In recent years, short short dramas have become the most representative new cultural form, standing out in the fiercely competitive cultural creation track and creating a considerable industry. The overseas expansion of short short dramas is also one of the hot topics that industry insiders are most concerned about at this point in the development of the short short drama industry. More and more short short drama creators and platform organizations are focusing on overseas layout.

Recently, the "Star Index" 2024 Micro-Short Drama Industry Annual Insight Report (hereinafter referred to as the "Report") released at the "Shining Stars" Micro-Short Drama Industry Development Conference held in Chengdu, Sichuan, shows that in 2024, the overseas expansion of micro-short dramas will be an important event in the industry, and micro-short drama apps launched by many companies have entered the top of the mobile application store charts in many countries and regions around the world.

At the meeting, many industry representatives from communication platforms and creative organizations shared their experiences and opinions, and jointly discussed good strategies for the overseas expansion of micro-short dramas.

The scene of the roundtable forum. Image courtesy of Visual China

The platform enables shipbuilding and going out to sea

"At present, some domestic industry pioneers have begun to lay out the platform and content of micro short dramas around the world, imitating and learning from some successful experiences in the West. From a global perspective, China's micro short drama platform is truly building a ship to go to sea." Hu Zhengrong, director of the Institute of Journalism and Communication of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and dean of the School of Journalism and Communication of the University of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said that in the competition to go overseas, the pioneers of domestic micro short dramas have adopted a large number of local creation, local production and local broadcasting strategies, using their own platforms to achieve very good results and experience in the local area, and explored the best path for micro short dramas to go overseas. This has paved a good way for telling Chinese stories well, spreading Chinese voices well, and showing a real, three-dimensional and comprehensive China.

In 2024, when micro-short dramas are in full swing, the new achievements of micro-short dramas going overseas can be seen from the many data and cases given in the "Report". The "Report" shows that domestic medium and long video platforms regard domestic micro-short dramas as important export products in their overseas layout. For example, "The Mysterious Cases of the Ming Dynasty: The Mud Plow" landed on the overseas version of iQiyi, "The Tea Garden of Love" landed on the overseas version of Youku, and "Qin Hao and Shi Ming" landed on the international version of Mango TV. Domestic micro-short dramas have also gradually appeared on foreign TV channels, such as "A Dream of Pillowing Stars" broadcast in Singapore and "A Taste Called Qingxi" broadcast in Malaysia.

The report also shows that in addition to enterprises and platforms, the international dissemination of short dramas also brings new opportunities to the local short drama industry chain. In 2024, an international film and television base dedicated to short dramas will be established in Lingshui, Hainan. In an environment of intensified competition, overseas short dramas "made in China" may bring new vitality to the industry and give birth to a short drama overseas service platform.

If 2024 is the year of the explosion of short dramas, then what year should 2025 be? Hu Zhengrong gave a concept - the year of improving quality and increasing efficiency.

The 2025 National Radio and Television Work Conference held in January this year made arrangements for the key tasks of radio, television and online audio-visual in 2025, which mentioned that we should promote the international communication of radio, television and audio-visual to accelerate the system layout and key breakthroughs, build an international communication system of radio, television and audio-visual, enhance the communication effectiveness, and serve the overall diplomatic situation. Hu Zhengrong said that this is closely related to the overseas expansion of short dramas.

Exploring and accumulating

As a subsidiary of China Mobile Migu Company, Migu Digital Media has actively laid out the micro short drama industry, promoted the integration and innovation of "online literature + short drama", and launched many excellent works. The company has promoted the Migu short drama brand to the world in a diversified and comprehensive manner through overseas translation, joint production, and self-built clients.

Yu Hang, Party Secretary, Chairman and General Manager of China Mobile Migu Digital Media, introduced that Migu Digital Media has been working closely with overseas micro-drama platforms to translate and export all copyrighted self-made dramas, which currently cover multiple language markets such as English, Korean, Japanese, and Arabic. In addition, Migu Digital Media is actively exploring the joint production of overseas micro-drama, and is working with micro-drama creators, production teams, distribution platforms and other parties to achieve self-production of overseas local micro-drama content and promote overseas monetization. Migu Digital Media also worked with China Mobile Hong Kong Company and International Company to create overseas micro-drama clients, promote overseas operations of its own clients, strengthen the micro-drama AIGC translation capabilities and overseas micro-drama joint production capabilities, and build an "operator system overseas short drama platform."

In the process of exploring the overseas expansion of short dramas, Ying Yuzhou Group has accumulated valuable experience through trial and error. Huang Qin, vice president and executive editor of Ying Yuzhou Group, revealed that the investment in the overseas production of short dramas by Ying Yuzhou Group is basically more than 150,000 US dollars, and the production cycle is about two months. The overall investment and cycle are twice that of domestic productions.

