Digging into the 1,000 Douyin accounts with the fastest growth in followers, we summarized 4 content trends

In the past year, which Douyin creator impressed you the most? What content categories did you see most often? What content trends did you see? Read this 2023 Douyin Fan Growth Report for the most comprehensive analysis!

Since 2019, Kass has regularly reviewed the 20 accounts with the most followers on Douyin in a single month, and summarized some industry trends and ideas for increasing followers for reference by industry insiders. Now that 2023 has passed, the monthly fan growth list has also been regularly released to readers. Standing at the beginning of 2024, we believe it is necessary to deeply review the content creation track in 2023. What creative trends and creative rules are worthy of our attention? What potential tracks and creative opportunities cannot be ignored?

In order to answer these questions, Kas Data has compiled the 1,000 accounts with the fastest increase in followers in 2023, and from a broader perspective, from the data and content dimensions, to give everyone a clearer and more intuitive understanding of Douyin content in 2023. (Note: The following data comes from Kas Data and does not represent the official source)

01 From the data, we found these trends

Let’s first look at the overall trend of Douyin’s content ecology in 2023 from the perspective of macro data such as advantageous content types and fan increase range:

1. Fan increase range

First of all, we can intuitively feel the strength of fan growth in 2023 from the distribution ratio of the fan increase range.

According to statistics from Kas, there are 17 accounts whose number of followers exceeded 10 million in 2023, 76 accounts whose number of followers increased between 5 million and 9 million, 207 accounts whose number of followers increased between 3 million and 5 million, 244 accounts whose number of followers increased between 2 million and 3 million, and the remaining 456 accounts whose number of followers increased were concentrated between 1 million and 2 million.

Overall, the overall trend of Douyin's content ecology in 2023 is not impressive - let's look back to 2020. According to statistics from Kass, there were 96 Douyin accounts with more than 10 million followers in 2020, which is more than five times the number in 2023. Under the sharp contrast of data, it has become an indisputable fact that the growth of Douyin's content ecology has slowed down and fatigue has gradually emerged.

In fact, since October 2021, the Douyin content ecosystem has gradually shown a trend of weak growth in followers. Among the 20 accounts with the fastest increase in followers each month, only a handful of accounts have "contributed" to relatively outstanding growth in followers, while the performance of the remaining accounts is relatively sluggish. In 2023, this sluggish trend is also more intuitively reflected in the monthly fan growth list.

Kas has analyzed the reasons behind this many times before: first, the traffic saturation of short video platforms has become an indisputable fact; second, the content circle itself has become a red ocean with fierce competition, and it is increasingly difficult to "stand out"; third, short video platforms vigorously promote e-commerce and expand commercial monetization paths, which has also squeezed the traffic space of professional content creators to a large extent.

2. Advantageous content types

From the perspective of content type coverage, the Douyin content ecosystem in 2023 still maintains its usual diversified characteristics, covering more than 30 categories including film and television entertainment, drama/funny, food, mother and baby, cars, beauty experts, vlogs, knowledge information, pets, government affairs, celebrities, sports and fitness, outdoor, music, etc. Among them, the distribution of content types with the top 20 accounts is shown in the figure below:

According to the table, film and television entertainment accounts for 10.4% of the accounts, becoming the most advantageous content type in Douyin in 2023. However, it is worth noting that although there are many accounts, official accounts of TV programs and a large number of sliced ​​film and television editing accounts account for more than 60%, and creative accounts focusing on commentary and secondary creation are rare.

After film and television entertainment, the drama/funny category, which has always had an advantage in the short video industry, ranked second with a share of 9.2%.

Since 2019, the plot track has taken off at a high speed. From the entry field to the content style to the creation of personality, we can not only see diversified content types, but also see many new faces with rapidly increasing fans. However, after two years of rapid development, Kas found that starting from 2021, although the plot track still maintained its growth advantage, it has declined significantly compared with the previous period. The main manifestations are: the content richness of the entire track has decreased, the speed of increasing fans has tended to be flat, the frequency of big Vs emerging has become lower and lower, and many accounts that can be active in front of users for a long time are old players who have experienced long-term precipitation.

