The evolution of the anchor with millions of fans: Dare to break through yourself and find a bigger stage on Douyin

What is the secret of traffic for these two anchors with millions of fans, from being new to now? It is their original intention and content, their dreams and hard work. They break through themselves and shine their own brilliance and charm on the colorful stage of Douyin. Let's follow the author to read on.

Last October, anchor Mu Sen decided to restart his "live streaming life" on Douyin.

At Zhouzhi Water Street Scenic Area in his hometown of Xi'an, he started a live broadcast of outdoor talent shows with his fellow Shaanxi people. Starting at 8 pm every night, during the two-hour singing, dancing and game sessions, Mu Sen needs to control the performances of dozens of people on stage, and also pay attention to the emotions of thousands of audiences below the stage, using the boldness and domineering spirit of a Northwestern person to heat up the atmosphere to the highest level.

In the Douyin live broadcast room online, the audience of Musen Grand Stage is even greater, with an average of more than 200,000 people watching each live broadcast online at the same time, and the total number of viewers is basically 3 million . Musen's live broadcast has become a business card for attracting tourists in Zhouzhi County.

He always includes the address of Water Street during his live broadcasts. Over time, many tourists who come to Xi'an will make a special trip to Water Street to watch his performances. "I went out to eat in Zhouzhi County, and the local tourism boss saw me and said, 'It's great that you are here. Our hotel rooms are now full, and there are more people eating here.'"

Half a year after joining Douyin, Musen’s number of fans has exceeded 5 million. More important than the growth in the number of fans is that he has found his original intention when he first started live streaming. Playing short videos and live streaming can not only make money and improve his quality of life, but also become a career that benefits others.

1. Restarting the live streaming career on Douyin

"Doing live broadcasts on Douyin, I feel that my path is getting wider and wider." Mu Sen sighed that his decision half a year ago was the right one.

Musen is well-known in the livestreaming community. Musen is 26 years old. He started making short videos in 2016 and accumulated a group of fans by making funny clips. After he had more than 100,000 fans, he tried livestreaming and earned 20 to 30 yuan in his first livestream.

Although the money was not much, it refreshed Musen's cognition, "Can live streaming make money?" As his family's living conditions were not good, he carefully studied the content formats of various live broadcast rooms, including outdoor, blind date, hiking, dream fulfillment, PK, talk show... He tried all kinds of popular content. Catching up with the great development of the live broadcast industry in those years, Musen soon became one of the top anchors with tens of millions of fans.

More and more people know him, and his fans are increasing, but Mu Sen is becoming less and less happy. "Racking my brains to come up with content that can attract traffic and popularity" makes him exhausted. "I want to go on this road for a longer time." So in mid-2022, he made a bold decision - to re-plan his live broadcast career and come to Douyin to open a new account.

In Mu Sen's opinion: "Tik Tok has many users and a lot of good content. Everyone is used to watching good things, and their minds are naturally more mature. " Therefore, he can focus more on polishing the content when doing live broadcasts.

"I kept a calm mindset. I just considered myself a newbie who had never used the Internet before." He added four words to the end of his Douyin account name - comeback.

As the first step of his comeback, Musen chose to continue his past live broadcasting format - hiking, blind dating and selling goods. However, after several live broadcast attempts, the popularity and effect were not ideal, and Musen also realized that Douyin viewers liked more high-quality live broadcasts.

The operation of Douyin live broadcast was also at a critical moment when Musen was starting from scratch. As Musen’s think tank, they gave him advice and provided meticulous services. They analyzed Musen’s past live broadcast data, combined with Musen’s live broadcast experience, development ideas, audience demand for content and the room for improvement of live broadcast content, and after several discussions and planning with Musen, they finalized a new live broadcast format - outdoor talent stage.

The well-decorated outdoor stage and the local songs quickly brought Musen millions of fans. Musen also began to think about how to make the big stage show more exciting.

"The platform operator suggested that I interact more with other anchors during live broadcasts, and immediately helped me invite many anchors." Soon after, Wang Kai, a young singer from the National Grand Theater, host Wang Fang, and Hua Jie, the original singer of the divine song "Crazy Waves", appeared on the big stage of Musen one after another. The arrival of these anchors also made the number of viewers in Musen's live broadcast room continue to rise.

Like many excellent anchors, Douyin also gave Musen some traffic incentive plans. Musen planned to use them at some special times, and the effect might be better. "At present, we rely on our own content to attract natural traffic." He was quite proud of this.

"I feel very comfortable doing live broadcasts on Douyin." This has been Mu Sen's most intuitive feeling since the start of the broadcast more than half a year ago.

2. The “Public Stage” in the Live Broadcast Room

Today, Musen devotes all his energy to the design of live broadcast content.

The Musen stage mainly features singing and dancing programs, supplemented by some games and imitation shows. Among them, there are performances by himself and his team, as well as performances by enthusiastic applicants selected from his private messages. "Musen stage, come if you have talent", this is the slogan he set for the stage.

Mu Sen attaches great importance to the opening segment. Almost every live broadcast has a different opening show, trying to mobilize the atmosphere first. He and his team also take turns to perform several shows after the opening.

When the atmosphere is heated, the stage is handed over to the public. Mu Sen will invite applicants to come on stage one by one, some to sing, some to dance, some to imitate ancient costumes, and some to perform classic film and television scenes in Xi'an dialect... Sometimes, he will even lead the entire audience to sing together, truly making it a "stage for all the people."

