Author Cheng Shushu
Edited by Zhu Ting.
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Why do many humanities documentaries have Xu Zhiyuan now? ”
Probably because his temperament fits well with the documentary, and Kochi won't make money."
In the past, documentaries as the "three highs" (* groups are mostly high-class, high-educated, and high-income) audiences have always been called the "least profitable" work. Before 2012, documentaries with little money and high content requirements were almost the exclusive content of the "national team" of TV stations, until the emergence of "A Bite of China" began to change.
It was the second year of the launch of the **TV documentary channel, directed by Chen Xiaoqing, and the food documentary "A Bite of China" produced by China** TV was broadcast on the channel, which quickly swept the country, with an average rating of 059%。Later, Chen Xiaoqing also said in an interview, "In terms of documentaries, it surpassed the ratings of all TV dramas in the same period, which is already very high, and the ratings of BBC documentaries are about the same." ”
According to online data, the film set a sales record of 40,000 US dollars (about 250,000 yuan) for a single episode, and was sold to more than 30 countries and regions, covering more than 100 countries and regions.
The results of "A Bite of China" have successfully stimulated the market, and not only some production companies have begun to realize the potential commercial value of documentaries, but they have also entered the game.
In 2012, Youku established a humanities channel; In 2015, iQIYI launched the "Partner Program"; In 2017, Tencent** established the "Penguin Film and Television Documentary Studio", and "Flavor of the World" is its first self-made documentary that is clearly serialized and IP; In the same year, Station B launched the "Search Plan" for documentaries, and produced documentaries such as "Polar Region", "A String of Life", and "Those Things in History".
According to the statistics of the Documentary Research Center of Beijing Normal University, the total investment of private institutions in 2013 was 37.7 billion, a significant increase of 88% from 2012 200 million yuan. In 2017, the production of documentaries by private companies was 72.7 billion yuan, more than three times compared with 2012, maintaining a compound growth rate of nearly 30% in the past five years.
In 2023, another five years have passed, and the documentary layout characteristics of the major ** platforms that have gradually grown into the main force have become more and more distinct. Under the spring breeze of the Internet, documentaries have gradually transformed from the stereotypical "niche art" and "cold style" to "networked" and "down-to-earth".
Nowadays, documentaries have broken through the limitations of the "three highs" crowd and transformed from "niche" to "popular". While "harvesting" young audiences, it also captured the hearts of "gold owners" such as cars and alcohol.
Iron-clad food, high-scoring humanities, and fancy interviews
In the case that major ** platforms continue to increase the documentary track, in 2023, the number of documentaries will still grow.
According to the data of Ratings China, the total number of new online documentaries in 2023 will increase slightly compared with the previous year, and only the four ** platforms of iQiyi, Tencent, Mango TV and Station B will launch 864 new documentary content throughout the year, an increase of about 10% over last year; The total duration is more than 3,000 hours, an increase of about 20% over last year.
In terms of genre, the old longboard of food documentaries continues to be reinforced, and new longboards such as humanities and interviews are constantly innovating.
At present, domestic top documentaries mainly come from three categories: TV stations, self-made by netizens, and overseas introductions. For example, this year's popular "Strange Journey" and "Earth Artery Season 3" are all imported overseas, but this category belongs to the overseas system, so I will not list it here for the time being. It can be seen from the documentaries broadcast by KK's "Aiyou Tengmang B" + TV station in 2023 that food is still the most stable content category in the domestic documentary market, accounting for a considerable proportion.
In addition to the old food IP series such as "The Taste of Mountains and Rivers in the World Season 2", "Towards the Direction of Supper Season 3", "The Taste of Lao Guang Season 8", "Jianghu Restaurant Season 4", "The True Taste of the Countryside 2 Watch", as well as special food programs such as "Earth Table", "No Spicy and No Joy", "Taste of the Alleys", "Let's Brush", "Chongqing Spicy and Spicy" and other special food programs, the market also has innovations.
For example, in "My Food Guide" launched by Tencent**, the director of "Tip of the Tongue" Chen Xiaoqing walked from behind the camera to the camera, leading the audience to taste the delicacies of various places from his personal perspective; iQIYI launched the "Seafood Hero" and "Soul of the Meal" series, with subdivided themes and topics; Jiangsu Satellite TV's "Midnight Delivery" starts from the delivery man as the starting point, connects the social scene with food, and outlines the world.
