100 episodes shot in 7 days, edited and released in 20 days: young people making money in mini-program short dramas

Mini-program short dramas, which have low production costs, simple and crude payment models, and high traffic returns, have formed a complete industrial ecosystem and become the hottest track at the moment. Behind the fierce competition, why is it said that "people" have become the least important link? From screenwriters and actors to editing and monetization, this article tells the real dilemma of mini-program short dramas.

No one can say exactly how many mini-program crews are filming in Hengdian.

Ge Yun, the producer of mini-program short dramas, heard that "there are 50 to 60 a day", while another Hengdian actor said that "there are more than 100 mini-program short drama groups in production, and more than 200 groups in preparation."

Mini program short dramas are a hot investment track this year. It refers to making some plot video content into slices suitable for short video dissemination, and attracting users to the WeChat mini program to pay to watch the full content through social platforms.

Each episode costs a few cents to two or three yuan. A mini-program short drama has 80 to 100 episodes, and it costs dozens to hundreds of yuan to watch the entire series.

Due to the simple and crude payment model and the large number of short video users, the number of views of short dramas in mini programs easily exceeds 100 million, and good news is frequently reported in the circle.

Under this model, it is no longer a fantasy to complete the filming of a 100-episode short series in 7 days and put it on the shelves in 1 month - some teams can even finish filming a short series of hundreds of episodes in 3 days.

"Flow", "Funny Points", "Fast Pace"...

Such words are flying around in the fanatical crew, and the "people" who were originally the most important thing in the film and television industry have become the least important link, and are fuel that can be consumed at any time.

This issue of Microscope Stories will take a look at the mini-program short dramas to explore the real difficulties faced by ordinary people in this world where traffic forces them to "race against time."

Here are their true stories:

1. Let’s take advantage of the traffic of short videos and short dramas

"The princess wants to recruit me as her consort?"

The young man in ancient costume and shorts spoke in non-standard Mandarin. To express his surprise, he made intense body movements, but the wig on his head remained motionless.

The old man at the side showed a happy expression, and said in a slightly servile manner, "Congratulations, young master, there is hope for the restoration of the family!"

A few steps ahead was another crew. The bride in Xiuhe dress was looking around, as if avoiding being chased. She pouted and said in a voice that everyone around could hear, "I don't care who you are, whoever wants to marry can marry, I want to run away!"

"There are crews like this everywhere in Hengdian now," said Ge Yun, who has just switched to being a mini-program producer, pointing to a director who was using a vertical screen inspection machine to check the shooting results . "What they shoot are those cheesy continuous short videos you see online, which have a first part but no second part, and you have to pay to watch the whole series."

The average length of each episode of these short dramas is about 1 minute, and the total number of episodes often exceeds 100. The plots include common "cool points" such as "loser son-in-law", "domineering president chasing his delicate wife", "powerful and sadistic love", and "traveling through reality to regain the throne" .

The payment points have been carefully designed. If attracted users want to continue watching, they must jump to the mini program to pay.

Figure | Charging standards of a certain platform

"Don't be fooled by the tacky taste of these mini-program short videos, they make a lot of money." Ge Yun introduced that the audience of mini-program short videos mostly live in third- and fourth-tier cities and are mainly middle-aged people with low education. They may be security guards, deliverymen, domestic helpers, and full-time mothers. They belong to the "less valuable part of the people" in the Internet community.

"They don't have much individual wealth, but the number is huge." For example, the hit drama "Oh My! The Queen Comes to Work" in July attracted over 12 million users to top up within 24 hours of its launch.

In comparison, the movie "Octagon Cage" released at the same time only had a premiere box office of 8.79 million, and the first-day box office of "Fengshen I" was less than 50 million.

On the other hand, the investment in mini-program dramas is much lower than that of regular film and television dramas.

Ge Yun introduced that when mini-program short dramas began to emerge last year, tens of thousands of yuan were needed to shoot one . This year, more people have joined in, and the price has risen, but the production cost of a high-quality drama is only a few hundred thousand yuan, "not even a fraction of an episode of a TV series."

Not only that, the time cost is also much lower than that of regular film and television dramas - as a product of assembly line production, short dramas can be managed by data from project establishment to content to post-production and promotion.

