Short video content operation trends in 2020!

According to CTR data, China's advertising market declined by 8.2% in the first three quarters of 2019, with traditional media falling by 11.4% year-on-year and Internet media also falling by 4.2%.

In the second half of the Internet, when the traffic dividend is gradually disappearing, the new traffic brought by short videos has become a new battlefield for all parties to compete and cultivate, and it has also become the only beam of light on the road of "innovation and transformation" in the advertising industry in 2019. Content marketing with short videos and live broadcasts as its core carriers has become popular and is integrated into every aspect of brand marketing, communication, sales, and operations; "content" has become a core variable, changing the time cost of traditional brand building and the budget structure of brand marketing and communication.

What I want to share with you this time is the 2020 Short Video Content Marketing Trend White Paper . The report not only summarizes the gains and regrets of all parties in the short video industry (including platforms, KOL/MCN, advertisers, etc.) in 2019 from an industry perspective, but also focuses on analyzing the Douyin and Kuaishou platforms under the G2 structure: KOL portraits, fan portraits, and fan interaction behavior preferences. From the perspective of content changes, it analyzes the KOL content types with the largest increase on the two platforms, as well as the KOL content types with the largest increase in fans, and commends the typical celebrities of the year.

Most importantly, the report analyzes the data performance of various industries in 2019 around the three major content marketing forms of KOL marketing, Blue V operations and challenge competitions, provides classic cases worthy of recommendation, and compiles practical methodologies for brands at different stages of development to learn and refer to.

The following is an interpretation of the contents of this report:

1. The gains and losses of the short video industry

In 2019, short videos stood out and became one of the fastest growing segments in terms of mobile Internet usage time and user scale. The number of daily active users of short videos was nearly twice that of online videos.

Although a large number of practitioners led by BAT have entered the market one after another, the G2 pattern of competition among comprehensive platforms has emerged. After the battle for traffic, deepening traffic cultivation and monetization has become the focus of competition between Douyin and Kuaishou platforms. Although the revenue structure of Douyin and Kuaishou did not change much in 2019 compared with 2018, the actions of enabling diversified commercial monetization through a series of products and policies are expected to "take root and blossom" in 2020, and the revenue structure of mainstream short video platforms will also undergo major adjustments.

▲Estimated advertising revenue of Tik Tok vs Kuaishou in 2019

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The short video content creation echelon has further expanded. As competition intensifies, similar to the disappearance of the platform's demographic dividend cycle, the "knockout round" among content creators has begun, and the life cycle of creators and even MCN agencies is shortening.

It is gratifying that in one year, the number of KOLs with exactly similar nicknames on Douyin and Kuaishou has increased by 2.67 times, and the number of top creators with more than 3 million fans on both platforms has increased.

▲The number of accounts with the same nicknames on Douyin and Kuaishou and their content categories in one year

The rise of short videos/live streaming sales has also provided a new channel for mid- and low-end accounts (with less than 1 million followers) to monetize, contributing to the continued prosperity of the content ecosystem.

▲Distribution of fans of the top sales experts from Douyin and Kuaishou in October 2019

From a marketing perspective: the entire industry is accelerating its entry into short video marketing, with beauty and personal care and e-commerce platforms being the most prominent. Internet celebrity brands and products are no longer just created by UGC, but more are the result of brand integrated marketing. However, success is a path that only a few brands can take, and most platforms have failed in short video marketing in 2019.

At the same time, the practice of inflating traffic and likes continues despite repeated bans. Its characteristics of intelligence, scale, platformization and industrialization have also greatly affected advertisers' trust in cooperation and the healthy development of the content industry. Data drives the healthy development of short video marketing, and the significance of correct assessment of marketing value increases.

▲Industry distribution of short video ads from January to October 2019 & number of Douyin banned accounts in each month

Judging from the data change trends of KOLs (number of followers ≥ 10w) on the seven major short video platforms, KOLs on most platforms are in a state of growth. The growth of KOLs on Douyin was the most significant, increasing by 1.47 times in one year; followed by Bilibili, where the number of UP hosts with more than 100,000 fans increased by nearly 100%.