Specifically, among the 1,000 accounts with the fastest increase in followers, there are 92 drama/funny accounts. Although they still have an obvious advantage over other tracks, they are obviously much "lonely" compared to the peak period in 2019 and 2020. Among these accounts, there are many familiar faces who have been popular for a long time, such as @疯狂小杨哥, @广东夫妻, @姜十七, @多余和毛毛姐, @李宗恒, and @晨晨.

Looking closely at the content formats of all drama/funny accounts, there are still several main content modes:

This funny drama in which "one person plays multiple roles" deeply restores the details of different life scenes in a highly dramatic form. It is full of fun and tests the creator's creativity and acting skills.

It is worth mentioning that in 2023, the creative mode of one person playing multiple roles obviously occupied a very high proportion in the entire plot track . Many accounts such as @脱链凯, @李濡濡, @丁郑美子, @二阳咂 and other accounts stood out with this mode, especially @脱链凯, with superb acting skills and funny settings, attracted a total of 924.9W fans in 2023; the imitation master @李濡濡 became popular with the "TVB accent", and then became popular with the sales champion series of short videos. Later, because of imitating the shouts of Miss Universe from various countries, the attention rose again, and even attracted the attention of the organizers of the "Miss Universe".

@脱链凯@李烂噜 video screenshot

The life-like funny plots presented in the form of vlogs mostly focus on the daily life of family and friends. Accounts such as @董赤赤, @周周啊, and @小叮当的一家 all belong to this type.

@周周啊@小叮当的一家TikTok video screenshot

This content model focuses on exquisite plots that focus on scenes, costumes, props, creativity, and visual appeal . It has produced dark horse accounts like @大圆哥, which dramatizes and films life details, as well as exquisite short drama accounts like @煎饼果仔, whose costumes, plots, editing, and acting are "not inferior to TV dramas."

@煎饼果仔TikTok video screenshot

The positive energy plot revolves around the human relationship and is good at constructing life-like dramatic plots from the aspects of family affairs and how to behave in the world, thereby highlighting the positive energy core and attracting fans' attention. For example, accounts such as @王家帮, @泥可松, and @阿乐哥哥 all belong to this model.

@王家帮@泥可松TikTok video screenshot

It should be emphasized that this type of content is highly homogenized, the plot lacks novelty and is obviously formulaic. Although there has been no shortage of audiences in 2021 and 2022, the attention it has received has declined significantly since 2023, and the fan growth data is not particularly impressive.

After the drama category, celebrities and media categories ranked third and fourth with 6.3% and 6% respectively. Then, appearance experts maintained their usual advantage with 5.8%.

Although the number has an advantage, looking at the fan growth data of this track, the overall situation is not outstanding. Compared with the grand occasions in 2020 and 2021, when Douyin successively brought out phenomenal appearance experts such as @刀小刀sama, @刘思瑶, @一栗小莎子, and @井川里予, the appearance track in 2023 not only failed to bring out the top appearance, but the entire track has also entered a clear period of calm, and conventional dancing and cross-dressing are no longer as effective as in the past . There are only four accounts with more than 4 million fans throughout the year, namely @凌达乐, @傻小刘, @蔓越莓的原因, and @李闽轩. Among them, @凌达乐 became popular because he resembled Lu Han, and @傻小刘 formed his own differentiated advantage among the appearance experts because he added Korean skills to the content in the later stage.

@Ling Da Le @Stupid Xiao Liu @Cranberry Truth

Tik Tok video screenshot

Among the 1,000 accounts with the fastest increase in followers in 2023, food accounts accounted for only 5.5%, a significant decrease in quantity compared to previous years. Analyzing the accounts on the list, three types of content dominated:

First, rural food accounts represented by @东北雨姐, @八零徐老佬, @王大师农村一家人, etc. , have captured the hearts of many users with their rich and warm rural customs and the smell of fireworks. Among them, the more authentic, down-to-earth, and true-feeling rural accounts are more likely to attract users' attention.

