work on personal IP is more of a technical issue rather than a direction issue.

Since buying an account and "changing the head" has been criticized, then she should create a new account from scratch and focus on the development system; since the identity of the number one public relations position is not suitable, then she should look for a more suitable executive; many negative rumors about Ni Jing, whose truth or falsity is unknown, have been exposed, and her public favorability is worrying, so she should replace her with someone with higher public favorability; as for Ni Jing's most criticized "career heroine" personality, it is more like a matter of netizens' preference rather than a matter of principle that touches the bottom line.

Some netizens speculated that Qu Jing's behavior of strongly binding her personal account with Baidu was most likely approved by Baidu or even Robin Li himself.

In the content industry, controversy brings traffic. Based on Qu Jing's experience, she has probably considered what kind of controversy her content might cause.

According to Sina Technology, as early as March this year, Qu Jing required all employees in Baidu's public relations department to transform into video self-media, and the performance of employees' video accounts would affect their year-end performance. It is understood that Qu Jing made Douyin to serve as a sample for other colleagues. Previously, Qu Jing also encouraged other executives to create personal IPs internally.

A personal video account suspected to be created by Baidu's public relations team

Personally, I guess that Qu Jing’s original plan was to first use controversial topics to generate traffic, and then change her style and gradually "whitewash" herself with mild content.

This kind of black-and-red style of creating an account is not uncommon, and many internet celebrities have successfully created accounts by using controversial topics.

In fact, controversy is never a problem, the problem is how to face controversy. "Are You OK" was originally a malicious complaint against Lei Jun, and Zhou Hongyi was ridiculed for his recent second-hand car auction.

But at present, the social feedback the two have received is mostly positive.

For Qu Jing, the core issue of some netizens' ridicule of Zhou Hongyi is that the change in public opinion exceeded her expectations. She may not have realized that a corporate identity is more complicated than a purely personal identity.

When there are too many negative feedbacks, Qu Jing can only clear the content of her account to control the further fermentation of negative public opinion.

03 Baidu "temporarily failed", but building personal IP has become a new direction for enterprises

Can Ni Jing’s “temporary failure” prove that companies should not build personal IPs and train bosses, executives, and employees to become internet celebrities with traffic, personality, and public favor?

On the contrary, the trend of enterprise-wide content marketing is becoming increasingly obvious.

Relying on his character as the "male protagonist in a cool novel", Lei Jun not only gained over 4.5 million followers across the entire network in 30 days, but also encouraged a group of bigwigs in the automotive industry such as Wei Jianjun and Yin Tongyue to do live broadcasts.

In addition to the bosses, senior executives of companies such as Xiaomi, Zeekr, and Avita have also opened personal accounts.

Because of the joke by netizens "Are you willing to be suppressed by Mr. Lei?", Xiaomi executives Lu Weibing and Wang Teng received a lot of attention from netizens.

In comparison, Baidu, which has just stepped down from its position as the number one public relations officer, can be considered a "latecomer".

Why are so many companies rushing to build personal IP?

On the one hand, in the era of short videos and live broadcasts, the threshold for companies to build personal IP has approached zero.

In the era of traditional media, even if companies wanted to build personal IP and operate accounts, they could not do so because they did not have media qualifications. Companies could only speak out through publicity channels such as television and newspapers. But in the era of self-media, everyone can become an Internet celebrity, and companies can also open their own accounts. In the era of short videos and live broadcasts, any boss, executive, or employee of a company can pick up a mobile phone to build their own personal IP.

On the other hand, successful cases such as Lei Jun have proved that it is profitable for companies to build personal IP.

For enterprises, building personal IP means at least having their own voice channel when being criticized. In the era of short videos and live broadcasts, enterprises must develop extremely fast reaction speeds, otherwise they will not be able to cope with increasingly rapid and complex public opinions.

In addition to official accounts, personal IP accounts represented by bosses, executives, and employees can not only increase the company's voice channels, but also gain public trust with sufficiently attractive personalities.

Lei Jun has greatly improved Xiaomi's corporate reputation and popularity

Many times, for the same public relations crisis, a popular company and a hated company may face very different public opinions.

In the comment section of Qu Jing's denied account, she responded positively to the Wei Zexi incident that caused Baidu to fall into negative public opinion.

Putting aside the problem itself, this action actually represents a possibility: companies can face the public directly, respond to questions quickly, and ultimately resolve or alleviate public opinion.

In addition to competing for the right to speak and maintaining the corporate image, companies can also gain tangible benefits by building their own IP. The most typical examples are Xiaomi and Huawei, which have saved a lot of traffic procurement costs thanks to Lei Jun and Yu Chengdong.

In fact, lack of traffic is becoming a pain point for more and more companies.

A leading MCN agency once revealed that some beauty companies have started to cooperate with more general traffic bloggers in addition to beauty bloggers this year in order to find more traffic. Mi Wei, a short drama practitioner, revealed that some traditional brands he has come into contact with have tried brand-customized short dramas because the increase in brand users in recent years has been very small, and they hope to reach more users through short dramas.

Driven by Lei Jun, more and more companies hope to build personal IP, create their own internet celebrities, and gain more traffic for the company.

Zhou Hongyi also called on entrepreneurs to learn how to become internet celebrities.

Of course, not all companies need to build personal IP.

Compared with B-side enterprises, C-side enterprises have a more direct demand for personal IP. Some industry insiders believe that one possible reason why Baidu's public relations team collectively builds personal IP is the change in Baidu's business. From autonomous driving to artificial intelligence, Baidu's current key businesses need to be directly oriented to C-side consumers. Not all bosses and executives are suitable to be Internet celebrities.

Although Lei Jun has set off a craze for Internet celebrities in the automotive industry, he is still a minority, and many car bosses still have less than one million followers on their personal accounts. Do they have enough time to shoot videos and do live broadcasts? Is their personality likable? Can their personal stories resonate with netizens? These factors determine that it is not an easy task for companies to build personal IP.

Lei Jun's personal story naturally has a lot of traffic

Traffic cannot solve all of a business’s problems.

Take the automobile industry as an example. Although Xiaomi Auto is one of the most popular automobile brands in China, it cannot be said to be the most successful automobile brand, because Xiaomi Auto still has a large number of competitors in terms of price, design, quality, after-sales, service, etc. Last month, Lei Jun's success made the industry realize the bright prospects of enterprises building personal IP and having their own Internet celebrities; this month, due to increasingly fierce controversy, Qu Jing had to clear the content of her personal Douyin account.

Lei Jun once said in "Xiaomi Entrepreneurial Thinking": "Stick to the new media position at any cost." At present, the exploration of enterprises to build personal IP has just begun. How to reap the biggest dividends? How to avoid pitfalls? Enterprises still have a lot to learn.