Considering that the original KOL hierarchy is unreasonable: there are too many KOLs with 100,000-1 million fans, the difficulty of increasing fans for KOLs of different fan levels varies greatly (3 million fans is the most difficult threshold to increase fans), and the current situation of increasing fans in vertical categories (the more subdivided the category, the more difficult it is to increase fans to 3 million), we decided to redefine the head, shoulders, waist, and tail KOLs of mainstream short video platforms (except Bilibili), and believe that: accounts with 3 million to 10 million fans are head accounts (accounting for 2.51% of the total number of KOLs), 1 million to 3 million are shoulders (accounting for 10.88% of the total number of KOLs), and accounts with 300,000 to 1 million fans are waist accounts (accounting for 31.63%), and accounts with more than 10 million fans are super head accounts (accounting for only 0.38%).

▲ Short video platforms (except Bilibili) redefine the head, shoulders, waist and tail KOLs

2. Typical Platforms: Douyin vs. Kuaishou Development

By analyzing the KOL portraits and fan portraits of Douyin and Kuaishou, we can see that Douyin has a larger proportion of female creators (KOLs) and female fans, while Kuaishou has more male creators and male fans.

From the perspective of the geographical distribution of creators: Douyin's first- and second-tier creators are highly concentrated (accounting for 74.92%), while Kuaishou's creators are relatively lower-tier, with third- and fourth-tier cities accounting for 49.02%, which is more in line with the user portrait of short videos. Judging from the geographical distribution of fans, Kuaishou has a deeper coverage of the fourth-tier and below markets (reaching 42.84%), and the "old irons" in the sinking market are more willing to be active around Kuaishou KOLs.

▲Douyin VS Kuaishou: KOL fan portrait

▲Douyin VS Kuaishou: Distribution of video likes and comments of KOLs of different fan levels. The smaller the ratio, the more interactive it is.

Judging from the hot words in fan interaction: whether it is Douyin or Kuaishou, users will actively speak out about the content they like, but compared to Douyin users who prefer to gain recognition (sofa, first) and express gratitude, Kuaishou users are more willing to express "intimacy" and express their expectations.

▲Douyin VS Kuaishou: 2019 user annual comment word cloud

From the perspective of the KOL content types with the fastest annual growth: Douyin is dominantly vertical, and the smaller the vertical category, the greater the growth rate. Automobile, emotions, food, beauty, etc. are the most typical , and they are in a period of content explosion. In addition, entertainment accounts chasing traffic also have a rapid growth rate;

The increase in small categories on Kuaishou is smaller than that on Douyin, but the trend of content diversification is unstoppable: vertical accounts in the fields of food, games, pets, fashion, etc. are accelerating their layout on Kuaishou.

At the same time, we also specifically studied the new content tags added in 2019 and found that: whether it is Douyin or Kuaishou, grass-growing/review accounts from various fields are growing rapidly on both platforms; and knowledge information, culture and art accounts are also growing rapidly.

▲Douyin vs Kuaishou: KOL content categories with the fastest growth in number from January to October 2019

An in-depth study of the 500 KOLs with the fastest annual increase in followers found that among the accounts with high follower growth, drama/funny accounts still account for the highest proportion. This is determined by the core motivation of users to watch short videos, and is also related to the active innovation of drama/funny content.

A specific analysis of the 10 influencers (excluding celebrities, media and blue V accounts) who gained the fastest followers on Douyin and Kuaishou from October 2018 to October 2019 in one year. Congratulations to Langweixian and Dongche Tantian for winning the title of TOP 10 in terms of increasing followers on both platforms. It can also be clearly seen from the 10 influencers with the most followers that both Douyin and Kuaishou show a strong verticalization trend.

▲October 2018-October 2019: KOLs with the fastest increase in followers (excluding celebrities, media and blue V accounts)

3. Tik Tok & Kuaishou: KOL Marketing

Looking at the advertiser industries that invested the most in KOLs in 2019: beauty and daily chemicals invested the most in Douyin; e-commerce platforms invested the most in Kuaishou. From the perspective of industry concentration, Douyin’s brand concentration is far lower than that of Kuaishou.

