Landu Culture Transformation Live Broadcast Variety Show Want to Make Industry Hot Models Non-Standardized Production Is The Key

"Making a program that is neither good nor bad is as meaningless as being a not-too-small star." Lu Tingting was very firm when she said this,"If you want to do it, make a hit."

Original title: How to launch a "hit" model within a year for Landu culture, which has half of "Kangxi"

."Making a program that is neither good nor bad is as meaningless as being a not-too-small star." Lu Tingting was very firm when she said this,"If you want to do it, make a hit."

With this stubbornness, Lu Tingting founded Landu Culture, an online content company focusing on women's vertical fields. Starting from the PGC model, it launched a series of "Honey" Short Video programs such as "Late Night Honey" and "Workplace Honey Recommendation", with 800 million views across the network. This year, we will enter the live variety show track. On July 23, Landu and Tencent Mutual Entertainment jointly produced the live variety show "Please, Fans" hosted by Chen Handian and Xiao Xiao, which was watched online by more than 1.5 million people.

At present, Landu's main income basically comes from advertising and naming rights sales. The main business line is divided into two parts. Live variety shows serve as traffic managers to attract advertisers and sponsors; Short Video content in PGC mode increases user stickiness with a higher broadcast frequency. In the future, Landu hopes to become a comprehensive content production company. Upstream produces PGC content, variety shows and online dramas, while signing contracts and incubating artists.

As the CEO of a cultural company, Lu Tingting's first impression was that she was gentle, but in subsequent conversations, I felt her sharpness and directness. After studying in the United States and working in the financial industry, Lu Tingting is actually "not short of money." She chose to return to China to enter the content field and start a business alone and with a PPT. She thought very simply: "People who have worked in media are all cheap. They can not eat or sleep and risk their lives to create good content."

Perhaps because she once worked in an investment company, Lu Tingting is accustomed to examining herself and the company from the perspective of a bystander and always remains introspective. "My criteria for measuring content are relatively simple and crude, which is whether the program itself is a hit and whether the people in the program are known to many people. Other than that, other data are false."

Transforming live variety shows and embracing changes to

the live broadcast scene of "Please, Fans", Chen Handian (left) and Xiao Xiao (right)

received 1 million angel round funds from Thunderstorm Capital and Eagle Fund in May 2014. Later, they obtained Qingsong Fund and Rongzheng Investment 10 million yuan in Series A financing, and at the end of last year, they received 40 million yuan in Series B financing led by Jinpu Mobile Internet Fund. It took Landu less than two years. The focus of Landu's content has also shifted from the short, plain and fast PGC mode to the live broadcast track.

The intrinsic motivation for this change is the pressure to realize.

Although it has gained popularity with "Late Night Sweet Words", which explores female topics such as best roommates and exes, and has launched a series of Short Video on food and travel. However, there is no denying that traffic is still firmly controlled by leading online variety shows such as "The Strange Talks" and "Mars Intelligence Agency". For advertisers or title publishers, traffic means everything. "They would rather spend a lot of money on a program that works well than spend a lot of money on a program that works well." Lu Tingting said,"Everyone is very practical."

How to obtain traffic and turn it into income, Landu finally took a fancy to live variety shows. At present, live broadcasts have become a popular trend, but the types are concentrated on beautiful women and game live broadcasts, and the platform still lacks the ability to continuously produce high-quality content. Even Papi Sauce's massive full-platform live broadcast was criticized for being restrained and boring in content. Lu Tingting believes that live variety shows hit the pain point of this industry. "Any single anchor can watch it for two or three days at most, and everyone will definitely be aesthetically tired, because everyone is only a little cute." Lu Tingting explained,"In fact, live broadcast platforms also have a sense of crisis."

Secondly, the advantage of live variety shows is that it can rely on B-side advertising, naming and other models to directly monetize it, and does not need to rely on users 'rewards. "The rewards of variety shows are definitely not as good as a beautiful woman asking for gifts." Lu Tingting analyzed this way.

Compared with the traditional show model, live variety shows are richer in content, but they also face more challenges. Due to the inability to carry out post-editing, the requirements for program planning and choreography are very high. "Ordinary variety shows can rely on post-editing to cut 80 points into 90 points. But to make live programs, you must have the heart of achieving 150 points, so that the finished product can score 80 points." Lu Tingting said. For the program "Please, Fans", the entire content department is working continuously and has no time to rest. Even if the live broadcast is not as exquisite as the recorded program, Lu Tingting still hopes to reach a relatively perfect level. "The time to put on dry ice, make sound effects, and get players to and from the game must be calculated well. The audience cannot wait."