WhileHumanities documentaries represented by vertical occupations, social emotions, and history and culture are Douban's high-scoring contestants.
Like Douban score 96 of "Twinkle Pediatrician" and 91's "Where Did This Goods Come From", the former was produced by the team of "Guarding the Liberation West", focusing on pediatric outpatient clinics, and the number of ** at station B exceeded 1500 million, with an in-station rating of 99 points, which is also the domestic self-made documentary with the highest score on Douban this year; The latter focuses on the first small and medium-sized sellers, extends the lens to China behind the web page, shows the visual spectacle and craftsmanship of local manufacturing, and tells the most popular small business from the most humane perspective.
Humanities and history categories such as "Why China", "General History of China", "Only Fragrant as the Past", are deep and wide enough for cultural output, and novel forms that are acceptable to the audience, and the word-of-mouth is steady and steady, and the Douban score is above 9 points.
In addition to the number of predominantly gourmet categories and the humanities category that are easy to produce high-reputation works,Since the launch of interview variety shows such as "Round Table Pie" and "Thirteen Invitations", interview shows have also become the type of major ** platforms.
Tencent**'s "Her Viewfinder", which was launched at the beginning of this year, gathered the interviewed characters in female film and television creators; Youku has also launched a series of "interview +" documentary programs, such as "First Person Plural", which talks about issues from a female perspective, "The Voice", which uses Cai Kangyong to talk to artists and excavate the side of artists' lives from the perspective of acquaintances, and "Why Not Candle Night Tour" and "Qiang Qiang Traveling the World Season 3", which combine interviews, travel, food, etc., with a variety of tricks.
You have Chen Xiaoqing, I have Dou Wentao, and there is Xu Zhiyuan
Although each platform is exploring and experimenting with new categories such as food, history, humanities, and many vertical industries, it has different approaches and expressions, as well as its emphasis. In contrast, the differentiated playing styles of major platforms in the documentary track have gradually formed their own styles.
For example,iQIYI's self-made focus is on the theme of food and takes the boutique theater model. The platform conducts the broadcast of documentaries through the three major theaters of "Human Theater", "Love Theater" and "Ideal Theater", emphasizing "one fish to eat more" and maximizing the value empowerment of the brand.
Tencent** focuses on the two major sections of "Taste of the World" and "Intellectual Life". Based on high-quality IP, it continues to enrich the content of documentaries, such as the original team of "A Bite of China", and the derived "flavor" IP series and "Breakfast China" series have become its brand logo.
As the only one of the five major ** platforms to take humanities out of documentaries and open up a humanities channel, Youku is a strategic layout focusing on "humanities".Develop humanistic content by empowering cultural figures. It has successively pulled cultural figures such as Dou Wentao, Ma Weidu, Cai Kangyong, Zhou Yijun, Xu Zhiyuan, and Zhang Yue into its "circle of friends", trying to create a famous brand of "Cultural Celebrity Universe".
Station B, where young people gather, focuses on creating a new school of documentaries for online students. The film library is mainly composed of high-quality self-made + high-quality programs introduced by professional institutions to attract young audiences. His "Guarding the Liberation West 4", "I Am a Museum", "Shining Pediatrician" and other documentaries are all popular with young audiences this year.
Mango TV, which is backed by Hunan Satellite TV, still retains the attributes of TV station documentaries, bringing together the main theme documentaries, focusing on traditional culture, the founding of New China, rural revitalization and other perspectives, leading the positive energy of youth. For example, "National Highway Cruise" and "Hello Judge" all focus on the vivid stories of the grassroots and present the great practice of Chinese-style modernization from a small point of view.
Of course, the platforms also have a common tacit understanding: the documentary market is getting younger and younger, and reality shows and celebrities are becoming more and more the norm.