On Kuaishou, performance-oriented advertisers account for the vast majority, with e-commerce platforms, games, and IT/Internet services accounting for more than 70% of KOL placements. From the perspective of brands, the 20 brands with the most KOL placements only account for 37.2% of Douyin's KOL placements, while Kuaishou accounts for more than 60%.

▲January-October 2019: The top 10 industries with the most KOLs on Douyin and Kuaishou

Judging from the content types that KOLs like to invest in the most: drama/funny, young men and young women are still popular; beauty KOLs have outstanding performance in vertical monetization capabilities, followed by: food, grass-roots/reviews and mother-and-child parenting.

Compared with the brand's investment in 2018, the order acceptance rate of dance, music, and cute pet accounts has declined. It is recommended that KOLs in this category update/enrich their personalities and continue to innovate content.

▲January-October 2019: The most popular KOL content types for advertisers

Taking the beauty industry as an example, we have summarized three major strategies for brand KOL deployment. They are:

1) Pyramid type: spread through the head, shoulders, waist and tail KOL matrix, penetrating layer by layer;

2) IP binding type: binding head IP bundled marketing, centralized resources, and ICON communication;

3) Collective screen-sweeping type: Through the synchronization and resonance of mid- and low-level KOLs or even KOCs and amateur accounts, small efforts can be made to achieve great results and make a counterattack.

From the perspective of brand adaptability: Strategies 1 and 2 are more common, bringing about scale effects through matrix seeding;

Strategy three is very friendly to innovative brands and brands that lack sufficient support from vertical top KOLs. It has better cost-effectiveness and is also the ultimate use of long-tail traffic. Kas Data provides detailed interpretations of each of the three major delivery strategies with cases.

▲ Common strategy 2 for brand KOL placement: IP binding

We analyzed the user portraits of users who frequently discussed brand words and product words in four industries, namely, beauty and personal care, maternal and infant products, food and beverages, and e-commerce platforms. We also analyzed the KOL advertising preferences of each industry and the celebrities most popular with advertisers. We found that, relatively speaking, in the beauty and personal care, and maternal and infant products industries, vertical KOL advertising is more concentrated. KOLs of the "beauty + plot" and "maternal and infant parenting + plot" categories have become new favorites for advertising. Relatively speaking, e-commerce platforms and food and beverage have wider options for KOL placement, and can often combine scenes and situations to implant content.

▲January-October 2019: KOLs most popular with beauty brands

4. Douyin Blue V Operation

Judging from the current development status of Douyin Blue V: the number of active Blue Vs (referring to those who have posted ≥1 video within 30 days) collected by the platform has reached 158,000, an increase of 11.19 times compared with the same period last year.

Judging from the industry distribution of Blue V Enterprise Accounts: the cultural and entertainment industry still accounts for the highest proportion, followed by Blue V Enterprise Accounts from the fields of life services, clothing accessories, and catering and food. The fastest growth rate is that this type of account has a low brand concentration, is closely related to people's daily lives, and can often combine scenes and situations to produce content at a high frequency. Of course, it is also related to the sinking of Douyin Blue V partner merchants.

▲2019: Industry distribution of Douyin Blue V corporate accounts (excluding media, government affairs, and institutional Blue V)

An analysis of the top 2000 corporate accounts by followers revealed that they were developing in two “extreme” directions:

On the one hand, the top blue Vs increased their followers at an accelerated rate, easily crossing the million-follower mark;

On the other hand: Corporate accounts with strong brand attributes are rarer among the TOP2000 accounts in terms of the number of followers: good content is mostly created by cultural entertainment, education and training institutions. Relying on their inherent content advantages and celebrity/expert traffic, they have attracted countless fans and account for 42.74% of the TOP2000 blue V accounts in terms of the number of followers. Secondly, the IT/Internet industry, which is well versed in content marketing, performed outstandingly.

▲Industry distribution of the top 2000 Blue V corporate accounts by number of followers

When studying the average number of Blue V fans and fan interaction performance in various industries, it was found that the sports/exercise and culture/entertainment industries ranked high. Analysts believe that both industries have sufficient video materials and high-quality celebrity traffic, and their original fan circles are relatively stable, showing great advantages in terms of both increasing fans and interacting with others.

