Chinese Internet celebrities who are popular on YouTube

"Li Ziqi is super popular in Korea!" A Korean fan expressed her love for the Chinese creator Li Ziqi to Ran Finance.

"I have watched each of her videos at least 10 times, especially before going to bed or when I have insomnia." When asked by Ran Finance, the Korean fan said with a little excitement that Li Ziqi's lifestyle meets all her expectations for a better life: no need to worry about rising prices, no need to consider various injustices and competition, and the difficulty in finding employment and the high poverty rate among the elderly can all be forgotten.

The social conditions faced by young people in each country are different, but individuals in the tide of the times all have similar anxieties. When a certain creation appears at the right time, it can easily resonate with people. This is also one of the reasons why Liziqi became popular overseas.

Content determines popularity. On the YouTube platform, Li Ziqi has 8.16 million followers. Such a large number of fans is rare among domestic Internet celebrities who have gone overseas. The only one who can rival her is "Office Ono", who, as of now, has 8.14 million YouTube followers. Although there are tens of thousands of domestic creators going overseas, there are almost no ones whose popularity is comparable to that of Office Xiaoye and Liziqi. The problem facing the entire industry is how to get more domestic creators to go global and become popular.

As internet celebrities go global, YouTube, a video website owned by Google that serves users all over the world, has undoubtedly become their first choice. YouTube's top creators can support themselves simply by monetizing their traffic. At the same time, YouTube also provides creators with relatively complete user data to help them attract fans from different countries and regions.

However, even with such relatively complete conditions, there are not many MCN agencies in China that have overseas business. Creators with a certain number of fans can share advertising revenue with YouTube, which is equivalent to additional income, but why do most domestic MCN agencies not involve overseas business? Why is it so difficult for MCN to go overseas? At the same time, what are the common characteristics of those creators who have already gained some fame overseas?

The most popular Chinese YouTube creators

The two most popular creators on YouTube in China are Liziqi, who has 8.16 million followers, and Office Ono, who follows closely behind with 8.14 million followers. Li Ziqi has surpassed Office Ono to become the Chinese creator with the most subscribers on YouTube. The guy from western Yunnan, who ranks third with 3.77 million fans, is more than 4 million fans away from the top two.

According to the data of YouTube authors in China compiled by the third-party statistics platform Social Blade, excluding institutional creators, the top 15 online celebrity creators in terms of the number of fans on YouTube in China are: Li Ziqi (8.16 million), Office Ono (8.14 million), Dianxi Xiaoge (3.77 million), The Food Ranger (3.73 million), Yu Ge Talks about Movies (1.25 million), Food Writer Wang Gang (1.15 million), Naomi 'SexyCyborg' Wu (1.05 million), Grandpa Amu (864,000), Saturday Wild (727,000), Huahua and Three Cats (600,000), Xiangxiang Da Zhan Zuo (482,000), Tianyue Tinrry (448,000), Hao Geli (427,000), Qiuqiuqiu (407,000), and Daily Food Diary (378,000).

Among them, the creators in the Chinese region are not all Chinese authors. There are also foreigners like The Food Ranger who have a deep understanding of and spread Chinese culture.

These Internet celebrities who have gone overseas also have their own characteristics:

"Brother from Western Yunnan" is a native Yunnan girl. Her style is similar to Liziqi, but her content is closer to rural life. Some people compare Li Ziqi's videos to the peaceful days without a trace of worldly affairs, while the young man from western Yunnan is the mixed feelings full of the breath of life. Her latest video is about making tofu blood sausage. The whole family will be busy all day making the pork and large intestines from a freshly slaughtered pig mixed with fresh pig blood and tofu. It is in this busyness that many people see the most authentic life of Chinese farmers.

A guy from western Yunnan makes his own blown pork liver Source/ YouTube

The creator behind “The Food Ranger” is named Chang Le in Chinese. He is a Canadian who vowed to eat all over China in three years. Although he is not Chinese, many of his creations are related to Chinese food. This "foodie foreigner" likes spicy food and speaks a mixture of Chinese and English like many returnees. In the latest video, Chang Le went to Chongqing, and he used the word “more fragrant” to describe the taste of Chongqing noodles.

The Food Ranger experiences Chongqing noodles, source/YouTube

"Food Writer Wang Gang" is also a food blogger. Wang Gang is a professional chef. In addition to describing the cooking process in detail, his videos also provide users with precautions and pitfalls to avoid. After watching his videos, you will have the illusion that you are a master chef.

