What kind of operational curve did Tik Tok follow in this World Cup?

The 2022 Qatar World Cup has come to an end, and companies or large manufacturers competing for World Cup traffic off the field also need to think about how to accumulate traffic so that the money spent can successfully feed back into the final revenue or achieve better business results. So how did Douyin perform when it “entered” the World Cup traffic competition? What advantages does it have and what disadvantages does it have?

Fans who witnessed the World Cup final on the evening of December 18 were extremely lucky.

After 1986, which belonged to Maradona, fans around the world once again witnessed the grand ceremony of the king of football ascending the throne after a lapse of 36 years. Opposite Messi and Argentina, Mbappe, who completed the miracle of a hat-trick in the World Cup final again since Hurst in the 1966 final, also announced to the world that a new king and legend is on the way.

Since the booming development of mass media in the 20th century, "media" and "major events" have formed a close connection. With the global coverage of the media, people are invited to witness together major events of extreme significance. Through a shared perception of the meaning of events, people are ultimately shaped into groups that share common meanings. Katz, a famous American communication scholar, once summarized the characteristics of media events as "competition", "conquest" and "coronation" in his book "Media Events".

A global event like the World Cup is undoubtedly the most typical media event.

The changes in the way people watch the World Cup also record the rise and fall of different media.

The 1978 World Cup was the first time that Argentina won the World Cup championship, and it was also the first time that audiences in mainland China had the opportunity to watch the world's top football event. The black and white TV showed Kempes with his long hair flying around running wildly in celebration. CCTV commentator Song Shixiong described his winning goal as "a little carp leaping over the dragon gate." With the coming spring breeze, China begins to look forward to the outside world.

Since then, Chinese fans’ media memory has always been closely tied to CCTV. The voices of several generations of commentators such as Song Shixiong, Huang Jianxiang, Liu Jianhong, and He Wei and the slogan "CCTV, CCTV" have become inseparable symbols of the World Cup in the hearts of Chinese fans. It was not until 2018 that CCTV distributed the new media live broadcast copyright to Youku and Migu Video for the first time, which was a highlight moment for the long video platform.

Four years later, in addition to Migu Video, which has a national team background, Douyin spent 1 billion yuan to acquire the World Cup broadcasting rights. New media has finally reached such a point.

For the general public, especially middle-aged users, opening TikTok has become as common as turning on TV. When you open your phone, you can see the World Cup as clearly as on TV, and of course you can also watch it on Douyin. This is the most meaningful mental output of Douyin.

Douyin has the support of a vast amount of sports video self-media content resources and an extremely sophisticated "live broadcast-advertising" monetization system, which gives the market reason to have high expectations for the chemical reaction between the World Cup IP and the Douyin ecosystem.

As the 2022 Qatar World Cup draws to a close, let us take an in-depth look at Douyin's operational methodology for this sports IP. In addition to attracting a high number of viewers, what are the results of its content ecosystem, can benchmark marketing cases be successfully written, and is the commercial feedback effect in place?

How far is TikTok from becoming a sports media aircraft carrier?

1. Want to be "CCTV", but the content effect is not "TikTok"

Judging from user viewing data, Douyin's performance in this World Cup live broadcast was very impressive. According to official data from Douyin, during the group stage, the average number of viewers on Douyin reached 70.62 million, the highest real-time viewers reached 21.46 million, and the real-time viewers of the final exceeded 37 million.

During the live broadcast of this World Cup, Douyin opened the 4K high frame rate mode for free, and there were no opening ads at all. At the same time, in addition to its own commentary links, Douyin has opened up multiple commentary channels including CCTV commentary and live original sound.

If non-member users use the Migu Video APP to watch the World Cup live, they will need to watch a 90-second opening advertisement and cannot choose 4K resolution. The CCTV Video APP does not provide a 4K resolution option.

In terms of live streaming viewing experience alone, Douyin is the best. Whether it is the web version or the mobile version, when users use Douyin to watch live broadcasts, they can almost replicate the experience of getting high-definition content for free and instantly on TV, and the delay is extremely low when users watch live broadcasts on Douyin.

