What are the “three major trends” in the live entertainment industry this year?

Author | Chang Mei, Art Editor | Qiu Yuan

“Group broadcast” becomes a new trend?

"Recruiting female anchors for group broadcasts, basic salary 8,000 yuan + commission", "Talent group guaranteed minimum 10,000 yuan, free dance training", "guaranteed minimum 8,000-15,000 yuan, the current comprehensive monthly income of group broadcast anchors is more than 50,000 yuan"...

Recently, Xinbochang discovered that many guild operators have posted recruitment announcements for group broadcast hosts on WeChat Moments, social groups and other channels, and all of them have given a relatively high minimum guarantee.

Entertainment live broadcast practitioners are no strangers to group broadcasts. Group broadcasts, or group broadcasts, are opposite to individual broadcasts and refer to broadcast rooms with more than two anchors. They are usually composed of 3-5 anchors and a host who is responsible for controlling the broadcast.

Since the rise of show live broadcast, the form of group broadcast has appeared. The reason why group broadcast is once again attracting attention and popularity is that the content of this form of live broadcast has changed fundamentally.

I watched several popular group live broadcast rooms in the new broadcast field, almost all of which were in the form of girl groups and boy groups.

It can be seen that the content of these group broadcast rooms is mainly talent shows, among which dance content is the most common. Moreover, the so-called group broadcast is not a centralized performance by the anchors, but a separate performance. Users can also let a certain anchor perform by sending designated gifts, which is highly interactive.

In addition to the live broadcast rooms of boy bands and girl bands, there are also many "role-playing" live broadcast rooms that are eye-catching. Among them, the most popular one recently is the "Ciyuan Pavilion Daoqi Peach Festival" with the theme of the Peach Festival.

In this live broadcast room, the Queen Mother, Guanyin Bodhisattva and other fairies sit in front of the camera in turn. Accompanied by the background music of the live broadcast room, the fairies will perform various styles of dance, and some fairies will even walk in front of the camera to show their magic tools. The scenes and special effects of the live broadcast room are comparable to those of film and television dramas.

This type of live broadcast room has a high degree of recognition thanks to the popularity of well-known IPs, and has invested a lot in scenes, costumes and props, so the live broadcast pictures are very beautiful.

Corresponding to high-quality group broadcast rooms are high costs and high investments.

One guild stated that in order to achieve better live broadcast effects, it invested in dozens of live broadcast venues, purchased and debugged countless film and television-level fill lights, sound card acquisition, cameras and other equipment, and equipped the team with a professional operation team, shooting team, dance team, and styling team.

The head of a certain guild also told Xinbochang that he was doing group broadcasts on Taobao and had just invested in a site of more than 1,000 square meters, and planned to set up 10-20 group broadcast rooms.

He revealed that the investment in cameras, multiple camera positions, costumes, props and scenes for a group broadcast room would cost at least 40,000 to 50,000 yuan, and then the staffing would cost 20,000 to 30,000 yuan based on the most simplified version of 4 people.

Therefore, the initial investment for 10 live broadcast rooms is about 1 million yuan. "Generally speaking, if we have a series, the investment for one live broadcast room for three months is about 150,000 to 200,000 yuan."

So, since the cost is so high, why is the guild willing to invest?

First of all, on the platform side, there is now great support for high-quality group broadcast content.

In September, Douyin held two group broadcast guild exchange meetings, revealing the platform's requirements for group broadcast content, policies for introducing external group broadcasts, and invited many high-quality group broadcast organizations to share.

One guild said: "In the future, group broadcasting will be a business segment that most companies must operate."

Xinbochang learned that platforms such as Douyin and Kuaishou now have support policies specifically for group broadcasts.

Among them, Douyin's policy is that the guild can obtain an introduction share incentive of up to 20% for 3 months; Kuaishou's policy is a maximum guarantee of 50,000 + 4 months of traffic support, and can also be superimposed with regional traffic policies and traffic support from the big stage.