Food writer Wang Gang's "Boiled Pork Slices" tutorial, source / YouTube

In addition to the above three creators, Xiangxiang Dazhan, Tianyue Tinrry, and Rishiji are also food video authors. "Xiang Xiang Da Zhan Shuan" is a food and comedy writer. Unboxing and dark cuisine are his specialties. Fans of Xiaoxiang told Ran Finance that watching Xiaoxiang cook is very addictive. “It doesn’t matter what he does, just watching him dancing is fun enough.” And “TianyueTinrry” is a food writer who mainly makes Western-style baked pastries; Rishiji’s videos are closer to young people, and his food is mostly about “marshmallow brownies”, “twice-fried spicy lamb trotters”, “Sukiyaki pot” and the like.

The performative Xiao Xiangge Source/ YouTube

In addition to the majority of creators who focus on food, there are also movie analysis creators like "Yu Ge Talks about Movies" and creators who focus on fashion and lifestyle such as "Naomi'SexyCyborg'Wu" and "Saturday Wild"; "Qiu Qiuqiu" is a beauty creator. On YouTube, beauty has become a red ocean, and the beauty styles at home and abroad are quite different, so among the top 15 popular creators, beauty accounts for a very small proportion.

Like Chang Le, "Hao Geili" is also a foreigner who is interested in Chinese culture. He talks about fitness and teaches men how to become handsome. "Grandpa Amu" is one of the older ones among the 15 top creators. He and Geng Shougong are both craftsmen, but the things made by Grandpa Amu are more practical.

In general, most of the content from popular authors is very mature after being combined with background music, appropriate shooting tone, and theme. The work is highly finished, the editing has just the right amount of excitement, and there are no gaps in the middle that would stop the audience from watching. And they are basically continuous creators. Watching their videos can either give you new knowledge or make you feel happy, and is a great way to kill time.

Who is suitable for going to sea?

A top internet celebrity in the country may not necessarily be extremely popular abroad. If we compare the first-tier domestic internet celebrities with creators who are popular overseas, the overlap between them is very low. So, what kind of internet celebrity is more likely to attract international fans and is more suitable for going overseas?

First of all, it must be unique enough. The guy from western Yunnan has 3.36 million followers on Weibo, which is not a lot compared to other big Vs. Food blogger "Rishiji" has 18.4 million followers on Weibo. But the YouTube followers of Dianxi guy are much higher than those of Rishiji. Fundamentally speaking, on the YouTube platform, the content of Daily Food Diary is not as irreplaceable as that of Dianxi Xiaoge. Whether in the domestic or foreign markets, the uniqueness of creative themes is one of the important factors in order to enter the first echelon.

Second, strong Chinese style. Among the top five most popular creators on YouTube, three are related to Chinese culture. Li Ziqi, Dianxi Xiaoge, and The Food Ranger, they showcase Chinese rural life and delicacies, rich Chinese urban life scenes, as well as Chinese pastoral life and family life, filling the gap in Chinese-style content on YouTube.

The picture comes from Li Ziqi's video

Again, low language threshold. This is also why food creators are the most popular. Julie, head of Grapeseed's overseas business department, told Ran Finance that food is the most direct and effective category of all overseas content. “Food is universal and is a universal language across the world.”

At the Asia RISE Technology Summit held in 2018, Office Ono summarized the reasons for his popularity into three points: passion, creativity, and silent film performance. The core of non-verbal video content lies in actions and scenes, and creators do not need so much explanation or narration. In addition, Office Ono's YouTube video titles and descriptions are in English, further lowering the viewing threshold for foreign audiences. In the video, she also marks key information in English for easier understanding.

Finally, institutional operations. Xinbang once analyzed the reasons why Office Xiaoye is so popular overseas: a large number of overseas users are UGC teams, and Office Xiaoye uses PGC strategy to create a UGC feeling. in the country, the first-tier internet celebrities are supported by institutions and teams. In addition, there are some institutions that specialize in providing overseas business services for domestic MCNs. For example, WebTVAsia is an MCN agency based in Asia. Its two main businesses are, on the one hand, introducing overseas Internet celebrities and high-quality content, and on the other hand, providing overseas services for Chinese creators and brands.

Going overseas = YouTube?

When going overseas, the preferred platform for internet celebrities and MCN agencies is YouTube. There are many overseas social platforms, but why is YouTube the most suitable for influencers to go overseas?

Jiang Xi, who is engaged in overseas marketing services, mentioned that the competition among foreign video websites is not as fierce as in China. There are not so many "iQiyi, Youku, Tencent Video, Mango TV" abroad. When it comes to video websites, the first reaction is YouTube, which is basically in a monopoly state. Julie believes that despite the lack of options, YouTube is a very mature platform and its profit distribution rules are more scientific.

"The income of creators on YouTube mainly comes from several aspects: on the one hand, it comes from Google's advertising, including pre-roll and post-roll ads, the display of graphic ads, and advertising marketing income after the brand is formed. The other part is copyright income. Every video with original copyright will be recognized as an asset, and if it is an asset, it has the potential to bring income. If your original song or picture is quoted by others, the other party will pay the copyright fee accordingly." Julie explained.

