"Internet celebrity with millions of fans" Xiucai title: neglected emotions of middle-aged and elderly people and the neglected silver hair market

Xiucai, who frequently appears in shy actions, has long been a top player in the market for middle-aged and elderly women with the rustic background music of "Little sister sends her lover". Although he was quickly banned, his breakthrough also made the public begin to pay attention to the emotional needs of middle-aged and elderly people who have been neglected. This article is based on national conditions and analyzes the reasons for the existence of the silver-haired market and its huge potential. It is suitable for those who are deeply engaged in self-media.

Wearing a 3:7 split hair and a POLO shirt, she walks in the fields with expressions of surprise, shy smile, fist covering mouth, hand down, licking lips, raising eyebrows, touching hair, tilting head and smiling... At this time, the music starts, and she lip-syncs love songs such as "Little Sister Sends Her Lover" and ends. The "Xiucai" who focuses on earthy flavor and has highly homogenized copywriting and content can gain 12 million fans on Douyin and receive more than 200 million likes, which puzzles content entrepreneurs and is a landscape of the Internet.

According to the new Douyin data, female fans account for nearly 70% of "Xiucai", of which fans aged 41 to 50 account for 24.66%, and fans aged 50 and above account for 47.83%. "Xiucai", known as the "harvester of middle-aged and elderly women", had his account blocked recently. The platform said that the account violated the platform's relevant regulations. Some media reported that someone reported "Xiucai" for suspected tax violations. In response, a person in charge of the Bozhou Municipal Taxation Bureau said that relevant reporting materials had indeed been received and the investigation was underway.

According to reports, in May 2023, a 62-year-old woman named Xin from Beijing reported Xiucai online under her real name. In her report, Xin claimed that Xiucai used dividends as bait and defrauded her of more than 500,000 yuan in three months through online rewards and offline dividends. Later, the two parties reached a settlement on their own.

Another "middle-aged and elderly male harvester" who is often compared with Xiucai is "A Captivating Smile", who has over 19 million fans. According to statistics, male fans account for nearly 80%, fans aged 41-50 account for 31.84%, and fans aged 50 and above account for 42.13%. The current note is that he is resting at home due to something, and the latest video was posted on August 21.

After the account was banned, some fans began to look for the missing Xiucai. Behind the expected collapse of his reputation and the widespread doubts and surprises of his fans, the middle-aged and elderly women in the sinking market whose emotional needs have not been met for many years have finally been "seen". Who will be the next Xiucai?

From fake Jin Dong to scholar: those "invisible and silent" middle-aged and elderly female fans

“He looks like a liar,” “I’m thankful for my mother’s pension,” “He’s so ugly, disgusting and greasy, who on earth likes him?” ... After the news of Xiucai’s account being banned, the topic became a hot topic and there was a flood of negative comments online.

Young people who have received higher education in first-tier cities, who are busy buying Maotai and Luckin coffee and walking in the city all day, may think Xiucai is too greasy to swallow, and they cannot understand those middle-aged women who give high rewards, express their love in comments, and travel thousands of miles to meet him. There was once a 72-year-old woman who took a train from Jilin to Anhui across 1,700 kilometers and said, "I must meet him."

However, the deep-seated source of such polarization in aesthetics comes from the unbalanced and even divided economic and social development of urban and rural areas in China: According to government announcements, as of June 9, 2023, the number of Chinese with passports is 132 million, which means that more than 90% of citizens have never set foot abroad. Previously, according to the research team of the Institute of China Income Distribution of Beijing Normal University, there are 600 million people with a monthly income of around 1,000 yuan. In 2019, economist Li Xunlei wrote that there are still 1 billion people in China who have never been on a plane. At the same time, Hong Kong, Beijing, and Shanghai entered the top ten list of the world's richest cities. This means that regions with different levels of development have huge differences in lifestyles, preferences, information exposure, and identification capabilities.

After Douyin and Kuaishou became national short video applications, their huge daily active users also brought the sinking middle-aged and elderly market and their aesthetic tendencies to young people - the Internet has made the world flat. "Xiucai" and "A Smile Allure the City" can be popular because, in addition to being "handsome" and "sweet" in line with their audience's cognition, the rustic makeup and environment also give them a sense of intimacy and accessibility, while excessive refinement will distance them. In addition, the simple and homogeneous content of the two lowers the threshold for understanding, and the high update frequency brings a sense of companionship and emotional value.

Under the influence of the algorithm mechanism, each person's recommendation is segmented and "folded", and when they mistakenly enter, they encounter a strong sense of cultural shock. A group of young people come to the live broadcast rooms of Xiucai and Qingcheng Yixiao to "check in in a trendy way", and even further deconstruct secondary creation, which brings them incremental fans of the post-00s. Xiucai is the favorite ghost animal material of B station UP masters. The "Xiucai Dormitory" uploaded by "Aoyiyeye" on August 19 has exceeded 15 million views.

The "Xiucai incident" is highly similar to the previous "Fake Jin Dong incident". In the program "Happiness Formula", a 61-year-old female "star chaser" with the pseudonym Huang Yue came from Jiangxi to the Northeast, claiming that Jin Dong asked her to come, they would get married, and Jin Dong would give her 500,000 yuan and a house. In 2020, Douyin banned a batch of "Dongdi", "Rui Ruidong" and "Didi Dongdong" high-imitation accounts. The salesperson used Jin Dong as the avatar and defrauded the aunties of money through voice live broadcasts and chats. Since then, the gray industry chain has made a comeback. Later, Jin Dong sued Douyin for network infringement liability.