Tik Tok screenshot

In sports communities such as Hupu, Douyin's series of operations such as opening up 4K for free have earned it reviews such as "conscientious" and "top experience".

On the other hand, Migu Video, after also acquiring the copyright at a high price, still relies on the membership income brought by the high traffic during the competition. The problem of user retention after the competition has plagued Migu Video for a long time. For example, after the 2021 Tokyo Olympics, the MAU of Migu Video increased by 14.55% month-on-month to 36 million in July, but by the end of the Olympics in September, the data began to decline rapidly, and the MAU fell to 25 million. Therefore, Migu will inevitably regard the users' spending during the game viewing period as the focus of revenue.

However, Douyin’s revenue model is fundamentally different from that of long video platforms that mainly sell memberships. The ceiling of advertising revenue that short videos can generate is several times that of long video platforms. What Douyin wants is a chemical reaction between sports users and Douyin's existing ecology after a large number of sports users are introduced into the traffic pool.

What Douyin wants to earn is advertising revenue brought by the long-term retention of sports users in addition to membership income. In a sense, this is closer to the revenue model of traditional TV stations.

Looking at Douyin's content layout during this World Cup, its focus is on introducing "big-name commentary + self-made programs", which is closer to the content strategy of traditional media.

Tik Tok screenshot

During this World Cup, Douyin launched "DOU Comes to the World Cup", "Still Fan Zhiyi", "Huang Family Football Class", "Huang Jianxiang Talks", "Big Names Talk about Football", "Brother Hong Talks about Football", "Understanding Football Conference", and "HI! "Football Boys" and other eight variety shows. Former famous CCTV commentators Huang Jianxiang, Liu Jianhong and Duan Xuan have joined the recording of these programs in addition to updating their personal Douyin accounts.

These eight variety shows have all received sponsorship from major advertisers in industries such as alcohol, dairy products, automobiles, and games. For example, the ace variety show "DOU Comes to the World Cup", which is comparable to CCTV's "I Love the World Cup", has received sponsorship from brands such as Mengniu, SAIC Volkswagen, and Huaxizi. Yili, which has always competed with Mengniu for the sponsorship center during the World Cup, sponsored "Still Fan Zhiyi", which also received sponsorship from Heineken beer. Huang Jianxiang and Dou Wentao joined "Huang's Football Class" and "Big Names Talk Football" respectively, which attracted sponsorship from Jiannanchun and Guojiao 1573.

This kind of content strategy is likely to win the favor of KA, but compared with Douyin’s previous sports content operations, it seems to lack “net sense” and is too “heavy”.

During the Tokyo Olympics and the Beijing Winter Olympics, Douyin almost brought the fragmented, short, flat and fast characteristics of short video new media to the extreme. During the Olympics, whenever a Chinese athlete wins a gold medal, they often go live on their personal Douyin accounts to interact with former Olympic champions or other cross-border celebrities.

During this period, Douyin has repeatedly become the primary source of information for athletes to release, creating many hot topics such as "Balance beam champion kangaroo shake" and "Rings champion looks like Chang Wei". The Douyin account of "Frog Princess Gu Ailing" became almost the most popular social account on the entire Internet during that period.

Due to the lack of immediate operational effects from celebrities such as Messi, Ronaldo, Mbappe and others who have huge celebrity effects in this World Cup, Douyin's focus has tended to be on creating self-made content, but the results are not "Douyin".

The end result is that veteran football fans who are accustomed to consuming this type of content are more inclined to watch this type of football programs on platforms such as CCTV and Migu Video, which have already formed content consumption habits. The program presentation that lacks a sense of the Internet does not conform to the content tastes of Douyin users, and ultimately fails to form a hot spot in the community. Cross-circle dissemination has become a drawback, and the heavy responsibility of this falls more on the selection of cross-border commentators.

