"Li Ziqi" goes overseas, the public opinion behind her sudden popularity

There are thousands of internet celebrities, and Liziqi has become the one that has aroused public opinion about "cultural export". Although the audience's attitudes vary, "Li Ziqi" has already become a qualified promoter of Chinese culture.

Li Ziqi, a girl who has won the love of netizens all over the world on Youtube, has caused huge public controversy in the country.

On December 4, an article titled "Why is Li Ziqi not a cultural export? 》 was widely circulated on the Internet, triggering a nationwide discussion on whether Li Ziqi is a cultural export.

The reason why Liziqi has won the love of fans all over the world is closely related to the love for her hometown and the identification with Chinese culture expressed in her videos. Although everyone has different answers to the question of "Is Li Ziqi a cultural export?", she has provided a window for foreigners to understand Chinese culture and can be regarded as a qualified promoter of Chinese culture. What can we see from this nationwide public opinion dispute?

I. Overview of Public Opinion Dissemination

1. Public opinion dissemination situation

From December 4 to December 18, a total of 471,122 pieces of information about "Li Ziqi's 'cultural export' dispute" were disseminated across the entire network, mainly distributed on social platforms.

On December 4, Sina Weibo user @莱斯林Raist posted a post describing Li Ziqi's popularity on the overseas video website YouTube, and lamented that "this is cultural export."

On the 5th, Weibo celebrities such as "@一領淡鹅黄" and "@小野学妹学吐槽" posted many times to express different opinions on the issue of "whether Li Ziqi is a cultural export", which triggered a large number of netizens to participate in the discussion of this issue.

On the 6th, the topic "Is Li Ziqi a cultural export?" topped the Sina Weibo hot search list, and the related communication volume reached its peak on the same day.

On the 10th, "@CCTV News" published an article commenting, "Without passion, you can't become Li Ziqi, and without passion, you can't understand Li Ziqi. Foreigners understand Li Ziqi's passion, which also explains why many of Li Ziqi's works have not been translated but are still popular all over the world." "@Headline News", "@Yang Tao", "@Coming and Going Between" and other Weibo celebrities participated in spreading relevant information, and the topic "CCTV comments on why Li Ziqi is popular all over the world" was on the hot search list that day.

In addition, on the 15th, Bai Yansong commented on Li Ziqi in the "News Weekly" program, "Li Ziqi doesn't have any slogans in her global communication, but her taste is impressive and has won her a good reputation." He also said, "If the number of Internet celebrities who come from the grassroots and go global increases from one to thousands, then there will be Chinese stories to tell." Afterwards, the related topic "Bai Yansong said there are too few internet celebrities like Liziqi" attracted the attention and discussion of netizens, forming a small peak in information dissemination on that day.

2. Hot words chart

In early December, the topic "Is Li Ziqi a cultural export?" sparked a lot of discussion among netizens, and the subject of the event "Li Ziqi" and core argument words such as "cultural export" became hot words.

Secondly, on December 10, "CCTV News" expressed its views on "Li Ziqi's popularity overseas". On December 15, Bai Yansong also expressed his hope that there would be more Internet celebrities like Li Ziqi in the program. Therefore, "CCTV", "popular all over the world", "Bai Yansong", "Internet celebrity" and other words have also become key words.

In addition, when netizens were discussing the topic "Is Li Ziqi a cultural export?", the words "rural life", "Chinese culture" and "rural area" appeared relatively frequently.

3. Social sentiment of netizens

Judging from the distribution of emotions, the social sentiment on the entire network regarding the "Li Ziqi's 'cultural export' dispute" is mainly positive, accounting for 82.4%. The main content is to express recognition of Li Ziqi and yearning for rural life. Neutral comments accounted for 10.9%, mainly some netizens spreading information related to the incident. Negative comments about this incident accounted for 6.7%, and a small number of netizens questioned whether Li Ziqi's video was "staged" and whether the video content was "fake".

2. Public Opinion Focus

Cultural export controversy

By creating videos related to China's "rural culture" and "food culture", Li Ziqi has attracted more than 20 million fans on Weibo and more than 7 million subscribers on the overseas video website YouTube.

While Li Ziqi has become popular overseas, the topic of "Is Li Ziqi considered cultural export" has also sparked heated discussions among netizens in China.

Some public opinions questioned whether Li Ziqi could be considered a cultural export and believed that the evaluation of her was too high. They believe that the video content overly glorifies rural China, deliberately caters to foreign audiences' stereotypes about China, and shows China's backward and primitive side. Moreover, the video shooting is a commercial activity and cannot be regarded as cultural export.

Blogger @一領淡鹅黄 posted a message saying: "What she sees is not the real China. Some people must elevate a deliberately packaged work that does not have universal significance in reality as the image of China and export culture on behalf of China. But we cannot force everyone to agree with this elevation."