They do not need to be rated or scheduled, they just need to wait for self-review by the WeChat platform before they can be put into the traffic pool and wait for users to "order" them.

Although it has just started not long ago, mini-program short dramas have already formed a complete industrial ecosystem. With a relatively short payback cycle and excellent monetization capabilities, it has become the hottest track at the moment.

Information published by the State Administration of Radio and Television shows that during the prime time of summer vacation in July, the number of short dramas that have been approved for filing exceeded 300.

The film and television bases in Xiangshan and Wuxi began to be crowded with people, filled with teams waiting in line to shoot scenes; in cities such as Shenzhen, Guangzhou, and Chengdu, where MCN agencies are prevalent, many teams transformed on the spot and started shooting across industries, pushing up the rents of surrounding villas; Hangzhou Linping District keenly issued support policies for the micro-short drama industry.

“Live streaming has reached its peak, so we need a new way out, right?” Ge Yun concluded, “Mini Program short dramas are that way out.”

It will be too late if you don’t get on the bus now.

Second, the target audience is the elderly, they don’t need your art

For low-level actors who earn a hundred yuan a day, short plays are a great opportunity to make their debut.

Dai Ni, a former producer, explained, “The biggest expense in filming in the domestic entertainment industry is the celebrity actors.”

For example, Ruyi's Royal Love in the Palace, which was once claimed to have cost 300 million yuan to shoot, saw the leading actors Huo Jianhua and Zhou Xun alone take away 150 million yuan in salary, accounting for half of the total investment.

But the mini-program short dramas are different. The crew emphasizes "low cost and fast cycle" and has very low requirements for the actors' acting skills. "A few hundred yuan a day for extras is enough. If it is an ordinary extra, sometimes 80 yuan can be invited to come for filming." Dai Ni said.

Picture | In Hengdian, the last thing you need is extras

The 24-year-old Wan Qiufei was born into an acting family. He stands out among ordinary people, but in the entertainment industry, he is "ordinary and inconspicuous."

After working as an extra in Hengdian, Wan Qiu deeply realized the cruelty of the industry. "Ordinary people can only start as extras. If they don't have fame and connections, they will never become a top star even if they work their whole lives."

"My daily salary is 220 yuan. If nothing unexpected happens, I won't be able to earn the daily salary of a big star throughout my career."

Since last year, short dramas on mini programs have become very popular, and the newly emerged top stars "Sun Yue" and "Xu Yizhen" have given Wan Qiu a glimmer of hope - both of them are professionally trained, and were once unknown in the industry. They gained fame through short dramas and made a name for themselves.

She once thought optimistically that it would be impossible for another Wang Baoqiang to appear in the traditional film and television industry, "but maybe in mini-program short dramas."

But the reality is that with the decline of traditional film and television, more and more people are entering the field of short videos, and the competition is becoming increasingly fierce. "Even Yang Rong, who played the female lead before, has started shooting short dramas."

Wan Qiu felt that this was very much like the night before a star tried out live streaming. Every extra in the skit felt that "their living space was getting smaller." But what could they do? They could only do it for now.

But Huizi didn't think so.

Huizi is a professional actor. After graduation, she was introduced by a friend and accepted the filming of the then newly launched mini-program short drama at a price of 400 yuan a day. Later, the mini-program short drama became popular. Huizi entered the industry early and her works had good data, which attracted many film producers.

In the most busy month, Huizi shot three mini-program short dramas seamlessly. But now, when faced with a crew that comes to her door, even if they offer a price of 1,000 yuan a day, she will refuse without hesitation.

"Do you know how much time is given to actors for a mini-program short play?" Huizi shook her head and gave the answer, "It takes 7 days from the start of filming to the end."

Huizi explained that since the short video scripts are highly similar, if the broadcast is delayed by one day, there will be more short dramas with similar plots on the market. Therefore, the film company will complete the shooting in a very short time and then invest and release them online as soon as possible to recover funds.

This also means that the crew will not give the actors too much time to study the characters, let alone write biographies to analyze their personalities; in order to make the scenes more "attractive to the audience", the director will also ask the actors to act as exaggerated as possible.

In addition, the location fee is paid on a daily basis, and in order to catch up with the shooting schedule, many crews are overloaded with shooting. For example, Huizi once joined a crew, and after finishing shooting at 4 a.m., she started a new day of work at 7 a.m.

