"The 300,000 movie tickets are gone!" "Gone? Let's do it again." Twenty days after his solo career, Andy Lau was waiting in the live broadcast room of "Walking with Fai". More than 1 million people were already waiting in the live broadcast room. At 8 pm on January 31st, Liu...

"300,000 movie tickets are gone!"

"Gone? One more time."

Twenty days after his solo career, Andy Lau was waiting in the live broadcast room of "Walking with Fai". More than 1 million people were already waiting in the live broadcast room. .

html At 8 pm on November 31st, Andy Lau and Ning Hao were guests in the "Walking with Hui" live broadcast room, talking with Dong Yuhui with the theme of "communication and understanding". The background of this conversation is that the movie "Mr. Red Carpet" directed by Ning Hao and starring Andy Lau was released on February 10, the first day of the Lunar New Year. After the

essay incident, Dong Yuhui went solo. In his eyes, "Walking with Hui" was "on the highway as soon as it was assembled", and revealed that sales reached 800 million in 20 days.

A week ago, "Walking with Hui" attracted much attention in the literary world due to a live broadcast event. In this live broadcast, "only one literary magazine was sold throughout the entire process", creating history in the literary and communication circles. The literary magazine "People's Literature" sold nearly one million copies and was called "Renaissance" by the outside world.

With the huge increase in sales and number of fans, the development of "Walking with Hui" can be said to be "unstoppable". Yu Minhong publicly stated at the financial report meeting that Peer Hui did not establish a board of directors, but only had one general manager and executive director, both Dong Yuhui, which means that Dong Yuhui has full management authority and decision-making authority, which allows him to exert his full influence. Use your own energy to make this platform better.

This "farce" that started from the "little composition" incident more than a month ago, to the departure of the CEO and the suspension of the broadcast by the anchor, seems to have come to an end. When Dong Yuhui moved from "worker" to "partner", the current handling method seemed to reconcile the relationship between consumers, anchors, and e-commerce platforms. This dispute and Dong Yuhui’s “establishing his own business” are a “vivid training” for the entire Chinese e-commerce live broadcast industry.

"Walking with Hui" on "High Speed"

When Andy Lau and Ning Hao entered the live broadcast room of "Walking with Hui", this encounter between top streamers and top streamers had actually been warming up for a week. As early as the live broadcast on the evening of January 25, Dong Yuhui revealed that if nothing unexpected happens, Mr. Andy Lau will be a guest in the "Walking with Hui" live broadcast room on the 31st of this month. "Two top celebrities are in the same frame!" Many netizens expressed their expectation for this.

At the beginning of the live broadcast, Dong Yuhui said "I thought Mr. Liu would not pay much attention to platforms such as live broadcasts to bring goods", while Andy Lau responded "I have been paying attention and watched a lot."

This time "Mr. Red Carpet" entered the "Walking with Hui" live broadcast room, and was evaluated as a "win-win" by Dong Ping, chairman of the board of directors of Huanxi Media Group Co., Ltd., one of the producers. He told the media that today's e-commerce platforms are no longer purely sales platforms. They need a good cultural experience environment; and movies need to let more audiences understand their connotation and charm.

In the past two years, "live streaming with tickets" has become one of the channels for movie promotion and distribution. On February 2, the film "Article 20" directed by Zhang Yimou will also be a guest in the "Walking with Hui" live broadcast room. If it is said that movies with goods are not uncommon, pure literature with goods is rare.

html On the evening of November 23, "People's Literature" editor-in-chief Shi Zhanjun, writers Liang Xiaosheng, and Cai Chongda visited the "Walking with Hui" Douyin live broadcast room to talk about "My Literary Path" with Yu Minhong and Dong Yuhui. The cumulative number of viewers was 8.95 million, the highest simultaneous There are more than 700,000 people online and hundreds of millions of likes. According to reports, the full-year subscription of "People's Literature" in 2024 sold 82,600 sets and 992,000 copies within 4 hours, with a transaction value of 17.85 million yuan.

Although Dong Yuhui is non-stop opening up "new fronts", the current main source of revenue for "Walking with Hui" still comes from third-party product selection. Previously, three days after it started broadcasting, the official public account of "Walking with Hui" announced that it would stop broadcasting for one day because "there was nothing to sell." This was the first time in the live broadcast industry. Among the products carried by

on the first day of the broadcast with Hui, the categories include meat and aquatic products, fruits, snack nuts, rice noodles, grains and oils, dairy drinks and books, etc., which overlap with "Oriental Selection". But they are all third-party brands and there are no self-operated products by Oriental Selection. Many interviewees believe that this means that "Walking with Fai" wants to develop a different model from Oriental Selection.