However, most public opinion still expressed recognition and support for Li Ziqi. Some netizens believed that life in rural China is rich and colorful, and she just chose one of the lifestyles to show it.

Some media also commented on the matter from a cultural perspective. For example, Guangming Daily published an article stating: "Li Ziqi's work is not a grand narrative. It records the daily life of an ordinary Chinese person, but it precisely shows the humanistic spirit in traditional Chinese culture, which is an important value consensus in the dialogue between Chinese culture and world civilization."

Media person Bai Yansong also said through Newsweek: "There are too few internet celebrities like Li Ziqi. If the number of internet celebrities who come from the grassroots and go global increases from one to thousands, then there will be Chinese stories to tell."

3. People who are the focus of public opinion

1. Crowd composition

The differences among groups affect the public's attention to hot issues. The grassroots (ordinary people + experts) are most concerned about this incident, accounting for 89.7%. As a top internet celebrity in the food circle, Liziqi has extremely high attention and popularity, and topics related to her are likely to trigger heated discussions among ordinary netizens. The second largest group is the certified user group (celebrities + enterprises + government + media + others), accounting for 10.3%. Celebrities, as opinion leaders, publish relevant views and opinions based on their own influence, and to a certain extent, also drive discussions on related topics among ordinary netizens.

The following figure shows the composition of the crowd in this public opinion dispute:

2. Posting habits

In the relevant discussions of this incident, 9.9% of netizens posted original posts to express their own views, most of which were well-known bloggers who spread the relevant circumstances of the incident and expressed relevant views; 39.5% of netizens participated in the discussion of the incident by commenting on relevant blog posts, mainly supporting Li Ziqi's relevant remarks. Another 50.6% of netizens forwarded blog posts related to the incident, further expanding the influence and communication effect of the topic.

3. Geographical distribution

Internet users in Guangdong paid the most attention to this incident. Guangdong has a developed economy and a large number of Internet users. A large number of Internet users actively participated in this incident and reposted and commented on a large number of related blog posts. Next in line are Beijing and Sichuan, where a large number of well-known Beijing bloggers spread the news and expressed their own opinions, which attracted great attention from many netizens. Li Ziqi was born in Mianyang, Sichuan, and her creative location is also in her hometown of Sichuan, so she has attracted much attention from local netizens.

IV. About Li Ziqi

1. IP Development

2. Public opinion heat

Note: The data in the figure comes from public information

Compilation>During the monitoring period, the total amount of information about "Li Ziqi" on the entire network reached more than 1.06 million. On November 3, Li Ziqi's video of "drinking mare's milk and roasting a whole lamb" was forwarded by Weibo fans and netizens, forming a small peak in dissemination.

The "cultural export" controversy that began on December 4th not only brought popularity to Li Ziqi personally, but also saw a significant increase in the number of fans on her official Weibo account compared to before. As of December 17, the number of followers of "@李子柒" has grown to 21.46 million.

In 2017, Li Ziqi joined the overseas video website YouTube, thus starting her “personal overseas journey”.

Brushes, ink, paper, and inkstones, rouge capes, traditional food... On YouTube, a global video website, these traditional Chinese crafts and delicacies displayed by Li Ziqi have attracted people from dozens of countries around the world to watch and comment. According to statistics, from December 2018 to December 2019, the number of global fans of the "LiZiqi" YouTube channel increased by nearly 5.4 million, and the total number of views of its videos reached 982 million times.

By counting the views of its most recent 30 videos, it was found that the average number of views of its videos reached 9.627 million, and among the 30 videos, 46.7% of the views exceeded the average. The video with the highest number of views, "Satisfying, addictive, and spicy food, just a bowl of Liuzhou "Luosifen"", has been viewed over 22 million times, and received 310,000 likes and more than 18,000 comments.

As the number of fans increases, Li Ziqi's commercial value is also increasing. It is estimated that the monthly advertising revenue of Li Ziqi's channel has reached 550,000 yuan.

3. Image and reputation

1) Personal image

"The Li family has a daughter, named Ziqi." This ancient and charming description is the introduction of Li Ziqi's WeChat public account.

In the eyes of her fans, she is a "real talent", "Oriental life gourmet" and "spokesperson of agricultural civilization". She makes bamboo chairs, builds stoves, picks flowers to make wine, and even makes paper and ink... This omnipotent post-90s girl condenses the picture of traditional Chinese agricultural society into the mirror world, and depicts an oriental paradise that conforms to the common imagination of the public.