This is a story about elderly fans chasing stars in the era of short videos. Many of the female elders who have worked hard all their lives have never received respect and care, so that anchors can easily cheat them of their emotions and money through live broadcasts and high-quality imitation accounts. Many comments with many typos and grammatical problems but true feelings are heartbreaking. "You are the stars in the sky, and I have been a workhorse in their family for my entire life."

In the movie "My Aunt's Postmodern Life", Ann Hui used her usual compassion to depict the emotional desires and real dilemmas of middle-aged and elderly women: Ye Rutang, an intellectual woman played by Siqin Gaowa, met Pan Zhichang, a charlatan played by Chow Yun-fat. They became soulmates because of Peking Opera and developed a twilight romance. Pan Zhichang disappeared with his aunt's coffin. There are two lines in the movie: "How can you discriminate against the elderly? The elderly also need emotional freedom." "I would rather believe him, because I have never owned anything and have nothing to lose."

The middle-aged and elderly people are unfamiliar with network rules, unfamiliar with legal aid, and feel lonely and empty, as well as have little retirement savings, which makes them the most vulnerable to fraud. As the lower-tier markets continue to grow, this is what Douyin and Kuaishou must accomplish: strengthen the safety supervision mechanism of machine review and manual operation, crack down on gray and black industries, improve risk loopholes, and reduce the occurrence of fraud cases.

In the neglected silver market, who will be the next “scholar”?

Quest Mobile's "2022 Silver Economy Insight Report" shows that the monthly active users over the age of 50 have reached 297 million, a year-on-year increase of 12.5%, and the average monthly usage time per person is 121.6 hours, making them one of the important groups on the Internet. The "2022 China Short Video Live E-commerce Development Insights" released by QuestMobile shows that users over the age of 41 watching live broadcasts on Douyin and Kuaishou account for nearly 40%. Among them, users over the age of 51 account for about 19%, and nearly 30% of users have a monthly online consumption capacity of more than 2,000 yuan.

The "silver economy" is often mentioned, but it still has great potential. They are the incremental market of the Internet, but also the vulnerable group that needs to be protected. Since the beginning of this year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has issued relevant policies many times to promote the adaptation of Internet applications to the elderly. More than 40 APPs have successively launched "elderly mode" to simplify information, simplify payment processes, enlarge fonts, and launch voice assistants to lower the threshold for middle-aged and elderly people to go online. Only in the live broadcast room of Xiucai and Yixiao Qingcheng, you will realize how huge the silver market is.

Yixiao Qingcheng, who claims to be born in the 1980s, is from Shan County, Heze City, Shandong Province. The exact MCN organization has not yet been revealed. Xiucai is from Mengcheng County, Bozhou City, Anhui Province. Neither of them live broadcasts to sell goods, but adopts the method of rewarding. It is reported that the general anchor split ratio is 50-50, and the big anchor can reach 60-70% or even higher. Yixiao Qingcheng's top brother is the highest level 60 fan, and the corresponding live broadcast reward amount is 20 million yuan. The monthly live broadcast reward amount is basically around several million yuan. The two also have various reposting accounts and copycat accounts.

During the Chinese Valentine's Day that just passed, "Xiu Cai" and "Yi Xiao Qing Cheng" had a live PK, which was watched by more than 20 million people, setting a record in the history of Douyin . The total number of people online in the two live broadcast rooms exceeded 400,000.

"A Smile Allures the City" once said that she would not allow college students to give her tips, but only uncles and grandpas, because they have pensions. She opened two fan groups, one of which requires exclusive membership for the group owner, while the other requires attention, exclusive membership for the group owner, and membership in the 9th level fan group. To become an exclusive member, you need to pay 980 Douyin coins per month, which is equivalent to 98 yuan per month.

After Xiucai falls, who will be the next Xiucai? A widely circulated joke is: "My mother is squatting at Xiucai, my father is squatting at Yixiaoqingcheng, my sister is squatting at Qingxin, and my brother is squatting at Yumeng." Currently, a user has left a message under the "Qingxin" video: "I will send you to be a Xiucai now." "If Xiucai can sit on this throne, you can sit on it too." What is certain is that anchors dedicated to middle-aged and elderly women, and even high-imitation accounts and gray market accounts will continue to emerge one after another, due to the growing silver-haired market and its emotional needs that are not fully met.

The seventh census data shows that the population of China aged 60 and above accounts for 18.7%, reaching 264 million people. It is estimated that by 2050, the number of China's elderly population will reach 487 million. In addition to goods, from content consumption, live broadcast platforms to institutions, Internet celebrities, communities, dating, business endorsements, and offline study tours, every link can be transformed accordingly for the elderly.

The "Fashionable Grandma Group", a top IP for middle-aged and elderly people with more than 15 million fans on the Internet, has seen this blue ocean market and seized the opportunity. It currently has more than 2,000 members. A group of accounts including the "Fashionable Grandma Group" have begun to explore and test the migration of video accounts, and "Grandma Wang who only wears high heels" has tried to build a silver-haired Internet celebrity matrix. Recently, Oriental Selection established New Oriental Culture and Tourism Co., Ltd., created the "Oriental Selection See the World" account and released multiple routes to enter the cultural and tourism industry, also seeing the market potential of middle-aged and elderly "aunt fans".

From cheongsam shows to jewelry live broadcasts, the entire middle-aged and elderly market needs to be constantly regulated, and at the same time, it needs to provide more emotional value such as a sense of companionship for special audience groups. Perhaps it is time for short dramas focusing on middle-aged and elderly content to enter the market.

Author: Mia

Source: WeChat public account "Entertainment Unicorn (ID: yuledujiaoshou)"