@Eighties Xu Grandma, @Wang Grandma Rural Family

Tik Tok video screenshot

The second type is store exploration accounts represented by @MR-白冰, @二百者也, @2饭桶, and @牛哥不牛. This type of content displays and introduces a variety of delicacies to users through different gameplay and forms. For example, @MR-白冰 focuses on luxury store exploration, @二百者也 focuses on fixed-quota blind box store exploration, and @2饭桶 focuses on tasting hundreds of restaurants . In addition to bringing a sense of freshness, it also gives users a warm sense of companionship.

@MR-白冰@二百者也@2饭桶TikTok video screenshot

The third is the eating broadcast account represented by @吃货老外铁蛋儿, @张圣叹, @猪猪七分饱, etc. It is worth noting that although they all belong to the same eating broadcast type, many accounts have taken a differentiated route. For example, @张圣叹, known as the "son of the god of death", focuses on weird food evaluation - eating weird food from all over the world in front of the camera, and making a series of "exaggerated" reactions that make people laugh while feeling the taste of the food, which makes users have a lot of fun while watching; @猪猪七分饱 brings users a full sense of impact through the huge contrast between the protagonist's body shape and his appetite.

@张圣叹, @猪猪七分饱TikTok video screenshots

In addition to these three types of content, regular food tutorial accounts such as @夏叔厨房 and @藏小厨家常菜 also occupy a certain share. These accounts do not emphasize too many forms and patterns in content presentation, but strive to intuitively show users the production process of various home-cooked dishes through clear pictures and concise explanations, with the core of satisfying users' practical needs.

@夏叔厨房@藏小厨家常菜TikTok video screenshot

After the food accounts, the number and proportion of accounts in vertical categories such as knowledge, travel, mother and baby, and music are not that different.

Among them, after the epidemic was lifted, the travel track has obviously regained its vitality , especially the "tour guide" travel accounts represented by @厦门阿波, @普托山小帅, @厦门小程, etc. are very popular. Wherever they go, they will not only show the local scenery, but also explain various cultural knowledge, historical stories, celebrity allusions, etc. related to the local scenery, bringing users a dual experience of beauty + knowledge. Kas has reason to believe that in 2024, the travel track will usher in a greater explosion.

@Xiamen Abo @Putuoshan Xiaoshuai Tik Tok video screenshot

In the knowledge track, the accounts on the list cover a very broad range of knowledge, and the content presentation forms are also more diverse:

@乔伯伯英语, through vivid homophonic decomposition and situational interpretation of each word, helps users "remember a word in one second" in a relaxed and funny fast-paced atmosphere;

@乔伯伯英语TikTok video screenshot

@DagongzaiXiaozhang, with his immersive popular science about seemingly insignificant common sense in daily life, such as "how to register at a hospital alone", "how to take a high-speed rail", "how to apply for a passport", etc., quickly hit the fear of a group of users who have just entered society, urban life, and social phobia. Many netizens jokingly called him "the top social survival scholar";

@DagongziXiaozhang Douyin video screenshot

@何老师在散呆 has successfully opened up a unique creative path that uses scenes to interpret and deeply restore the birth process of art. Through his videos, ordinary people with no artistic foundation can also acquire professional knowledge of art one by one, and feel the spiritual cleansing and self-satisfaction brought by art.

@何老师在呆呆TikTok video screenshot

In addition, the maternal and infant track is still dominated by accounts that record the daily lives of cute babies, while the music track includes both passionate outdoor music masters who are active in the streets and alleys, and indoor music masters who show their talents in a relatively literary style . No matter which type, as long as there is innovation in form and style, there is a chance to attract the attention of a large number of users. For example, @豪哥哥, who focuses on "bulk song modification" and secondary creation, will magically modify the lyrics of various popular songs around different plot themes, and then perform and present them in a vivid and exaggerated way, thus forming a unique new style that makes users very addicted to it.