After the two-hour stage performance ended, he immediately went to the team’s live streaming account and set aside a separate ten minutes to live stream and sell goods.

The design of each link must conform to the rules of traffic. This is what Mu Sen has summarized in practice, and it is also what Douyin operators have reviewed through repeated follow-up broadcasts and a large amount of live broadcast data.

For example, when inviting people to sing, you must not invite six or seven people at a time, and then have them stand in line and sing one by one, otherwise the popularity of the live broadcast room will drop. For another example, the products you bring should be few but fine, and the products you choose must be high-scoring brands. Bringing more than a dozen products in a short period of time will not affect the audience's stage viewing experience, and can also provide the company with a new revenue opportunity.

With the careful live broadcast settings, Mu Sen quickly accumulated a group of loyal fans on Douyin. Mu Sen has received many similar messages, "The whole family has formed a habit of watching your live broadcast, coming on time at 8 o'clock every day, just like watching the Spring Festival Gala during the Chinese New Year."

There are relatively few Northwest anchors in the anchor circle, and the Northwest folks affectionately call him "Northwest King" and are happy to see his transformation after joining Douyin. Mu Sen said that this is everyone's preference for their child.

In line with this, he is giving back to his hometown. Today, in addition to being a live streamer, Musen also runs his own live streaming organization. He has set up the company's headquarters in Xi'an, providing hundreds of jobs. The local live streamers he recruited can earn a considerable income for each performance.

During each live broadcast, he would generously ask his fans to follow his teammates' accounts, "so that everyone can gain more fans and earn more money." Thanks to the traffic from the Musen stage, the average number of online viewers in the live broadcast rooms of other team members also increased from a few thousand to tens of thousands.

Gradually, Musen's stage has become "bigger". He has received invitations from other scenic spots to do live broadcasts on big stages, and he is also considering participating in some local village and county agricultural assistance projects. Musen said: "I was originally just an ordinary talent anchor, but in the past six months of live broadcasting on Douyin, I have had more opportunities to give back to society."

When talking about future plans, in addition to leading the team to continue to develop, he has more social responsibilities : "My dream is to run the company well and let my fellow villagers live a better life. I also want to donate some money to those in need so that everyone's life can become better."

3. Breakthrough and transformation of anchors with millions of fans

The live streaming industry has gone through nearly ten years of development, and many of the top anchors who remain today have chosen Douyin as their latest career destination.

The reasons they chose Douyin are similar to those of Musen: a large user base, positive fan feedback, a fair and healthy live streaming environment, and the ability to do what they really like.

Music anchor Fei'er is one of the earliest anchors on the Chinese Internet. After switching platforms to Douyin live streaming in the middle of last year, her number of fans quickly expanded to more than twice her previous level, and currently she has nearly 10 million fans.

She is a girl from Northeast China who has loved singing since she was a child. In 2014, she chose to sing live. After becoming famous, she also released her own singles, fulfilling her childhood dream of becoming a singer.

But in recent years, she has clearly felt a bottleneck in her career. She sings live almost every day, which inevitably leads to some aesthetic fatigue. Therefore, many people enter her live broadcast room not to listen to her songs, but to focus their attention on other things. "In the previous live broadcast room, I just wanted to sing, but the audience thought it was boring. They preferred to watch others send gifts, chat in the comment area, etc."

In 2022, Fei'er switched to Douyin live streaming. On June 2, the first day of her debut, the maximum number of concurrent online users reached 110,000, and the total number of views was nearly 3 million. "My partners at Douyin not only gave me advice and guidance on the content of my live broadcast, but also created my first show. This live broadcast feels like a concert, and the number of viewers is more than ten times that of a concert! I am really grateful and touched."

In the Douyin live broadcast room, she also found more audiences who like to listen to her singing quietly. In the comment area, everyone praised her excellent voice and positive singing state, calling her a "positive energy anchor". Some older viewers like to call her "girl" like a daughter. The positive feedback from these fans makes Fei'er feel that "there is a reward for hard work, so I am willing to devote myself to it."

Recently, she is preparing to upgrade the stage, renting a 500-square-meter venue and upgrading the sound equipment, hoping that people who enter her live broadcast room can enjoy the effect of a concert. She has no dance foundation at all, but she started to practice dancing after the live broadcast at 10 o'clock every night, and the latest practice was until 6 o'clock the next morning. The reason for learning dance is also very simple. Since it is a concert effect, it must be combined with singing and dancing performances.

All her efforts are centered around singing. Turning something she loves into a career, being able to support herself and being liked by many people, Fei'er described this feeling as "I would wake up with a smile even in my dreams." Live streaming on TikTok brings her a simpler state: "I just sing, and everyone comes to see me to see me sing."

In Douyin's live broadcast room, more anchors are breaking through themselves and achieving personal transformation. Meiyi, who was once famous for outdoor group dance, has transformed into a popular dance on Douyin; Fang Yan, a "magic joke teller", has his own comedy theater on Douyin; Yixiu, who used to be able to sing karaoke alone in his room, now has a wide stage and a professional band on Douyin.

Most of these senior anchors have witnessed the live broadcast industry's transition from a rapid start-up period to a mature stage of development. They have also experienced ups and downs, seeing some of their peers become popular for a while but quickly fade away, while others have worked hard in silence and finally made great achievements.

"Find a healthy development path and continue to develop here for a long time." This is the common goal of many anchors and Douyin live broadcasts. Just as Musen wished himself and the industry: "I hope it will be evergreen and keep going."

Source: WeChat public account "New Broadcasting Field"