"Under such high-intensity shooting, the actors don't get any chance to think or make any progress." The sequelae of seamless joining the crew soon appeared on Huizi. She found that she "couldn't act" and began to get used to expressing her emotions with exaggerated body movements.

She tried to communicate with the director, but the director, who had just started his career, was unwilling to listen to her theories about "acting" and said impatiently: "The audience is just uncles and aunts, they don't need your art."

After suspending the filming of mini-program short dramas, Huizi also tried to invest in some big productions, but most of the auditions did not receive a response. Huizi sighed, "The industry still thinks that mini-program short dramas are not considered performances."

This is also the reason why many of her classmates would rather spend their free time than shoot mini-program skits, "Everyone still wants to produce works."

When asked whether the performance format of mini-program short plays would affect actors, Wan Qiu was silent for a moment, then replied: "No actor doesn't want to take on big and good plays, but most actors can't get any."

“This is the only chance we ordinary actors have left.”

3. Forced by traffic, procurement costs account for 90%

The practitioners behind the scenes are not so entangled, and their evaluation of the mini-program short dramas is simple and rough.

"This is a sweatshop industry." This is how short video screenwriter Zhao Qi and post-production practitioner Cao Yang summed it up. Cao Yang, who has been in the industry for decades and has edited movies and variety shows, is even more direct, "Mini Program post-production is not a job for humans. If you don't have money, don't come here, and don't think about gaining experience."

Cao Yang explained that the profits from mini-program short dramas mainly include two parts. One is that users jump to the WeChat mini-program and then purchase the full version to continue watching. The other is the placement of advertisements in the drama. No matter which one, it is impossible to avoid the "traffic" business.

Traffic procurement is the lifeblood of mini-program short dramas, and relevant practitioners say that buying traffic accounts for more than 90% of the total cost.

Regarding the amount of money spent on purchasing traffic, producer Dai Ni did not give a specific number, but indirectly confirmed the statement that it "accounted for a large proportion."

She said that since the mini-program short dramas are mainly "short, flat and fast" and have low production costs, they are destined not to become national TV dramas like "The Legend of Zhen Huan" and "The Story of Minglan". Therefore, they must be pushed to potential users through social media as soon as they are completed to realize monetization.

"At this stage, consumption and recharge are the only two indicators to measure traffic," Dai Ni explained. The amount of "recharge" directly reflects the user's willingness to pay, while "consumption" is a unique indicator of information flow platforms, referring to the advertising fees generated by advertisers placing advertisements on information flow platforms, which are charged according to clicks. The higher the consumption, the more people click.

The platform actually supports the behavior of buying volume for short dramas. WeChat officials said that they will give advertising money to developers who meet the relevant conditions for placing advertisements in the short drama mini program.

As competition for short dramas on major platforms intensifies, the cost of the crew needs to be further tilted towards the promotion and distribution end. The cost of actors is already low enough and difficult to compress, leaving only the invisible behind-the-scenes staff to be manipulated, becoming the cheapest and most easily replaceable "machine".

It is common practice to have multiple roles and not have a complete filming team. What puzzles Zhao Qi and Cao Yang the most is the crew's compression of the "script" and "post-production" links, which are the most labor-intensive work.

"Currently, many short video scripts have about 500 words per episode, and the package price of 100 episodes is as low as 5,000 yuan," Zhao Qi said. "This is a price that is almost an insult to the screenwriting industry."

Since mini-program short dramas are very popular and their audiences are highly overlapped with those of online articles, many online article authors have chosen to switch to writing mini-program online dramas. "Online writers are already cheap and have a large audience, so the industry is even more competitive."

Zhao Qi explained that as more and more people poured in, many demanding contracts emerged in the industry, such as completing a review of 20 episodes of about 10,000 words before considering whether to cooperate, or requiring 100 episodes to be written within three days.

Figure | There are many "secrets" about writing scripts for mini-program short plays on the Internet

After the script is finalized, the short play will enter the post-production stage after 3-7 days of performance by the actors. That is, the post-production staff will edit the materials into hundreds of short videos of about 1 minute in length according to the script provided by the director.