However, correspondingly, the platform also has higher requirements for the content of group broadcasts, and has corresponding requirements on the host’s talents, the setting of the live broadcast room, etc.

As for Taobao Live, there are now content subsidies, and it favors this kind of high-quality group broadcast content.

The above-mentioned guild president said that Taobao Live currently has subsidies, so he is not worried about the investment. Moreover, he said that if Taobao Live fails, he can still switch to Douyin and Kuaishou. "We are producing high-quality content, so we are not worried about not being able to continue."

Secondly, compared with individual broadcasting, group broadcasting has several main advantages:

1. Help new anchors quickly get started. The group broadcast room has its own traffic. When a new anchor joins, it is equivalent to entering a mature live broadcast room with traffic, so they can share the traffic of big anchors and quickly get started.

2. Rich content. The group broadcast room is like a small variety show, with talent shows, outdoor challenges, and various styles and scenes, so it will collide with more live content.

3. Solve the problem that the anchor can’t interact or chat. Generally, there are 4-5 people in a group broadcast room, and there is also a host, so the anchor doesn’t have to worry about whether the audience will be bored, nor does he have to think about how to interact with users, he just needs to perform well.

4. More topical. A guild operator said that because there are many people in the group broadcast room, sometimes topics such as "CP formation" will arise, which will make the entire broadcast room more topical, stimulate users to participate in the interaction, and thus increase the popularity of the broadcast room.

5. It is in line with the trend of content upgrade of the platform and even the entire live broadcast industry. Group broadcasts are mostly group performances, singing, dancing and other talent shows, with a big stage, lighting, etc., and the whole live broadcast room will have a better picture quality.

After years of development, the entertainment live broadcast industry has long been a consensus on content upgrades, and the industry's gameplay has also been iterating. Group broadcasting seems to be a new form of live broadcasting, but in fact it has already existed. The reason why it has attracted attention again is essentially a breakthrough of "high-quality content + innovative gameplay".

However, despite the popularity of group broadcasting, not all guilds and organizations that enter the market can succeed. Whether or not group broadcasting can be done well still tests the guild's operational and incubation capabilities.

An organization that had been involved in group broadcasting for two months told Xinbochang that they would no longer do it because after entering the group broadcasting, they soon faced problems such as energy and input-output ratio.

There are top live broadcast scenes and the experts have talents, but whether the group broadcast room can generate good returns still tests the live broadcast operation capabilities of the organization, which they do not have. Moreover, they are better at making short videos and are not willing to devote all their energy to live broadcasting, which makes group broadcasting a costly thing for them.

In addition, group broadcasts also face the same challenges faced by individual broadcasters: recruiting and managing anchors.

Guild operator Xiao Z said that no matter how things change, the guild's problems have always been recruitment and management. Moreover, compared with individual broadcasts, group broadcasts also face the problem of too many people to manage and high costs. "Group broadcasts have higher requirements for anchors, so recruitment will be more difficult and they need to pay higher salaries."

Not only that, group broadcasting also values ​​cooperation between anchors, so how to position and train anchors so that they can better demonstrate their advantages in a live broadcast room is also a test for the guild.

Xiao Z also said that in order to do a good job in group broadcasting, it also depends on the IPization of the group broadcasting room.

Among them, IPization means that the group broadcast room must have a high degree of recognition. At present, in addition to some leading group broadcast rooms, many group broadcast rooms will directly take advantage of the popularity of well-known IPs. For example, the "Ciyuan Pavilion Daoqi Peach Festival" mentioned above took advantage of the popularity of "Journey to the West", and there are also various imitations of costume dramas.

However, this type of live broadcast room is expensive on the one hand, and people will get tired of it after a while, so the guild needs to think about how to produce content continuously.

Despite the development difficulties, the popularity of group broadcasting is now intensifying. Xiao Z said: "The trend is very clear, the platform really attaches great importance to it, and the most important thing is to enter the market as soon as possible."