Skits invade the plot number

The short drama craze swept through 2024, and the plot account creators all used "short drama stalks" to break the creative bottleneck, achieve a high flow of traffic, and increase fans. From online jokes to short drama stalks, the status of plot accounts has risen, and the interaction between the two has detonated the popularity. Let's see what this article says.

Short dramas have almost become a hot word for attracting money at the beginning of 2024. News such as "monthly income of over 100 million", "short dramas create the next rich man", and "8-day turnover exceeds 100 million" are everywhere, and there are also some true and false ones. How to get a share of the big pool of short dramas, with the dividends in front of it, has quickly triggered creators of all types and regions to scramble to explore.

Recently, more and more plot-telling creators have used "short drama gags" as creativity, exploring a smooth entry from a corner, and unexpectedly achieved a certain degree of traffic climax, increased fans, and even broke the zone and circle.

1. Add Coke to Mentos

Three years ago, the short video industry was not optimistic about plot accounts: they were joke-telling, low in content and had weak monetization capabilities.

However, after wave after wave of "Internet jokes" made a number of plot accounts popular, even the reverse operation of plot accounts creating Internet hot memes began to appear, and the status of plot accounts rose rapidly.

People flock to anything that is profitable, and the large number of players has led to more and more story-telling accounts becoming homogeneous, repetitive, and lacking in ideas. Many accounts of this type have fallen into a fatigue bottleneck period, with mediocre playback volumes.

The "skit memes" that appeared at this time were like adding Mentos to Coke. The chemical reaction produced by the two memes had the momentum to create a hit.

The first step is to detonate traffic, break the calm "deadlock", and have the motivation to break through the bottleneck.

"Seven Orangutans", the creator of college campus jokes, has distributed her works on multiple platforms. From the data feedback of her works released on Bilibili, we can see that since February, she has continued to shoot traditional creative themes such as "College Students' Self-Made Situational Short Films" and "Love Brain Transformation Plan", and the number of views she has received ranges from hundreds of thousands to more than one million. Her videos have been at this level for the past six months, which shows that it is difficult to make new breakthroughs.

But in March, she began to try the "short drama gag" series of videos for "Reborn as an Actor in a Cool Drama", and the number of views reached around five million, with one video even achieving an impressive result of nearly eight million.

To a certain extent, it was the innovative creativity and acting skills of "Seven Apes" that were recognized, but it is also hard not to admit that she took advantage of the short drama craze.

The second is to start a new series, which may expand creative ideas.

It can be seen that the creators of the plot accounts who tried "short dramas" basically archived their works in the form of new series. For example, "Pai Xiaoxuan", a plot account creator with the workplace as the main background, has updated 4 episodes of the "My Billion Dollar Engagement with Mr. Gu" series, which has won 230 million views; "Li Datou" took a different approach and used the classic fairy tale in the form of short dramas. After the creation of "Cinderella Experience Card", many people followed up in the comment area.

The birth of the new series shows that there is no limit to the creators’ endless creativity and imagination, and there is still a lot of room for exploration, which is exciting.

Finally, it is to break the circle and increase fans, jump out of the original fan group of the drama account, and attract fans towards the short drama.

According to online data, Wang Ma "Seven Orangutans", who plays NPCs in various types of short dramas, has gained nearly 3 million followers across the entire network in the past month, including 1.26 million followers on Douyin, 960,000 on Kuaishou, 420,000 on Xiaohongshu, and 260,000 on Bilibili. Countless fans are waiting for her to update her posts.

The new series successfully drove the account to a peak in follower growth, and the popularity can almost be said to have exploded across the board, and it was a rare multi-platform explosion.

The explosion in various aspects has also led to more and more "short drama memes" being discovered, gradually forming a "short drama meme" universe:

The collision of absurdity and reality, and the "rare clarity" in the skit, produce another kind of pleasure that goes beyond the skit itself: in the gameplay of "Pai Xiaoxuan", imagine yourself as a normal person, traveling to the world of the cool skit, and a clear mind appears in the brainless plot, facing endless unexpected things and lots of jokes.

Unexpected twists and turns in the routine trigger embarrassing and hilarious moments: car accidents, amnesia, divorce, pregnancy, bankruptcy, counterattack... In these conventional plots of short plays, the sequels are no longer predictable with your eyes closed, which makes people addicted.

"Take the 50 million and leave Mr. Gu!" "Okay, okay, what's the password?" "Lost your memory? Then sign this contract quickly!" "I lost my memory, not my culture."

Instead of being the protagonist, they act as NPCs, borrowing logical loopholes to directly output ordinary people's reactions to outrageous plots, and making funny comments to arouse empathy: the creators not only play the protagonists, but also play nannies, bodyguards, secretaries, drivers and other functional NPCs, and even increase the watchability of the story. Vicious female supporting roles and spare male supporting roles also appear frequently.

For example, the creator "Qiao Yu Optimist" has repeatedly made fun of NPCs such as doctors and drivers. From the perspective of supporting characters, he has made accurate complaints from office workers and ordinary audiences, making the plot full of humor.

The creation of plot accounts has evolved from fragmentary "online jokes" to "short drama gags" and then into a continuous collection, just like adding Mentos to Coke, which enables the two to interact with each other and ignite the heat in a point-to-line manner.

2. Premeditated Slippery Entry

The intersection between plot numbers and skits has a long history.