2. No “Wang Meng” was created in the football world

The difference in commentary lineup and effects has become a key variable that makes viewers choose other platforms.

This time, Douyin's commentary lineup has chosen to focus on retired players and crossover celebrities.

The only qualified commentators who come from traditional commentator backgrounds are the more experienced Su Dong, Jin Xiangkai and the new commentators Yu Xinmiao, Wang Zhengkun and others. As for retired players, nearly ten Chinese football stars including Sun Jihai, Xie Hui, Li Yi and Dong Fangzhuo were invited. At the same time, cross-border commentators such as Lu Han, Bai Yansong, Su Xing, and Zhao Lina were invited.

Douyin's commentary lineup hopes to present the effect of professional commentators controlling the scene + retired players expressing professional opinions + cross-border celebrities attracting attention from beyond the circle . The lineup of Su Dong + Sun Jihai + Lu Han in the final is the most intuitive reflection of this formula.

During the Winter Olympics, Wang Meng quickly became popular on the commentary desk of Migu Sports. "My eyes are the ruler" has spread like a virus across the entire Internet. The core of Wang Meng's popularity lies in his professional analysis of the competition rules and related contestants, combined with his oral expression with great humor and personal style.

As it turns out, Tik Tok did not find the "Wang Meng" of the Chinese football circle during this World Cup. The retired football stars who took the commentary seat for the first time were able to present professional insights, but there was still room for improvement in their language expression skills.

As for traditional commentary, the veteran commentator lineup headed by Su Dong lacks appeal to the audience. In contrast, CCTV has become a choice like muscle memory for the audience, and the commentary combination of "Zhan Jun + Zhang Lu" can be the reason for many veteran fans to choose Migu. Finally, the commentary arrangements of Lu Han, Guan Zeyuan, Zhao Lina and others, which were clearly aimed at users outside the football circle, were proven to be unsuitable for the football consumption scenarios of domestic fans.

However, there is still huge room for imagination in Douyin commentary and secondary creation of sports content. For example, although Douyin has introduced many former senior CCTV commentators such as Liu Jianhong, Duan Xuan, and Huang Jianxiang to create sports programs, it did not let them take the commentary seats . If they take the commentary seats again on Douyin, Douyin can completely market the memory of being "closer to CCTV than CCTV."

Tik Tok screenshot

On the other hand, there are already many influential football content bloggers on the Douyin site. They can actually do a second-channel commentary via Tik Tok’s live feed. This long-tail content, similar to the e-sports commentary model, can be aggregated to meet the audience's diverse viewing needs. However, in order to avoid diversion of subjective competition areas during this World Cup, Douyin did not tilt traffic to or promote video creation and commentary by personal accounts.

There is no doubt that Tik Tok is almost the most powerful platform in today's Internet ecosystem that can create stars, and it can ensure that content creators can continue to monetize on the platform. After Migu Video became popular, Wang Meng still needed to switch to Douyin to continuously update short videos to operate his personal IP, and use Douyin's infrastructure for business cooperation and live streaming to monetize.

In the best case scenario, Douyin can help KOLs focus traffic from the World Cup to individuals through commentary and self-produced programs, and expand the audience from professional groups to a wider group. Even after the World Cup is over, these creators can continue to update content, and the traffic from the World Cup will follow the creators and remain on the platform.

But now, no one has achieved a breakthrough on Douyin during the World Cup cycle, whether it is professional retired players, big-name commentators introduced by Douyin, or grassroots creators of football content.

During this World Cup, TikTok also invited FIFA big names such as Neymar, Beckham, and Michael Owen to join. However, the content updated by these famous stars seems to be "hasty" and "utilitarian" - the content updated by Neymar and Beckham is almost entirely copied from external platforms, and the content updated by Irving also has little connection with the World Cup.

Tik Tok screenshot

In contrast, Xiaohongshu has introduced two famous coaches, Mourinho and Simeone, and a very talked-about player, Jesse Lingard, who update their personal reviews and predictions of the World Cup in real time on Xiaohongshu, and the content readability is much higher than that of Douyin. At the same time, Lingard and Mourinho also conducted live broadcast activities on Xiaohongshu. Compared with Douyin, the "football celebrities" introduced by Xiaohongshu are better integrated into its own community ecology.