But the public's impression of her is not always that of flowers in the fog and the moon in the water. Back to reality, Li Ziqi is still a "top internet celebrity" with 21 million fans, hundreds of millions of cumulative video views and great commercial value. In addition to this, she is the first ambassador to promote Chengdu’s intangible cultural heritage and was invited to Malaysia for cultural exchanges... Li Ziqi has surpassed the generally accepted definition of an "Internet celebrity" and has become a promoter of Chinese traditional culture.

2) Personal reputation

Since she started producing and publishing ancient-style food short videos in 2016, Li Ziqi has been loved by many netizens and has also become famous in the Internet celebrity circle.

In 2017, Li Ziqi continued to expand and enrich the content of her videos. Craft products such as "rouge and powder" and "handmade paper" also appeared in her videos. These breakthroughs made her a dark horse among Weibo celebrities. The number of her fans increased from hundreds of thousands to tens of millions in one year, and she received endless praises such as "dexterous", "all-powerful" and "treasure girl".

But in addition to the support, there are also voices of doubt. From 2017 to date, doubts such as "Is Li Ziqi presenting her real life or a performance?", "Li Ziqi is over-packaged", "There is a team behind Li Ziqi hyping her up" have never stopped, and topics such as "staged photos" and "hype" are often brought up for discussion by netizens.

Despite constant controversies, Li Ziqi 's personal influence and brand value are growing day by day, and she is loved by more and more netizens.

V. Conclusion

1. Current situation of online celebrities going overseas

Faced with the increasingly saturated domestic market and increasingly fierce competition, in order to seek new traffic and monetization, while some Internet celebrities have begun to penetrate the sinking market, some Internet celebrities such as "Li Ziqi" and "Office Xiaoye" have made efforts in overseas markets and carried out international transformation. Platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and TikTok have become the first choice for domestic internet celebrities to go overseas due to their large user base and wide influence.

Taking YouTube as an example, its MAU (monthly active users) exceeded 1.9 billion in July 2018, and its monthly active users are nearly four times that of TikTok.

Note: The data in the figure is compiled from public information

"Office Ono" is the internet celebrity with the most fans in China on YouTube. Since the opening of her channel, she has garnered 8 million fans, ranking in the top 1% of fans worldwide, and her total video views have reached 1.832 billion.

In addition, the influence of emerging Internet celebrities such as "Brother from Western Yunnan" and "Grandpa Amu" overseas should not be underestimated. The channel of "Dianxi Brother" has been in operation for only more than a year, but the number of fans has exceeded 3.5 million, the average video views have reached 3.73 million, and the monthly advertising alliance income has reached 2.63 million yuan.

From a regional perspective, most of the fans of Chinese internet celebrities going overseas come from Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Thailand and other Asian countries with similar cultures, while in Europe and the United States, the majority are from the United States. Different internet celebrities will have obvious differences in the region of their fans due to their different video styles.

Taking the top internet celebrities in the overseas market as an example, "Office Xiaoye" specializes in office cooking. Her videos are novel and interesting. Her fans mainly come from Southeast Asian countries such as Vietnam, Thailand, and Indonesia. The theme of Li Ziqi's videos is "Pastoral", and the content is far from real life. Her audience mainly comes from the United States, Taiwan, China and other places.

2. Why are they successful?

Although it has become a trend for internet celebrities to go overseas, it is not easy to get a share of the overseas market.

Compared with domestic works, overseas internet celebrities need to overcome cultural, language and other barriers to create their works. Therefore, less verbal communication and more visual presentation has become the main way for overseas influencers to express their personal style and charm.

For content creators, creativity is undoubtedly the magic weapon for success, and one successful example is "Office Ono".

In February 2017, the official YouTube channel of "Office Ono" was launched. In July, she released a video titled "Ono Watermelon Feast", with the title and description both in English. Thanks to her whimsical creativity, the video quickly received over 100 million hits in a short period of time. In the same year, the number of subscribers to the "Office Ono" YouTube channel exceeded 1 million, setting a new record for the growth of YouTube creators.

The secret of the popularity of "Office Ono" lies not only in the highly creative program style and the synchronized video details in Chinese and English, but also in the spiritual core she conveys: "The office is not only about KPI, but also about food and distance."

Different from "Office Xiao Ye", "Li Ziqi" and "Dianxi Xiaoge" mainly use food to present the original rural life, providing the audience with an "Eden" away from real life. From making New Year snacks, making brown sugar from sugarcane to cutting bamboo to make bamboo beds... "Li Ziqi" uses simple and natural food and craft production processes to convey Chinese cultural symbols, providing foreign users with a new window to understand Chinese culture.

Although some domestic netizens criticized the video for catering to foreigners' stereotypes about China, the real data does not lie, and "Li Ziqi" has become a qualified promoter of Chinese culture.

Author: Huang Qiangwei

Source: Yellow Rose