As a live variety show,"Please, Fans" performed well. Chen Handian relied on his usual self-slander and funny imitation to support the scene, while Xiao Xiao was responsible for "poisonous tongue" and playing cheap. Although there is a lack of new stalks, the audience is still willing to pay the bill. Lu Tingting said: "Live broadcasting is currently the hottest field. Landu should try and prove that we can achieve No. 1."

It is true that the pattern of live broadcast content has not yet taken shape, so it has increasingly become a red sea where platforms and content production companies fight each other. Hunan Satellite TV's "Summer Sweetheart" and Huang Xiaoming's announced investment in the salted egg live broadcast have tested this field. But at present, live variety shows on the market simply introduce live elements, and the way of producing content is not much different from traditional TV. How to innovate and enhance interaction with the audience on the other end of the screen remains to be seen.

"The most difficult thing is to convince others to believe me."

Throughout the interview, Lu Tingting mentioned "Strange Talks" and Miwei Media several times. This 27-year-old girl did not hide her ambitions for her career. "For a company that has not yet succeeded, it has to be competitive." Lu Tingting said,"Because only successful people are qualified to say that success is not important."

Since she did not have a background in content production, Lu Tingting has been constantly questioned since she started her business. "I have never been a producer or a director, and investors and partners find it hard to believe that I can do it." Lu Tingting said,"The way people judge people is very simple." But she believes that her greatest advantage lies precisely in her identity as an "outsider". "Only people in the industry will constantly reflect on themselves and have the motivation to find excellent people to cooperate."

First, she persuaded Wendy Li Wenyan, former vice president of Yihaodian, to become her partner. In an interview, Li Wenyan once said that she gave up her high salary to join Landu because she liked Lu Tingting's requirements for content.

After that, Lu Tingting found Sun Lexin, who had produced "hit movies" such as "Kangxi Comes" and "Night of Xiaoyan". He has experienced the heyday of Taiwan's variety shows, and has also seen Taiwan's status in the variety field swap with the mainland due to the shortage of production fees. "The production fee for Taiwan's variety shows is too small, and the market size cannot be compared to that of the mainland. It is inevitable that talents will flow into the mainland." Lu Tingting judged.

In order to persuade Sun Lexin to join, Lu Tingting and her partners tried their best: "Talking about cooperation with excellent people will not go too smoothly. What attracts Sun Lexin most to Landu should be its common values and a relatively free content creation environment. He still hopes to do something in the content field."

In addition to laying out live variety shows, Landu Culture has started the business of incubating and brokering artists. Six male artists have been signed, and the number is expected to increase to 10 in a year. Lu Tingting uniformly classified these good-looking artists as "fresh meat". "If Miwei Media's positioning is 'weird', then we are all kinds of' fresh meat '." Lu Tingting said.

Speaking of the cold winter of the capital market, Lu Tingting admitted that the current environment is indeed very cold, but this is an opportunity for Landu. "Hot money is pouring into the industry and the valuations of not-so-good companies have become very high. This is actually a terrible thing. If the environment is not good, investors will be very calm, and Landu will be able to run a track instead."

In the future, Lu Tingting hopes to launch a "hit" program and a high-profile artist. She is full of confidence in this goal. "In fact, Ma Dong has done many programs before, such as" Hero of Chinese Character ", but" Qi Qi Shuo "is a 'block'." Lu Tingting said,"It takes a little luck."

The opportunity for the content industry lies in "non-standardized production"

. For the entire content industry, finding well-known stars and producers is the guarantee for successful works.

But looking back at the production systems of Hollywood and South Korea, standardization and industrialization are indispensable keywords. South Korea, which produces a lot of high-quality content, does not know the concept of "IP" because the "writer-centered system" and standardized cultivation and packaging of idols make "hot" content and star creation predictable. The industrial system of content production does not rely on individual individuals, and both content and idols come down the assembly line.

For the mainland entertainment industry, stars are the guarantee that attracts attention. As a scarce resource, their high value is entirely determined by the market. Perhaps because standardized production has not yet been achieved, there will always be opportunities in the content industry.

Editor: Nancy