One video generates 2 million yuan in revenue, but it is difficult for UP hosts to make content paid

Video platforms such as Bilibili and Douyin have tried to explore new paid business models. Douyin has launched paid short videos, and Bilibili has tested charging exclusive videos. What is the revenue-generating logic of this paid video? Can Bilibili really make a profit in this way? This article takes us to an in-depth analysis of the logic behind video content payment. Let's take a look.

Following the open and covert competition in the field of knowledge, Bilibili and Douyin have started a new round of "competition" in paid videos.

In November this year, Douyin started the internal testing of paid short videos. Creators can "upgrade" their video content to the paid version, and users need to pay corresponding Douyin coins to unlock all the content. This move was ridiculed by users as "spending money to watch short videos" and "Douyin helped me quit my internet addiction."

Douyin is not the only company to try out new business models. Last year, Bilibili conducted a paid video internal test, but the user response was poor and the test was aborted. This year, this "ambition" has taken a different approach and turned into another feature - exclusive charging.

Six months after the launch of the feature, a popular video dedicated to charging was born on Bilibili . A two-hour paid video "Lost in Tokyo" by UP host @食贫道 has been played over 2.24 million times. According to his homepage, nearly 210,000 people have opened charging for the UP host (including user-defined charging). According to the 12 yuan monthly charging level set by the column "大开大合", the cumulative revenue of the video exceeded 2 million yuan, of which 70% belongs to the UP host.

From free to paid, there is a "some happy while some sad" phenomenon among B station UP hosts. How long will the platform continue to explore in cultivating users' mentality of paying for content?

1. Who is “paying” for the content on Bilibili?

The newly launched "Exclusive Charging" feature of Bilibili is derived from the charging plan launched by the platform in 2016. At the 14th anniversary conference of Bilibili this year, CEO Chen Rui officially announced the upgrade of the charging plan, which is to increase commercial revenue channels for UP hosts through monthly charging, exclusive dynamics, and fan medals.

Since the charging-exclusive videos are time-sensitive and can only be watched repeatedly during the paid service period rather than being a one-time purchase, this feature may seem like a monthly membership subscription at first glance, but the main source of revenue is from the UP host.

The official website of Bilibili intends to promote this feature. More than one UP host reported that the incentive task has added a lot of content for posting exclusive charging videos. Kas observed that some UP hosts also randomly posted charging videos in order to cope with the platform tasks, and warned fans "not to recharge".

Some people are avoiding it, some are still waiting and watching, and some are making money quietly.

"UP hosts can create hardcore and in-depth content for users who really like it and have real needs, and the entire account development model will become healthier." In a video released at the end of June, UP host @汉森白JW talked about the new experience that the "charging plan" brought to him, "More importantly, it provides UP hosts with real economic income."

@汉森白JW is one of the first UP hosts to participate in the test. His content is based on the field of mystery and suspense, and he explains classic mystery works in the form of comics. He has more than 900,000 fans on Bilibili. Within a month of the release of the first charging-exclusive video, he gained more than 600 monthly charging users, including core fans who generously "contracted" to update for a year. At present, a total of 2,310 people have opened charging for Hansen Bai.

In Hansen Bai's opinion, the "Charge Exclusive" function provides a way for UP hosts to give back to their fans, and also gives him the opportunity to truly operate a video product for core fans. Hansen Bai, who started out with mystery content, set the Charge Exclusive video as an explanation of classical mystery novels, and the focus of daily updates gradually shifted to the more popular "Those Things in the Ming Dynasty" explanation.

In the public opinion field, the negative comments on the charging plan were much milder than those on the paid videos that B station had previously tried. Nevertheless, users' doubts about this feature are also one of the mainstream voices. After all, apart from the core fan group who are willing to "pay for love", most users still consider the question of "whether the expenditure is reasonable and worthwhile".

Take Hansen Bai as an example. From May till now, the UP host has produced 6 exclusive videos for charging, and the overall update frequency has maintained an average of one VIP video per month. However, upon closer inspection, the UP host had no relevant output in July and November. Although the price is clearly marked, the irregular update frequency inevitably makes fans who have subscribed to the monthly subscription feel "backstabbed".

On the other hand, Hansen Bai's paid column costs 18 yuan. Considering the update speed of the UP host, this means that fans need to spend 18 yuan per month to unlock a paid video. This price exceeds the price of B station's premium membership and is also a bit expensive for a video that is no more than 20 minutes long. After all, the price for non-member users to watch a classic movie on B station is only 5 yuan.

In terms of content quality, even if it is specially customized for the core fan group, since the comment area for the charging-exclusive video is not open, users cannot know the quality of the video before paying, which is almost the same as "opening a blind box."

As a business model that has already matured abroad, content payment itself does not need to be questioned. However, Bilibili is still stumbling on this road, and the consumption mentality and price system of users have not yet been matured. Based on various risks, Kass observed that the top UP hosts are still in a wait-and-see state about this model because their other channels have more abundant revenue. Most of the UP hosts who have opened this function are small and medium-sized UP hosts, which has solved the dilemma of "generating electricity for love" to a certain extent.

In addition to @汉森白JW, the first batch of participants in the charging video test also included @九筒笔记, whose content focused on business observations and comments. The content was priced at 30 yuan, and a total of 2,670 people became "shareholders" of the UP host. However, judging from the homepage, the UP host's last charging-exclusive video stopped at the end of September.

What kind of content do users want to support, and what kind of videos will they continue to pay for? And how can UP hosts avoid controversy?