It is understood that in the process of producing overseas short dramas, Ying Yuzhou Group used local actors, combined with local culture, and adopted newly created scripts and shooting teams for production. "The process was very tortuous. We encountered many problems, which led to the inability to control the shooting time or the cost. Moreover, the development of overseas short dramas cannot see the effect in the short term, and can only look at long-term data feedback. We must extend the battle line and observe its long-tail effect to determine whether a drama is successful." Huang Qin said.

But Huang Qin was pleasantly surprised by the results of the overseas sales. Huang Qin said that the micro-short dramas of Yingyu Group were mainly exported to North America and Southeast Asia. "Initially, we just translated many micro-short dramas directly overseas. Now Yingyu Group has two production teams, 'Kuai Chuang' and 'Meiguang Shengshi'. The 'Kuai Chuang' team has launched two apps, RedShort and ReelBox, for the North American and Southeast Asian markets." Huang Qin said: "The overseas sales results are pleasantly surprised, which also strengthens our confidence in expanding overseas."

Catch the latest technology trends

The application of AIGC technology can open up new growth space for the development of short drama overseas market. At present, many short drama productions have fully utilized the advantages of AIGC.

Wang Weizhi, vice president of Jiuzhou Culture, introduced that Moss, the AI micro-short drama model independently developed by Jiuzhou Culture, can automatically translate subtitles, dub and produce simple animations, which solves the language barrier problem and enables micro-short dramas to quickly enter different language markets.

The "National Color" model developed by Huace Film & TV Group focuses on the overseas expansion of Chinese film and television content. It can quickly complete the content extraction, content translation and target language content generation of Chinese film and television works, and realize the rapid editing and rapid production of film and television content. At present, the "National Color" model supports more than 10 major languages including Spanish, Arabic, French, etc., and the number of supported languages will continue to expand in the future. These functions have been applied to the international distribution and overseas content operation business of Huace Film & TV Group, and have received good feedback. "With the support of the 'National Color' model, the content production efficiency of Huace's overseas content operation business has been improved by 30%." Jia Yao, deputy editor-in-chief of Huace Film & TV Group, said that Huace Film & TV Group has a strong gene for long video production, and short dramas also continue this production gene.

Yingyu Group is also considering accelerating AI empowerment in the micro-drama production process in the future. Huang Qin revealed that at present, Yingyu Group's micro-drama team has tried to use AI to write script outlines. It is believed that with the iterative progress of the big model, AI will be able to better drive the creation and interactive experience of overseas micro-dramas in the future.

Finding a balance between "industry + culture"

There are still some problems in the development of micro short dramas, such as homogeneity of content, uneven quality, and payment traps that cause great trouble to users. Hu Zhengrong said that these problems still need to be solved for Chinese micro short dramas to truly go global. In the long run, the State Administration of Radio and Television has realized these problems and has made arrangements for the future development of the industry, organizing and implementing the "Micro Short Drama +" action plan. "I personally agree with it. Now all walks of life are not very good at telling stories. Telling Chinese stories well is a very good starting point. We need both 'micro short drama +' and 'all walks of life + micro short drama', so that we can run to each other and empower each other." Hu Zhengrong said.

In recent years, Kuaishou has continued to explore overseas markets and has made good progress in Southeast Asia and the Middle East. In the view of Wang Xingyi, vice president of Kuaishou Technology, the overseas expansion of short dramas is both an opportunity and a challenge. There are two paths for short dramas to go overseas: industrial expansion and cultural expansion. Specifically, industrial expansion requires a higher degree of localization, and the industry must be implemented from a localized perspective such as local industrial policies and local people's consumption habits. The ultimate goal of cultural expansion is to spread China's good stories, good history, and good culture, and enhance the country's soft power. Every company or every industry has its own purpose and plan for going overseas, and it depends on how everyone positions themselves. "The overseas expansion of short dramas needs to find a balance point in the 'industry + culture' path and find the possibility of advancing as a whole." Wang Xingyi said.

The path for cultural exports mentioned by Wang Xingyi can also be seen in the report. In the survey conducted by the "Star Index" for users, when asked about which elements they expect to see spread abroad through micro-short dramas, 70% of users chose local cuisine, historical culture, and intangible cultural heritage, and nearly 40% of users chose the national treasure giant panda, demonstrating the potential of micro-short dramas in showcasing the charm of China in the process of international communication.

"If micro-short dramas want to improve their quality and efficiency in 2025, they need to build a good network ecology, so that they can ultimately empower the construction of a cultural power." Hu Zhengrong believes that micro-short dramas will continue to improve their quality and efficiency in 2025 in the process of eliminating the false and retaining the true, and eliminating the dross and retaining the essence, and build a good micro-short drama network ecology, thereby empowering the country's construction of a cultural power.

(This article was published in China News Publishing and Broadcasting Newspaper, January 22, 2025, page A7.)