Previously, Oriental Selection focused the company's development on self-operated business. In mid-2023, Oriental Selection announced its 2023 fiscal year results, with revenue from continuing operations of 4.51 billion yuan, of which total revenue from self-operated goods and live broadcast e-commerce business was 3.9 billion yuan, and revenue from self-operated products exceeded 26 billion. The financial report also shows that the number of self-operated products of Oriental Selection exceeds 120, and the total number of self-operated and live broadcast teams is 1,103, including 346 people in the supply chain and product teams.

In less than two years, Oriental Selection’s achievements in the “self-operated” supply chain can be described as strong. Dongfang Selection has been focusing on self-operated products and has gradually stepped into the upstream of the supply chain to increase its control over the supply chain, such as investing in and expanding its self-operated sausage factory. Based on this, Oriental Selection also launched a membership card in October last year, with an annual fee of 199 yuan. Zhuang Shuai, founder of

Bailian Consulting, told China News Weekly that there are two business models in live broadcast e-commerce, and self-operated products are one of them. Whether it is purchasing or attracting investment, you have to do your own product management and merchant management. Not only Oriental Selection does this, but many MCN organizations such as Three Sheep, Make a Friend, etc. do this. The other is a traffic diversion model similar to Li Jiaqi's. There is no need for procurement and after-sales. It just directs its own traffic to merchant stores, and the products purchased by users are also placed in merchant stores. Anchors only need to collect pit fees and commissions. This management model is very light.

"Nothing is sold" is a signal that must be taken seriously for a new team. Zhuang Shuai also asked, what is the reason for suspending broadcast for one day? He speculated that on the one hand, it may be because there are too few cooperative merchants or the cooperative merchants do not replenish their goods in time. In comparison, Li Jiaqi can have a steady stream of products and merchants to choose from, indicating that the product selection work of the entire team is not mature enough; on the other hand, it may be that It's because Dong Yuhui's team has relatively high requirements for products, and they couldn't find suitable products in the current product library in a short period of time.

A person close to Oriental Selection revealed that Dong Yuhui’s team currently does not have enough product selection staff, so the energy efficiency of product selection is relatively low. The end point of the entire product selection process is Dong Yuhui, who also has some personal requirements for product selection standards.

Looking back at Dongfang Selection, self-operated products account for as much as 58% of revenue. The supply chain of these products and the construction of self-operated products are mainly led by former CEO Sun Dongxu. This is an area that Dong Yuhui has not been involved in before, and it is also the "obvious shortcomings" of the new team. plate".

Zhao Zhenying, a researcher at the National Engineering Laboratory of E-commerce Transaction Technology, pointed out to China News Weekly that the supply chain is the basis for the survival of all e-commerce companies, and whether they have a strong supply chain system determines the life or death of the e-commerce team. Analyzing the many ups and downs of e-commerce in the past, we can find that the demise of most companies is more or less related to the construction and management of supply chain systems. The construction of the supply chain system depends not only on money, but also on the personal connections and industry influence of the main creative team. "The development of the account not only depends on Dong Yuhui's personal performance and team building, but also depends on the future development trend of the live broadcast industry."

According to Gray Dolphin data, after the launch of "Walking with Hui", in addition to the first day's sales In addition to breaking 100 million yuan, sales in other time periods basically exceeded 25 million yuan every 6 hours. In the daily live broadcast of the main account of Oriental Selection, the sales are basically between 10 million yuan and 25 million yuan.

From the traffic point of view, there is no doubt that the launch of "Walking with Hui" has caused a "siphon effect" of traffic to the "Oriental Selection" live broadcast room. But how long does this effect last? iiMedia Consulting CEO Zhang Yi believes that there are three types of fans in the "Walking with Hui" live broadcast room: fans, spectators who join in the fun, and competitors. It remains to be verified by time who can really continue to buy goods.

"We must take a differentiated path with Dongfang Selection and operate multi-matrix traffic." Cui Lili, executive director of the E-Commerce Research Institute of Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, pointed out that "Walking with Hui" is more suitable for independent innovative business lines and will not be affected by the main account or main account. Business impact, more freedom. She believes that the development of two routes is more resilient for an enterprise group. It can be very innovative and maintain a stable foundation, which should be a better strategy.