Therefore, this large-scale entry into the game of playing with memes can be said to have been planned for a long time.

Around 2022, some drama accounts have already shifted towards a modular approach to creating short-form dramas.

The drama account "Bankrupt Sisters and Brothers", which focuses on sibling families and funny daily life, launched a 12-episode exclusive short drama "Sisters and Brothers at Home" in March 2022, integrating the fragmented fragments of the drama account model into a coherent collection. Not only does it achieve the output of a larger amount of information in a short period of time, but it also strengthens the symbolism of the series' characteristics.

In fact, the creative ideas of the plot account and the arrangement of the skit have similar underlying logic, which is why the plot account is the first among many sections to be able to play the "skit" with ease.

The selection of themes, creation of scripts, division of labor among actors, and start of performance, the forms of creation are essentially similar, making "short play gags" an easy-to-grasp creative idea for plot creators. The plot creators, whose "inspiration comes from life", can find suitable entry points in "short play gags" and develop differentiated approaches.

The plot accounts leverage short plays in form, and the "short play gags" have pushed the plot account content to reach the public in a new form - the most notable is the transition from fragmented works with high uncertainty and divergent themes to modular works with fixed themes, similar styles and high stability.

"Short drama" brought the first taste of the short drama mode to the drama account, and also formed a new track in a new form, reaching a new group of people, breaking the circle with half the effort, and the cost-effectiveness of traffic is quite high. As several creators who rushed to create "Short drama" commented in the comment area: "You and xxx are so strong in this track!"

What followed was the commercial industry's increasing preference for "short drama gags".

Each of the "short drama" works of the drama account creator "Pai Xiaoxuan" has a strong commercial brand blessing. On the premise of the already good fan traffic, the addition of "short drama" traffic works that can challenge the high position has attracted a large number of brands, and even customized short dramas for brands, achieving a double growth in traffic and commercial income.

Since March, drama accounts have reaped huge rewards from "short drama memes", but based on the current situation, whether this kind of gameplay is just a temporary novelty or has the opportunity to develop into a new track, it not only needs to be tested by the market, but also depends on the exploration and development of creators.

Currently, most of the works that have received high traffic use the popular short drama gags that have been popular for a long time, so they are still traffic products that are chasing "heat" for plot accounts. If the "gags" are used up, then this form will be difficult to sustain, and the fluctuation of peak and valley traffic will be inevitable, and the formation of new tracks will no longer exist.

At the same time, it can be seen that most plot accounts consciously weigh the importance of traditional plots and "short dramas".

Even though comments on traditional drama works often urge updates of "short drama gags", how to balance the two relatively separate business lines to meet audience needs and promote the healthy development of the account is still a difficult problem that needs to be discussed and measured in the actual cross-regional content operation process.

3. It takes some wisdom to get a piece of the pie

There are many players in the market, and it still takes some wisdom to stand out from them, get a share of the traffic pool, and turn the short-term benefits into sustainable ones.

Be sensitive to the heat and seize the opportunity.

The popularity of "short drama gags" on drama accounts is a product of the general environment. Many "short drama gags" have developed over the years and have a strong mass base. This year, the popularity of short dramas has been pushed to a new peak, with new gags accumulating old gags and creating a huge wave of exciting traffic.

The entry of Drama Account at this time is just in time, as it has both a mass base and a commercial base.

As for the way to play "skirt drama", not all ideas can be copied. The appropriate form and the right audience are also important ideas for playing "skirt drama" across regions.

Not only are plot accounts trying out "short play gags", creators in other areas are also looking for a suitable format.

For example, the creator of the living area, "Lahongsang", first filmed a short play based on a class assignment, which received a good response. Later, she took advantage of the situation and brought in neighbors and family members to create a sequel of the "dominant president" theme.

Different from the memes played by plot accounts, the works of "Lahongsang", a creator in the lifestyle area, are not just skits. Instead, they still record life and show the on-stage and behind-the-scenes process of creating a meme: how actors strive for a role, how costumes and props are prepared, how NGs occur during filming, etc. Not only do they play "skit memes", they also have the characteristics of lifestyle accounts and still conform to the preferences of the original fan group.

For the plot number that is at the forefront of the "short drama memes" this time, the current use of memes may just be a popular leverage, but it may also become an opportunity for transformation.

Therefore, we must be aware that users are prone to aesthetic fatigue. Whether it is playing with memes or transformation, it is necessary to create differentiation among a large amount of homogeneous content, making it short in length but not shallow.

For creators in any sector, new attempts outside of their comfort zone are not easy, but they are also very important. The entry of different players has given the opportunity to enrich and expand the content themes, and any content has the opportunity to gradually spread to multiple circles.

Platforms and audiences should also give creators appropriate opportunities to try and make mistakes, support content creators' exploration with a more inclusive attitude, and allow more "playing with memes" and "chasing trends". Perhaps a new track will be born in this way.

IV. Conclusion

With development and maturity, the popularity of short dramas will gradually return to rationality. It is not easy to get a share of the traffic pool. You must be able to catch up with the dividends of the times and keep moving forward, and you must also be able to find the right ways and methods to ride the waves in the craze.

Whether it is to break through yourself or change your mindset in your comfort zone; or to keep going with the flow and continue to produce, or to just try it out for a short time. How to keep the popularity going is the topic that creators in all regions behind the halo effect need to think about continuously.

Author: Di Fei

Source: Media No. 1 (ID: zcfhxy)