For example, the public welfare and environmental protection documentary variety show "All the Way Forward" produced by Station B was initiated by stars such as Hu Ge, Liu Tao, and Chen Long, and Huang Bo appeared in "China Ambulance"; Tencent**'s "Her Viewfinder", invited guests include Li Shaohong, Qi Xi, Yang Zishan and other star directors; Youku's "Ten Thousand Scrolls Collection" also invited Yu Entai, Yang Di, Wang Ziyi, Wang Hedi and other artists to participate.
However, an interesting point is the Q&A between kk and colleagues at the beginning of the article: many humanities documentaries have Xu Zhiyuan.
It can be seen that Tencent's "flavor" and "breakfast" two major business card series IP are all participated by Chen Xiaoqing, and this year, Tencent has launched "My Food Guide" with Chen Xiaoqing as the IP and adding tourism and cultural elements; Youku's high-reputation programs "Round Table Pie" and "Qiang Qiang Xing Tianxia" and other series of cooperation are also Dou Wentao.
Intuitively, there is a **. This is also in line with the attributes, the focus of documentaries on each platform is different, and the cultural figures they cooperate with have their own tonality required by the platform. However, Xu Zhiyuan can travel between them, and "Thirteen Invitations" in cooperation with Tencent and "Why Not Candle Tour" in cooperation with Youku are all documentaries with good results on the platform.
It can really be said that the stars belong to everyone, the cultural figures are the platforms themselves, and Xu Zhiyuan is shared by the documentary.
Only documentaries with IP and celebrities have advertisers, and cars and alcohol are true love
Back to the beginning of the article, it was the good sales performance of "A Bite of China" that made the market see the commercial potential of the documentary, which attracted the best platforms to enter the game. And with the increase of various platforms, has the commercial potential of documentaries been stimulated?
Although documentaries have begun to be accepted by young people, they still seem to have failed to gain the favor of advertisersAccording to KK's statistics on the investment promotion of documentaries broadcast on the platform in 2023, many documentary programs have not seen advertising placement.
There are no more than two kinds of documentaries titled by brands, one of which has been broadcast for several seasons, such as "The Taste of Lao Guang Season 8", "This Station, Guizhou Season 2", "The Taste of Mountains and Rivers in the World Season 2", "Jianghu Restaurant Season 4", "Guarding the Liberation West 4", etc., which already have well-known IPs.
The other is like "My Food Guide", "Her Viewfinder", "Why Not Candle Night Tour", "Voices", "All the Way Forward", etc., although they are newly developed documentary programs, they have the participation of stars and celebrities. Influenced by the star effect, advertisers are also willing to invest boldly.
This may also be the reason why the current documentary market is developing towards IP, reality shows, and celebrity stardom.
Specifically, these advertisers who watched the documentary: automobiles and alcohol accounted for the majority; Soy sauce, drinking water, milk, mobile phones, and insurance also appeared.
Advertisers such as soy sauce, drinking water, and milk find documentaries on food and tourism, which are based on content-oriented and consistent input. As documentaries, the two major advertisers have their own points to pursue in the selection of content.
Most of the alcohol advertisers choose IP documentariesFor example, Jiujiang Double Distilled Wine is titled "The Taste of Lao Guang Season 8", Guizhou Daqu Wine is titled "This Station, Guizhou Season 2", and Chinese Spirits is titled "The World Tastes Mountains and Rivers Fresh Season 2".
Automotive advertisers are interested in cultural celebritiesFor example, Cai Kangyong's "Voice" won the title of Volvo Cars in the first season. In the program, eye-catching forms such as brand standard plates, empty mirror oral broadcasts, screen pressure strips, corner labels, transitions, and end credits are implanted. In addition, it also exclusively named Xu Zhiyuan's "Thirteen Invitations Season 7".
On the whole, with the strong rise of the new **, documentaries collided with online platforms and began to embrace the taste of the public, but the cultural genes in it make it different from many variety shows in terms of content and cultural depth, and there is still a certain threshold for the audience, and investment promotion is naturally incomparable to the unlimited limitations of entertainment variety shows.
It is true that documentaries still have to have cultural attributes, and too much "variety show" may lose the love of documentary lovers, "Kochi" may be its charm, just like Xu Zhiyuan, who was scolded as a "thorn", or liked by a group of people.
Source: Weibo, Douban, invaded and deleted.