Is taking the lead in cultural tourism a breakthrough?

During this short essay controversy, New Oriental announced that Dong Yuhui will concurrently serve as the vice president of New Oriental Cultural Tourism Group. This means that in addition to bringing goods, Dong Yuhui will also lead cultural tourism.

In July 2023, Beijing New Oriental Cultural Tourism Co., Ltd. was established with a registered capital of 1 billion yuan. The legal representative and chairman of the board are Yu Minhong. Its business scope includes tourism business, tourism development project planning consulting, and organizing cultural and artistic exchange activities.

Prior to this, Oriental Selection had already launched a number of special live broadcasts such as "Traveling to the Northwest" and "Qilu Mountains and Seas", and gradually tested the waters in cultural tourism by reaching multiple destinations. In addition, a new live broadcast room "Oriental Selection Sees the World" was opened, with Dong Yuhui selling cultural tourism products. Yu Minhong also publicly stated that Oriental Selection will cultivate a group of tour guides who can give lectures.

On December 10, New Oriental cultural tourism products were officially launched on the Oriental Selection app. According to public media reports, Oriental Selection stated that New Oriental has finalized cooperation intentions with more than 100 companies and launched cultural tourism products such as travel packages, attraction tickets, and hotel packages on the Oriental Selection app. Official data from Oriental Selection shows that on the first day of product launch on December 10, sales were 16 million yuan, "far exceeding expectations."

In fact, New Oriental has registered cultural tourism companies in many places, and has successively established 18 holding cultural tourism companies in Shanxi, Heilongjiang, Fujian, Anhui and other places. According to various reviews, Oriental Selection mainly targets senior tourism, study tourism and outbound tourism in terms of cultural tourism.

On Douyin, there are currently more than ten accounts related to New Oriental Culture and Tourism, including Beijing New Oriental Culture and Tourism, Zhejiang New Oriental Culture and Tourism, and Henan New Oriental Culture and Tourism. However, most of the accounts do not broadcast live broadcasts, and only a few tourism products are listed. In the window. The account of

New Oriental Culture and Tourism shows that the store has a total of 13 group purchase products, with a total sales volume of more than 2,000, including the "Winter Vacation Parent-Child Travel Through Zhou, Qin, Han, Tang, Xi'an and Guanzhong Cultural Study 6 Days and 5 Nights Multi-Day Tour" priced at 9,680 yuan and The "Be Your Own CEO Ten Business Growth Challenge 6 Days and 5 Nights Multi-Day Tour" priced at 7,780 yuan has sold more than 300 units. In addition, there are group tours for middle-aged and elderly people in Bali, priced at 16,600 yuan. Peng Han, a tourism analyst at

, told China News Weekly that New Oriental entered the cultural tourism industry with the traffic gameplay of "Dong Yuhui + Live Broadcasting", but their first area of ​​success was tourism destination marketing, which has a typical "content" color. This is different from the previous "deal-breaking" approach of many giants.

Destination marketing is not the same as product marketing. New Oriental’s advantage lies in its head anchor Dong Yuhui and a large team of teachers. These are ace resources in the content era, which can continue to produce good content and form stickiness to users; its disadvantage is that if it comes from the back-end travel transactions and services Look, we also need to build a mature supply chain management, product quality and follow-up service control system.

New Oriental’s cultural and tourism products have previously been criticized for their high prices. A "Hangzhou In-depth Cultural Tour" product, a 21-day tour for two people, priced at 29,800 yuan, including meals during the period, double rooms in designated hotels for 20 nights, tickets to paid attractions, performances, etc., as well as transportation during the trip (excluding round-trip transportation). Many netizens shouted, "It's not something I can consume."

Peng Han analyzed that the difficulty of travel products is that there is a long chain from ordering to experience completion. Unlike ordinary e-commerce, even if you find that the product is not to your liking and then return or make a complaint, you have already paid a considerable time cost. Many times there have been bad consumer experiences. Therefore, what New Oriental really needs to complete is the back-end tourism supply chain and services.

As for Dong Yuhui taking up a management position, Peng Han believes that Dong Yuhui should be able to better organize his team, implement his own ideas, and also have more resources to do things. In the future, New Oriental Cultural Tourism may have an increasingly strong "Dong Yuhui flavor", but this also means that if New Oriental Cultural Tourism fails commercially, Dong Yuhui will need to bear greater responsibilities than before.