Secondly, more and more brand Blue Vs have learned to use the "Tik Tok style" to communicate with fans. Among them, Blue Vs in the food and beverage and automotive consumption (including automotive aftermarket services) industries performed the best, while e-commerce platforms showed a polarized state with good and bad mixed.

▲The top 2000 Blue V corporate accounts by number of followers: Differences in average number of followers and active fan interactions in each industry

Regarding the current development status of Blue V, 5 suggestions for Blue V content marketing are given, and a methodology for building a Blue V matrix account is sorted out.

For Blue V corporate accounts with high brand awareness, it is recommended that brands choose: parent brand + sub-brand matrix, parent brand + store/clerk matrix and parent brand + influencer incubation matrix to build the Blue V matrix , speak out through the matrix, penetrate the circle, and expand brand awareness and reputation.

For Blue V enterprise accounts with insufficient brand power, it is recommended to layout the Blue V matrix starting from products/services/solutions, or professional employee incubation, and use the matrix accounts to create a voice for the public, ultimately leading to the brand and enhancing brand influence.

5. Tik Tok Challenge

Finally, we added a new challenge section because: the challenge is essentially a high-quality topic customized exclusively for brands by Douyin. By deeply applying the fission mechanism in the content social system, it helps brands create phenomenal marketing cases on the Douyin platform! In addition to the budget, the topic name, interactive gameplay and the use of celebrities/KOLs will all affect the effectiveness of the challenge.

According to statistics: From January to October 2019, a total of 579 challenges (including super, brand and regional challenges) initiated by brands (excluding ByteDance, tourism agencies, government, media, etc.) were collected.

▲The number of challenges launched by brands in each month from January to October 2019

Compared with the first half of the year, the popularity of challenges initiated by brands in the second half of the year has increased significantly. From the perspective of the initiating industry, the food and beverage industry has the largest number of initiators (accounting for 24.53%), taking the first place in the number of challenges launched in the 9 months from January to October. Not only is the investment strong, but there are also many brands involved. The most typical investment is from the brand lines of Yili and Mengniu, and most of the challenges are launched around the two core goals of conventional brand promotion and product launch/promotion; followed by the beauty and daily chemical industry and e-commerce platforms. In the third quarter, beauty and daily chemical brands became frequent initiators of challenges.

An analysis of 579 challenges revealed that there was no significant increase in either the number of views on the aggregation page or the number of participants compared to last year. However, more challenges with high-quality gameplay, creativity and resource investment have emerged, with over 10 billion exposures and over 1 million participations.

Among them, 4 of the 10 most entertaining and most viewed challenges in the 3C digital industry were created by the 3C digital industry. It is recommended that brands pay more attention to the value of the challenge: either don’t invest, or invest and it will be profound!

▲2019: Interaction data performance of challenge competitions launched by various industries

From the perspective of challenge marketing suggestions: As ByteDance strengthens the construction of the middle platform, the challenge, as the product with the highest authority, will trigger a traffic carnival in the ByteDance system under the link of the mini program.

At the same time, ByteDance's mini-program system has become increasingly complete. Introducing mini-programs in the challenge can not only enrich the gameplay and increase the user interaction experience; for brand owners with effectiveness and customer service demands (such as games, e-commerce and financial services), they can also take advantage of the mini-program construction to achieve lossless jumps and increase the chances of user registration/ordering/payment.

This means: the marketing value of the challenge is still fissioning, but the performance of the challenge is not only linked to the brand budget, but also tests the brand's content creativity and planning capabilities. It is recommended that brands pay more attention to the value of the challenge: either don't invest, or invest and pay attention.

It is worth mentioning that 2019 is the first year of short video e-commerce. Advertisers’ increasingly strong demand for results may give rise to a new challenge model with both brand and effect orientation in 2020. More e-commerce/live streaming KOLs will be invited by brands to join the challenge marketing, which will not only provide exposure but also help brands reap big sales.