@Hao brother TikTok video screenshot

The remaining categories include talent skills, games, cars, etc., and their overall performance is quite satisfactory. It is worth noting that sports and fitness, which were hot in 2021 and 2022, gradually declined in 2023 and rarely made a splash. In addition, among the 1,000 accounts with the fastest increase in followers in 2023, beauty accounts only occupied 4 seats, which can be described as a very bleak performance.

3. The 20 accounts with the fastest increase in followers

After looking at the overall data trends and type distribution, we will focus on the 20 accounts with the fastest increase in followers in 2023. According to Kas statistics, after excluding two media accounts @凤凰卫视 (annual increase of 1245.3W followers) and @豹新闻 (annual increase of 879.6W followers), the 20 accounts with the fastest increase in followers in 2023 are shown in the figure below:

Among the 20 accounts, the singer @刀郎, who has a huge fan base, returned to the music scene in July 2023 with his new work "罗煞海市", which quickly aroused heated discussions on major platforms, and after entering Douyin, he became the account with the fastest increase in fans in 2023. Another celebrity account @张的大的大, who transformed into an "entertainment customer service" in the live broadcast room, passionately confronted netizens, and his unique entertainment style, lively live broadcast atmosphere, and the long-lost "live" atmosphere of the entertainment industry, made him gain a lot of attention.

@张的大抖音 video screenshot

Ignoring celebrity accounts, the creator with the fastest increase in followers in 2023 is the dark horse @李炮儿.

In January 2023, @李炮儿 kept up with the trend and started the content mode of "accepting fan challenges", incorporating the humor of a plot master into it. During the challenge, he constantly made jokes and made a fool of himself, bringing full joy to the audience. After starting to shoot the "China Voice" series of challenge videos, he successfully passed the levels one after another and had another label - excellent singing skills. This differentiated feature helped the account usher in a new peak in fan growth. In addition, he actively shot videos with official accounts and platform celebrities, and the account's popularity and influence continued to expand.

@李炮儿TikTok video screenshot

Looking at the other five accounts in the plot track, @疯狂小杨哥 and @广东夫妻 are well-known old accounts. After starting out with funny content, both are now thriving in the sales track.

Among the other three plot accounts, @董赤赤 developed a series of hilarious jokes around the sharp contrast between appearance and behavior style, thus constructing the unique characteristics of the account. @脱链凯 plays multiple roles, focusing on campus life, and staged a series of hilarious campus dramas through the interpretation and collision of different roles. @大圆哥 is another dark horse that emerged in the second half of 2023. The biggest advantage of its content is that it presents ordinary life as very "unusual" through a series of natural and clever funny designs, reversal designs, and warm designs, allowing users to experience the pain and joy, laughter and tears of life, and gain deep emotional resonance.

@大圆哥TikTok video screenshot

Among the remaining accounts, @董宇辉, who was loved by the public because of the "small composition incident", saw his followers increase by more than 10 million by the end of 2023; @旭旭宝宝, the "strongest anchor" in the DNF circle who already has a super high reputation and a huge fan base, switched to Douyin in August 2023 and quickly accumulated a lot of popularity.

In other tracks, the three film and television entertainment accounts @二里清风, @熬夜视界, and @随心追剧 are all slice-and-slice editing accounts, which have attracted a lot of attention with their highly gimmicky and attractive film and television clips.

@Outdoor Hair (Dongfang Abao) and @Ni Haishan both took the "outdoor quiz + money-giving" live broadcast route . The two experts' boldness, generosity, and down-to-earthness maximized the entertainment effect of this outdoor live broadcast. While watching the excitement, users also had a strong sense of participation and interaction.

@倪海杉@温泉发 (东方阿保) TikTok video screenshot

The mother and baby account @姚一尧小肉包 records the funny daily life of the cute baby Yaoyao. With her cute appearance and personality, Yaoyao has captured the hearts of many "online moms" and quietly occupied the emoticons of countless netizens.

@B Tai, who transformed from a food expert to an "anti-counterfeiting expert", has single-handedly lifted the veil on many industries. His bold and just approach has won him the attention and support of many fans.