But Zhao Zhenying is worried that the relationship between cultural tourism and live streaming is not strictly related.Perhaps as a top player, Dong Yuhui will be able to help coordinate political and business relations between New Oriental Cultural Tourism and local governments in the future, but the characteristics of the live broadcast business determine that he may not have much time and energy to participate in New Oriental Cultural Tourism's business among.

Dong Yuhui must "transform"

Within three days, Dong Yuhui led a team of about 70 people to sell 200 million goods, and the number of account fans exceeded 10 million.

html At 19:00 on the evening of November 9th, after a few days of pre-heating, "Walking with Hui", which has gained more than 3 million followers, was launched on time. Countless "mother-in-laws" were waiting in front of their mobile phones to wait for Dong Yuhui, who had been "silent" for more than half a month. When the broadcast started, 100,000 people were online at the same time. After the live broadcast of

started, Dong Yuhui led a team of seven anchors to perform talent performances, including playing and singing performances, Chinese and English recitations, and a chorus of many songs, which made the atmosphere in the live broadcast room "enlivening". Dong Yuhui in the live broadcast room seemed to demonstrate his management capabilities and was "leading people" rather than "leading goods."

Dong Yuhui also emphasized in the live broadcast room that he wanted to use the opportunity of the premiere to let everyone remember every young person who "walks with Hui". They are just as diligent, talented, and hard-working as they are, so they are full of hope; whether it is music or poetry, The essence is that I hope that this live broadcast room can bring you not only the beautiful details of life or firewood, rice, oil, salt, sauce, vinegar and tea, but also hope that everyone's soul can drift far away, and be able to escape from the trivial daily life and experience some beauty.

Later, Dong Yuhui started selling goods, but as soon as the director started, he directly told him that "it was out of stock." Internet observer Zhang Shule believes that Dong Yuhui and his team's live broadcast style is consistent with previous Dongfang selections, but in terms of data effects, it is indeed very good and has broken many records. Dong Yuhui's "establishing his own business" has strengthened his personality and expanded his fan circle. Every fan who watches his live broadcast may feel "honored". During the

live broadcast, Dong Yuhui also specifically responded to the news that "income exceeds 500 million" spread online. He joked: "My mother sent me a message and said, get the money quickly." In addition, Dong Yuhui himself seems to be relaxed and open-minded. He often makes jokes while selling goods, and has shown his ability to "take the lead".

Zhao Zhenying believes that live broadcast is a pleasure economy, and pleasure is the most direct reason for users to pay. Fans’ emotional management is a capability that a mature live broadcast team must possess.

In fact, the biggest change in this live broadcast is that Dong Yuhui’s entire team began to “blatantly” “favor” fans. According to public media reports, an Oriental Selection employee previously revealed that the company once had to ensure the length and frequency of live broadcasts for each anchor, and was not allowed to mention the word "mother-in-law" in any official copy. But in the live broadcast room of "Walking with Hui", there are no taboos. Even Dong Yuhui himself mentioned "mother-in-law". He understands fans and emphasizes the importance of fans.

Before this essay incident, since Dong Yuhui became popular in June 2022, in the promotion road Dong Yuhui has taken from "worker" to "partner", "mothers-in-law" have repeatedly defended Dong Yuhui. .

Since the beginning of 2023, the "square-faced teacher" Dong Yuhui disappeared from the packaging of Oriental Choice's self-operated brand steaks. "Mothers-in-law" have been aggrieved. In addition, they have also questioned New Oriental's treatment of Dong Yuhui in live broadcast rooms and social platforms. The live-streaming of "more than 2,000 Dong Yuhui's faces" selling slices has triggered strong protests from "mother-in-laws".

Zhang Shule emphasized that for Internet celebrity anchors, fandom is inevitable. This is the fan economy. In a sense, "flying solo" also allows the main account of Oriental Selection to be removed from the fandom, allowing the fandom to be vertically integrated into the exclusive live broadcast room. This can eliminate some hidden dangers for the subsequent development of Dong Yuhui and Oriental Selection. On the day of the premiere of

, Yu Minhong appeared in the live broadcast room and emphasized that Dong Yuhui had "worked day and night" to build the team in such a short time. Dong Yuhui joked in the live broadcast that "every time I wake up, I am the salary of so many people", and actively sold goods and recommended products as a "boss", which was completely different from his previous "implicit" performance in the Oriental Selection live broadcast room.Is

the best balance or a stop-gap solution?