In addition, YouTube's backend data analysis tools are also more complete. "These data can directly reflect the content output and design effects of each creator, and can provide creators with timely feedback and guidance for their next creation." According to Julie, YouTube's backend has user portrait data, and domestic operators can determine what tags, titles or languages ​​should be added based on the data and portraits to meet the needs of most fans.

Generally speaking, the preferred destination for internet celebrities to go overseas is places with a large number of Chinese users, and overseas operators will focus on allocating marketing resources in countries or regions with large Chinese populations, such as Southeast Asia, Canada, and the United States. After expanding the Chinese circle, when going to other regions, we must consciously add language assistance.

In addition to the above revenue, YouTube has several other types of revenue, such as paid subscriptions, e-commerce, live broadcast rewards, etc. However, Jiang Xi emphasized that these are not suitable for domestic creators, and domestic creators going overseas still mainly rely on traffic advertising revenue sharing.

Image/Unsplash

The reason is that these domestic creators first rely on domestic platforms to produce content, and only a few of them will customize content specifically for overseas platforms. If creators want to increase their income, they need to spend more effort. "If creators want to adopt paid subscription models, they must treat YouTube as a main battlefield and spend more energy to maintain users. Moreover, the creative ideas and monetization ideas are also different from simply going overseas," said Julie.

The advertising revenue sharing ratio and model on YouTube platform are more reasonable than those on domestic platforms.

Jiang Xi said, "We have seen many mid-level creators on YouTube who can get some traffic and advertising revenue through high-quality original content. This revenue not only improves their living conditions but also brings a sense of accomplishment, supporting them to continue creating. It is difficult for domestic platforms to survive by relying solely on traffic sharing, and they must rely on other monetization methods, but this has also led to more flexible and rich monetization methods. In addition to creating good content, creators must also consider advertising brand investment, knowledge payment or transformation to the e-commerce field. In 2019, a large number of live-streaming bloggers and even celebrity live-streaming appeared, which are all related to this."

Not everyone can go to sea

There are roughly four stages for internet celebrities to go overseas.

In the first stage, MCN only uses overseas platforms as a distribution channel, and creators only need to re-upload the videos that are circulated in China; in the second stage, as the videos accumulate advertising traffic, YouTube becomes a new source of income; in the third stage, as overseas popularity accumulates, creators develop a higher sense of accomplishment and mission, which in turn drives creators to create; in the fourth stage, after forming IP overseas and turning it into a global brand, creators will further enhance their global influence and gain more global monetization methods.

YouTube's grading of creators starts at 100,000 subscribers. Creators who reach the 100,000 level will get a silver button, while 1 million and 10 million will be distinguished by a gold button and diamond button respectively.

In the eyes of practitioners, having over 100,000 subscribers on YouTube means being somewhat famous among vertical users; having over a million subscribers may make one a national idol in a region with a small population; and having over 10 million subscribers means having a certain influence worldwide.

However, "the influence generated by creators with millions or tens of millions of fans on YouTube and creators of the same level on domestic platforms is different," an industry insider told Ran Finance.

There are two meanings in this. Domestic operating methods are not fully applicable abroad. For example, a million-level creator on a domestic social media platform can easily reach that level by inflating the number of followers. For example, in the country, it is easy to obtain traffic through clickbait or hot keywords. But overseas, if users find that the content is irrelevant, they will quickly unfollow it. "So on the second level, you can also understand that every retained subscriber of a creator on YouTube has a higher individual value, and the creator is also more valuable in the minds of users who subscribe to his content," said the practitioner.

Jiang Xi said, "Before this, some domestic MCN organizations have tried or are trying to go overseas, but in the process of going overseas, they will find that some content will not adapt to the local environment." Many videos produced in the domestic environment are directly moved to overseas platforms, and the effect is not good.

Domestic MCN agencies have their own clear content attributes, and will produce content and operate for a specific platform. Some focus mainly on Weibo, some MCNs specialize in Bilibili, and some MCN content is more suitable for Douyin and Kuaishou. Jiang Xi emphasized that YouTube also has clear preferences.

YouTube is very sensitive to duration. The duration of original high-quality content should be increased as much as possible, and the duration is also indirectly linked to the income earned by creators. In China, short video platforms are the platforms with which most MCN agencies cooperate most frequently. Short video platforms hope that the video content is as short as possible, calculated in seconds. Similar to this, there is a huge inconsistency in the content required by domestic and foreign platforms, which leads to the fact that many contents are not very effective when directly exported overseas.

Among the internet celebrity authors who have gone overseas, only Office Xiaoye and Liziqi are far ahead in the number of fans. More organizations are still in small-scale trials, and their main energy and resources will still be in the domestic Chinese market. In the short term, the landscape of MCN agencies in overseas markets will not change much, Jiang Xi said.

Author: Yan Lijiao

Source: "Ran Caijing" (ID:rancaijing)