@B太TikTok video screenshot

@东北雨姐, who became popular on Douyin at the end of 2022, has maintained its vitality in 2023. The account focuses on telling the customs, daily life, special food, etc. of the Northeast countryside, releasing a positive vitality from the inside out, which makes users never tired of it.

@东北雨姐TikTok video screenshot

Although postgraduate entrance examination tutor @张雪峰老师 always causes social controversy due to various remarks, he still attracted 12.405W fans in 2023 with his excellent eloquence and professional ability.

The travel account @湖远行 records his cycling trip around the world. Through his lens, we can not only appreciate the scenery of all parts of the world, but also feel his youthful courage and vigorous vitality.

@湖远行TikTok video screenshot

02 Content creation trends worth paying attention to

Next, we will start from the perspective of content creation and extract some creative trends.

1. The stronger the contrast, the faster the fans grow

Creating a sense of contrast has always been a common method for short videos to attract fans. In 2023, we have also witnessed multiple accounts from different fields deriving various ways of playing around creating a sense of contrast, thereby achieving rapid fan growth.

For example, the account @好端端的猪, which focuses on the visual contrast brought by the appearance of a pig farm and a beautiful woman. The combination of a pig farm and a professional beauty breaks the user's conventional cognition and creates an extreme sense of contrast. On the other hand, the heroine's decisiveness and the frightened and helpless expressions of the piglets in the pigpen form a sharp contrast, further enhancing the contrast of the video and increasing the user's interest accordingly.

@好端端的猪TikTok video screenshot

One of the reasons why the food account @食貨老外铁蛋儿 was able to attract 807.1W followers in 2023 is because the contrasting combination of foreigners and Chinese stomachs quickly attracted users' attention, allowing the account to establish a differentiated feature that is difficult to replicate in the food broadcast track.

@吃货老外铁蛋TikTok video screenshot

The huge contrast between the external image and internal characteristics of the story accounts @王七叶 and @董赤赤 is undoubtedly a highlight of their popularity. Especially @王七叶, from the perspective of her personality, whether it is her appearance, figure, outfit, or dancing skills, she can be regarded as a genuine goddess with high appearance value, but from the perspective of her expressiveness, she is a "female psycho" who is open-minded, down-to-earth, and willing to take risks. She can make all kinds of magical behaviors in the video that are in sharp contrast with her external image, and extend various creative plots based on this, thus forming the differentiated characteristics of the account.

@王七叶TikTok video screenshot

@周大爷不服老, attracted 605.4W fans in 2023. Although the protagonist of this account is a silver-haired internet celebrity, he likes to actively try a series of trendy things that young people like, such as escape rooms, go-karting, manicures, etc. Not only is the sense of contrast maximized, but users also gain a lot of fun and energy when watching videos.

@周大爷不服老TikTok video screenshot

Overall, by creating a unique and personalized sense of contrast, different types of accounts can derive a set of playing methods that suit them, and then, on the basis of creating a sense of contrast, give the account more characteristics, thereby forming their own differentiated advantages in a certain track.

2. The more you play with short video blind boxes, the more you spend.

Since @小鱼海棠's "Inspirational Photoshoot with 999 Handsome Boys" in 2021, "opening blind boxes" has gradually become a very popular form of creation. In 2022, @二百者 also launched the "exploring blind boxes" gameplay. Through the 200 yuan fixed-quota challenge gameplay, check in at food stores across the country and co-create with merchants, setting off a challenge trend of "I eat whatever the store sells".

@二百者也TikTok video screenshot

As time comes to 2023, short video blind boxes have come up with more new tricks:

@在下辉子 "turned old classmates into blind boxes". In each video, a former classmate from the graduation photo is randomly selected, and then a field visit is made to record their current life situation ten years after graduation. This form of content that seems to open a blind box of life allows the audience to glimpse more possibilities in life, while also triggering their multiple thoughts on time, choice, mentality, life and other issues. With the help of the "Old Classmates Blind Box" series of content, @在下辉子 gained 4 million followers in just three months.