In fact, the "little composition controversy" more than a month ago brought a lot of challenges to both Yu Minhong and Dong Yuhui. Oriental Selection, which has been at the forefront of public opinion, has staged dramas such as the dispute over the copyright of short essays, the annual salary Rashomon, and the choice of two executives. It finally came to an end when Sun Dongxu, who threw his phone in the live broadcast room, took the initiative to admit his mistake and stepped down.

But this was not enough to calm fans' emotions. During this period, Dong Yuhui's fans tacitly used the Guandong Selection account and refused to place orders, and even went to live broadcast rooms such as Gaotu and other competing products to buy like crazy.

Under tremendous pressure, New Oriental quickly handled relevant matters. On December 18, 2023, New Oriental Education Technology (Group) Co., Ltd. issued a notice: Appointing Dong Yuhui as cultural assistant to the chairman of New Oriental Education Technology Group and concurrently as vice president of New Oriental Culture and Tourism Group.

On December 26, 2023, Dong Yuhui’s new account “Yihui Peer” was certified by the platform, and the certification information was “Yuhui Peer (Beijing) Technology Co., Ltd.” Public information shows that Youhui Peer (Beijing) Technology Co., Ltd. was established on December 22, 2023, with a registered capital of 10 million. The legal representative is Dong Yuhui, and it is 100% held by Beijing New Oriental Xuncheng Network Technology Co., Ltd., which is legally The representative is Sun Dongxu, and it is 100% controlled by New Oriental Education Technology Group Co., Ltd.

Yu Minhong revealed in the live broadcast that the income generated by the account is included in Oriental Selection, but if Dong Yuhui leaves Oriental Selection, the ownership of the account will belong to Dong Yuhui.

Previously, Luo Yonghao, who defended Dong Yuhui, once mentioned that it would be relatively fair for Dong Yuhui to take at least half of Oriental Selection’s revenue, which amounts to several billions. According to media reports, the industry’s valuation of personal IP is generally (GMV sales – cost) x 12 months x 100 months. The current valuation of Dong Yuhui’s IP on the market is approximately US$1 billion.

refers to the top Internet celebrities, who basically set up their own businesses or become partners in companies. Simba and Xiao Yang are both family businesses and are the actual controllers of the company. Li Jiaqi became a shareholder in the cooperation with Mei One, shared a lot of interests, and established several joint ventures with Mei One.

Dong Yuhui, who serves as the cultural assistant to the chairman of New Oriental, vice president of New Oriental Culture and Tourism Group and partner of Oriental Selection, has been compared with Li Jiaqi's status in One in the United States many times before.

Li Wei, an economics professor at Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business, pointed out that Dong Yuhui’s essay incident was essentially caused by the difference between Oriental Selection itself and the market’s positioning of Dong Yuhui as an employee or a star.

Cui Lili pointed out that the core of traffic logic lies in big IPs. To give full play to the commercial value of big IPs, it must also be reflected in the benefit distribution mechanism, whether through equity or other methods. If there is an irrational distribution of benefits, cooperation will be unsustainable.

According to public research reports, in the week of the Oriental selection in June 2022, the Douyin keyword "Dong Yuhui" was branded with a strong New Oriental brand, and the audience's brand recognition was clear and clear; followed by various "golden sentences" key Words, humanistic care, personality charm, life philosophy, etc. have become Dong Yuhui's labels. The live broadcast room provides the audience with emotional values ​​such as "touching" and "healing". This means that Dong Yuhui is indispensable as the super head IP of Oriental Selection.

Zhao Zhenying said that live broadcasting is a newly emerged industry, and the business model design that matches it is still on the way. The design of business model is not only a science, but also an art. Good business model design can enhance the team's Centripetal force improves team stability and reduces company operational risks, which is the best balance between personal interests and team interests.

He further said that the current structure of "Walking with Hui" is a temporary solution for both parties, and there is still a lot of room for adjustment in the future. To a certain extent, the management model of performing arts companies has certain reference significance for the live broadcast industry. The rise of anchors is, on the one hand, a very big factor in personal ability, and on the other hand, it is also related to the cooperation of the collaborative team and the investment of company resources. “Whether it is top-tier or not top-tier, the interests of both parties should be stipulated through an agreement at the beginning of the cooperation, and both parties respect the spirit of the contract.If you ask for conditions after becoming a top player, it will be a serious harm to both the unit and the individual. "

Published in the 1126th issue of "China News Weekly" magazine on January 22, 2024

Magazine title: Dong Yuhui "flying solo", Oriental Selection launches "horse racing"

Reporter: Meng Qian