2. Can Bilibili “cross the river” by relying on “Lost in Translation”?

Six months after the launch of the exclusive charging function, a "hot" video finally appeared on Bilibili. On November 30, the hardcore food UP @食贫道 released a two-and-a-half-hour video "Lost in Tokyo", which uses a humanistic perspective, in-depth interviews, and the topic of "loneliness" in the hearts of modern people, making this video a great success in both traffic and word of mouth.

As of press time, "Lost in Translation" has been played over 2.32 million times, with over 210,000 people paying for it. Based on the 12-yuan price tag set for the "Big Open, Big Close" column, the video revenue should exceed 2 million yuan.

The inspiration for Lost in Translation may be the movie of the same name starring Scarlett Johansson, which was released in 2003. In the pre-production video, Uncle Bing mentioned the reason for restarting the "Dabao Recommended" series, one of which was the revenue pressure of the team, "In March, the cash flow was almost cut off." In order to shoot Lost in Translation, the team spent 400,000 yuan on their own, and opening the exclusive charging service was also to recover the cost.

On Bilibili, @食贫道 has 3.77 million fans. Its past content is known for its "hardcore" and humanistic atmosphere. The "東瀛大寶荐" series has a good reputation, and the first episode of Fukushima has received 13.86 million views. As the third part of the series, the filming of "Lost in Translation" was particularly difficult.

In order to film the Japanese underworld, Uncle Bing went to the hotel run by the gangster boss's wife to drink every night. In order to film the hostesses, he also had to go drink. When filming "Lonely Death", he went to social events every day to get interview opportunities for himself. It was not until September when he went to Japan again that the team was able to capture the desired scenes.

During the filming process, Uncle Bing realized that "we can't escape a different perception that is particularly sensitive to Japanese society, which is that this society is really lonely and everyone is lonely." "All your desires can be commodified, but when you commodify your desires, you will suddenly find that people themselves may be commodities." Therefore, they decided to combine all the content they had collected into one episode and named it "Lost in Translation."

In terms of payment, the team set the price to 12 yuan, which is also the lowest price for users to watch exclusive videos on Bilibili. In order to ensure the charging experience of fans, Shipindao also promised to try to go abroad once a month to take pictures of local customs and customs around the world. "In the future, all the content of the charging section will be unique, interesting and carefully produced."

It is not difficult to see from the comments section that users love and are willing to pay for high-quality content . There are many comments such as "This kind of content is worth paying for", "There are not many teams on the entire network that can have such creative quality", "The first charge went to Uncle Bing", etc., all pointing to "high-quality content". This "high quality" is reflected in the energy, time and money spent by the team, the detailed and in-depth content of the documentary, and the movie-level post-production and production cycle.

However, although a "hit" was born, the success of the Shipindao team is almost impossible to replicate - hits themselves are largely accidental, not to mention that for small and medium-sized UP hosts, a project of this magnitude is even more difficult to achieve by personal strength.

When we turn our attention to the creators of medium-length videos with a duration of about 20 minutes, it is not difficult to find that B station users have their own "scale" in their minds about what content is worth paying for. According to the B station UP host charging list released by Feigua in November, the UP hosts with more than 10,000 people charging include @食贫道, @马督工, @啊粥粥啊粥, @马林思考, @罗爷的动物, and @朝阳冬泳怪鸽.

Among them, those who have not opened exclusive charging include @马督工, who mainly comments on current affairs, @罗爷的动物, which is involved in public welfare relief, and the "Oli Gei" uncle @朝阳冬泳怪鸽. Most of the users' active charging has obvious emotional tendencies, helping UP hosts to achieve profits and show their support.

Among the UP hosts who have opened exclusive charging channels, @啊粥喝啊州 mainly interprets "Journey to the West", analyzing the cause and effect of the plot from the perspective of character behavior logic. The price of "Havoc in Heaven" is 12 yuan, and more than 40,000 people have paid. @马林思考 focuses on "going against the will of heaven and changing fate, realizing oneself" from the perspective of thinking logic. The 30-yuan charging column is marked "practical dry goods", and a total of 11,150 people have charged.

From this perspective, exclusive opinion videos, including current affairs and practical videos, are more likely to be favored by users . These UP hosts tend to be general knowledge, and their content or opinions are mostly of unique value in the minds of users. Thanks to the maturity of the "classroom" section and the name of "learning platform", Bilibili has a certain payment mentality in the field of general knowledge, which also helps UP hosts increase their revenue potential.

Kas observed that some UP hosts also use the charging plan to monetize. For example, @大问题Dialectic, the UP host updates his daily life to raise philosophical questions and conducts in-depth analysis of multiple viewpoints to achieve the purpose of "dialectically" looking at events and phenomena. His speculative nature and philosophical discussions have attracted a group of core users. In order to ensure revenue, 大问题Dialectic opened a community payment in the form of a charging plan, with an annual fee of 288 yuan. Currently, community recruitment has ended.

Bilibili has stumbled onto the road of paid content, but the problems it faces still exist.

From the content level, even for a big production like "Lost in Translation", the paid experience is not satisfactory. Someone on Zhihu said, "I paid for the content alone, but the service I enjoyed was castrated (the extra clarity actually requires a premium membership to unlock)." The lax review of the 30 yuan charging content has also been criticized, and the dance area has seen the appearance of "charging exclusive" content.

At the UP host level, how to balance the proportion of paid videos while maintaining daily updates, ensuring the quality of content, and avoiding infringement may be an issue that entrants need to seriously consider.

Author: Chao Guan

WeChat public account: caasdata (ID: caasdata6)