The post-production of a TV series of the same size takes at least 3 months, but for a short drama on a mini-program, the time left for post-production staff is usually only about 20 days.

"Our video evaluation criteria are based on internet indicators such as bounce rate, completion rate, and sharing rate," Cao Yang explained. Under this regulation, conflict scenes that can attract users are more important than coherent plots and beautiful pictures. "We have to ensure that there is conflict in every episode, so there is no need to talk about editing techniques. We can just edit it in a fool-proof way and add filters."

The consequences of extreme compression in each link are gradually emerging, such as screenwriters plagiarizing their work and copying their peers; in the video production link, editing templates are formed, and there are formulas that can be applied to specific episodes and points...

Zhao Qi jokingly stated that "the industrialization of video has been first completed in the field of mini-program short dramas."

"It's a job that doesn't require any brainpower and relies purely on physical effort. People in our industry actually look down on this kind of work. It's only done by young people who have just entered the industry or people from other industries." Repetitive work also "pollutes" the resume greatly, Cao Yang sighed.

"I have no choice. The industry has been in a slump for three years, and I have children to raise."

4. Actors come and go, but MCN remains the same

Every hot track is crowded with young people who want to take advantage of it.

When they found that building a pay-on-demand platform on their own was not feasible, they turned to the production of short dramas through mini-programs.

"This track will have at least three years of dividends." Kang Ning, who is engaged in the shooting of short dramas for mini-programs, said that after he transformed from an MCN company to do related business last year, many friends came to ask him every day "whether it is worth entering the industry."

Those MCN organizations that originally relied on traffic business are the fastest to transform. After all, it is not too far to cross over from advertising and live streaming to paid short dramas. These teams buy a large number of "scripts" or set up "traffic investment" teams, striving to catch the trend again.

Many filming companies that have never been involved in the "traffic" business have lost themselves in the media reports of "low cost and high return". They believe that the relevant track has low investment, high return, and a mature monetization model that is almost an "assembly line", and they are determined to "form their own team for filming."

Some companies use this as a gimmick to raise funds. If you open the social platform, you will find that under many contents about mini programs, there are remarks such as "seeking personal investment" . The other party promises that as long as you invest 20,000 yuan, you can get 5% of the equity of the project, and dividends will be distributed according to the paid income after the mini program short drama is launched, which makes many office workers and entrepreneurs excited.

In Dai Ni's opinion, this kind of investment is extremely risky for ordinary people.

"Mini program short dramas are now a hot track, with a lot of capital entering, and good projects are not even available to individual investors." Dai Ni introduced that as long as there is a work with good data, there will be a steady stream of investment in the industry, "most of those who need personal investment are novices, and they may not even make it until the short drama is broadcast."

Even if the short drama can be broadcast, newcomers will be the most unstable in the face of the huge traffic algorithm.

"Many people think that money is easy to make, but the lifeblood of mini-program short dramas is consumption. It takes a huge amount of money to buy traffic. Relying on ordinary users' investment of 10,000 or 20,000 yuan cannot keep up with the speed of consumption."

Figure | Daily consumption of short plays shared by practitioners

Dai Ni has also seen many projects that solicited individual investment but ended up being "illegal fund-raising". "Only 200 to 300 projects are approved each month, but there may be tens of thousands of production companies online that are posting short drama investment projects, and some of them are just scams."

Even if you are extremely lucky and can successfully wait until the short drama is launched online and make money, individual investors still have to pay a 20% tax when receiving the remuneration. After all the trouble, the income is not as high as imagined. "After all, investing in mini-program short dramas has taken off for a year. It is not a business where ordinary people can make money without doing anything."

There are also many young people who hope to become famous through short dramas on mini programs, so many film and television training institutions have sprung up around Hengdian and other places. They charge high tuition fees to those young people who have dreams of becoming actors but are not born in professional schools, and then "package" them to small drama crews at low prices, and the harvest is completed in one go.

As for the future of these young people, no one cares.

As practitioners Huizi, Yang Qi and Cao Yang said, "In the world of mini-program short dramas, the least important thing is people."

"Yes, traffic is the only indicator in this world," said Dai Ni.

(To protect the privacy of the interviewees, pseudonyms are used in this article)

Author: Yang Jia, Editor: Du Ruifeng

Source: Microscopic Story (ID: xianweigushi)