@在下辉子TikTok video screenshot

On February 28 last year, @好梦一天游 appeared on the street with 100 yuan and randomly "caught" passers-by. The selected people could choose to take the 100 yuan immediately or make a wish in front of the camera, and Youzi would do his best to fulfill every wish made by the stranger. So far, Youzi has successively fulfilled many wishes, including helping others to work for a day, helping long-distance couples meet, and helping girlfriends prepare wedding gifts. Everyone who dares to express their wishes in front of the camera can always gain unimaginable satisfaction and touching.

@好梦一天游TikTok video screenshot

The logic behind the "short video blind box" is to sell a sense of surprise, satisfaction, pleasure, and anticipation, which can quickly arouse the audience's curiosity. It is not surprising that this content format has become popular . And divergent thinking around the blind box element may create more surprises.

3. Find the right way to play, so that niche professional content can also enter the public eye

In 2023, many niche and professional accounts broke through their original niche circles and entered the public eye through differentiated entry and interesting operational content.

For example, @老九好茶, which publishes content closely related to tea knowledge and tea industry insider information, gained a million followers in 7 days and a total of 249.6W followers in 2023.

Looking at the content ecology of Douyin, tea accounts are not uncommon, but most of them are active in niche circles, and there are few accounts that go beyond the circle. The biggest reason why @老九好茶 stands out is that it does not play by the rules. It uses a talk show style to tell various industry insider information and industry pain points that ordinary users cannot know, while satisfying the characteristics of being interesting, useful, and informative, thereby quickly attracting the attention of users.

@老九好茶TikTok video screenshot

There is also @龙腾虎跃, whose followers increased by 333.1W in 2023, which records the daily life of a grassroots rural veterinarian who has been working for 30 years to treat animals. Following the camera of the photographer, users can clearly see the real work routine of the veterinarian. Even if he receives a call for help from villagers at 2 o'clock in the middle of the night, Veterinarian Long will get up and rush to the scene without complaint. From the different treatment processes, you can feel the preciousness of life up close, and the process of animals from pain to being rescued is also extremely healing and touching.

@龙腾虎跃TikTok video screenshot

@律师老韩, in addition to popularizing legal knowledge on his account, also opened a live broadcast and microphone consultation, and published live broadcast slices to his account. The "diversity" and "thrillness" of the people he connected with, plus the high level of professionalism he showed, made his account a success and gained a lot of attention.

Another example is @何老师在发呆, whom we mentioned above. He also popularized art science through vivid and easy-to-understand forms of expression, making the originally niche and high-threshold content accepted by the general public, thereby allowing the account to quickly gain followers in a short period of time.

Kas believes that no matter what field the professional account is in, as long as it can enhance the entertainment, fun and watchability of the content, it will be easy to achieve the goal of expanding the circle.

4. Sense of interaction and participation - the key to increasing followers that cannot be ignored

After analyzing the 1,000 accounts with the fastest increase in followers in 2023, Kas found that one of the key reasons why many accounts were able to increase their followers was that they created a sense of interaction and participation through videos.

Whether it's @李炮儿 accepting various challenge themes sent by fans in private messages, or @温泉发 (东方阿宝) and @倪海杉 throwing out various knowledge quizzes with prizes, it has undoubtedly stimulated the enthusiastic participation of users in front of the screen. Compared with the traditional one-way output of content, this model can more quickly stimulate users' enthusiasm for participation and viewing, quickly immerse themselves in it, and thus extend their stay time.

Another example is the voice actor monster @阿七, who will report every detail of his life to users in the video. The various trivial and real life scenes presented from the first-person perspective, combined with Ah七's unique dubbing skills, make these works both private and intimate. When users watch the video, it is as if they are watching their sweet, lovely, and coquettish perfect girlfriend sharing their life alone. In the highly interactive viewing experience, it is easy to have a strong emotional connection with the protagonist of the account , which undoubtedly effectively drives the account's fan growth rate.

@阿七TikTok video screenshot

The above is Kas’ complete analysis of Douyin’s content ecology in 2023. I hope these analyses can be helpful and inspiring to everyone in the industry.

Author: Yue Yao; WeChat public account: Kas Data