Nowadays, creating a KOL is more like a process of "doing one's best and leaving the rest to fate", with great uncertainty.

But judging from the final results of this World Cup communication cycle, Douyin has to bear more negative uncertainties.

In this regard, what Douyin may lack is sensitivity to football content. In addition to the pursuit of sentimentality for Messi and Ronaldo, what other memes do fans like to watch, and what tactics and gossip do they talk about with relish? Douyin has not shown a deep exploration of these contents.

3. Introducing World Cup traffic into the second and third revenue curves

In the article "Open and Closed Loop, What is the Ultimate Imagination of Douyin", Yiyuguancha (ID: yiyuguancha) once analyzed that after achieving the closed loop of traffic and advertising revenue, Douyin is striving to promote e-commerce and local life businesses in order to build the second and third revenue curves in addition to advertising.

It is only natural that Douyin will use such a huge traffic hotspot as the World Cup to drive traffic to its e-commerce and local life businesses. In fact, facing any traffic hotspot, the above operations can almost be regarded as Douyin’s standard approach.

In terms of e-commerce, Douyin launched the "World Cup Goodies" in the World Cup special topic, and users can purchase sponsors' products and derivatives directly in Douyin. According to QuestMobile data, during the World Cup in November, sales of Juxing Power, Qatar World Cup Cultural and Creative Center, and KAYFORD flagship store exceeded 10 million, and the sales of the Argentina national team's 2022 World Cup official cheering uniforms on Douyin exceeded 10,000 pieces. At the same time, authorized stores such as the Qatar World Cup official flagship store hold live broadcasts almost every day to sell official souvenirs.

Image source: QuestMobile

Compared with CCTV, this may be the advantage of Douyin. Faced with the huge traffic boost from the World Cup, CCTV provides advertisers with simple brand exposure services. However, with the help of the established e-commerce infrastructure, Douyin can use a shorter and more direct link to transform user attention into consumption behavior.

In China, monetization of the sports industry has always been a huge challenge. One of the core reasons is that the sales of sports peripheral products are very different from those overseas. At a time when brands are increasingly focused on conversions, Douyin's ability to influence users to transform from content consumers to product consumers will be increasingly valued by businesses.

In terms of local life, Douyin launched the Heart-beating Season event as early as October this year, inviting ten major brands including Huang Shang Huang, DQ, COSTA, Nayuki Tea, Taotaoju, Hutouju, Atlantis Hotel, McDonald's, Helens, and Haidilao to jointly market, and jointly with more than 100 brands and tens of thousands of merchants across the country to launch special packages and cultural and tourism services. On the Douyin website, search for "Heart-beating Season" and related local group buying discounts and exclusive activities will pop up.

Due to the impact of the epidemic, the linkage with offline did not show very impressive data performance in actual results. However, it shows that Douyin has a complete infrastructure to cover all aspects of commercial conversion for a huge traffic event. Through its business ecosystem layout over the years, Douyin can conduct commercial promotions covering advertising, e-commerce, and offline services for huge traffic events such as the World Cup, achieving "killing three birds with one stone."

Tik Tok screenshot

However, the premise of these commercial conversions is that Douyin ensures that users become more and more fond of watching the World Cup on the Douyin site.

At present, Douyin has played the role of a broadcaster in this World Cup and is capable of providing users with high-definition, low-latency live broadcast services. However, Douyin still needs to gain more experience in producing content that better reflects soft power, such as commentary, secondary creation, and self-made programs.

Only by filling such gaps can TikTok truly use the World Cup traffic to help its own business infrastructure run at high speed and eventually become a well-functioning sports media aircraft carrier.

Author: Fathead Fish

Source: Yiyuguancha (ID: yiyuguancha), the telescope and sonar of the pan-entertainment industry.