At a time when digital technology and artificial intelligence are reshaping the film and television ecosystem, China's TV drama industry is at a historical juncture of transformation and upgrading. On March 19, at the Shanghai TV Drama Production and Broadcasting Annual Conference Forum, senior practitioners from platforms, production companies and academia gathered together to debate core topics such as "Innovation of long video profit models", "Response to the impact of micro-short dramas", and "Path to digital transformation". This feast of ideas, known as the "vane of China's TV drama industry development", not only revealed the deep logic behind the industry's predicament, but also provided multiple solutions for long video breakthroughs.
Forum site. Photo from the official WeChat account of "Shanghai Jing'an".
Breakthrough in profit model: from "traffic dependence" to "deepening ecological development"
Faced with declining advertising revenue and bottlenecks in the growth of paying users, long video platforms are in urgent need of building a sustainable business model. Zhou Hai, member of the Party Committee of Hunan Satellite TV and deputy general manager of Mango Super Media, pointed out: "The profit code of Mango TV lies in 'dual platform collaboration + ecological closed loop'." Relying on the "Mango New Rainforest" ecological system of Hunan Radio and Television, Mango Super Media has opened up multi-dimensional scenarios such as artist brokerage, e-commerce, and entertainment, and transformed the income of a single content into long-tail value. Zhou Hai also admitted that the core competitiveness of long videos still lies in the quality of content. "The long-tail consumption of users for "The Legend of Zhen Huan" and "Do You Know?" proves that high-quality content has the vitality to transcend time and space. Platforms should establish a 'content moat' instead of blindly chasing traffic. Different users have different motivations for paying for content. Some may be willing to watch for free, some are willing to be SVIPs, and more viewers and users hope to accompany their growth and find new value from the peripheral expansion of the project. Users cannot be treated as 'leeks' to be cut. Everything should provide users with deeper and more emotional value, and at the same time hope to become a long-term business. I think the entire industry, including our company, is exploring this accordingly."
This view was echoed by Zhou Yu, general manager of Shangshi Pictures: Instead of worrying about the diversion of short dramas, it is better to focus on the development of IP series. The success of "Celebrating More Than Years" proves that users are willing to continue to pay for high-quality content. The key lies in whether a narrative universe with emotional resonance can be built.
Stills from the second season of "Celebrating More Than Years"
Response to the impact of short dramas: from "passive defense" to "active integration"
In the industry context of "reducing costs and increasing efficiency", how to balance artistic pursuits and business rationality has become the focus. Wang Yuren, CEO of Golden Media, said bluntly: Cost reduction should not be at the expense of quality, otherwise it will accelerate user loss. Talking about the impact of short videos on long dramas, he said: "Starting from Youtube, the impact of a large amount of UGC content in the foreign streaming media market on the long drama market has actually been for many years. How do their so-called long video platforms respond? They have made updates in content, business logic, including user mining, and have promoted more international and more extreme content." However, some good long drama content has activated the consumption of long drama content in the entire market, and pulled people who might not have watched long videos to the screen, "but this screen may be a mobile phone screen, not necessarily a TV screen."
Wang Yuren also admitted that how content creators and platforms can coexist with short videos does not mean blindly reducing costs to cater to them, but how to increase efficiency, make viewers like long videos more, and make long videos reach more new users. "I think, on the one hand, we should actively respond and actively improve our cost structure, use AI, and use technological alternatives, including stimulating the creative vitality of young creators. On the other hand, we should improve the content structure and work with the platform to promote more new win-win business models."
Yang Wenhong, chairman of Shanghai Xingge Culture, admitted that the creation and production of short plays are iterating and upgrading very quickly, just like the rapid development of AI technology. She predicted that within five years, short plays may replace 90% of long plays. "The remaining 10% depends on whether you are good enough and whether your emotions are full enough. If there is a difference between humans and AI, it is that human emotions cannot be replaced. In the future, long plays that are known for their plots will be easily replaced by short plays. If you want to make a long play, you must be determined to "make a work that will be passed down from generation to generation" and devote yourself to making a long play."
Faced with the strong rise of short dramas, participants generally believed that "long and short symbiosis" will become the norm. Zhou Hai, member of the Party Committee of Hunan Satellite TV and deputy general manager of Mango TV, revealed: "The platform has formed a full matrix layout of 'long dramas + medium dramas + short dramas'. Fengmang Studio is trying to turn classic IPs such as "The Great Detective" into short dramas and explore the business model of 'long and short synergy'."
Wang Yuren took the full industry chain development of "A Mortal's Journey to Immortality" as an example to demonstrate the breakthrough path of "using the long to beat the short": through the IP linkage of novels, animations, dramas, and games, a cross-media narrative ecology and business model was built. When users see the fairy-tale clips in the short video, they will actively return to the long video to follow the more complete story.
Poster of "A Mortal's Journey to Immortality"
Faced with the industry transformation and the impact of short dramas, the participants unanimously called for the establishment of a new type of collaborative relationship. This forum sent a strong signal: the future of China's TV drama industry depends on whether it can find a balance between technological innovation and humanistic adherence. From "traffic carnival" to "value precipitation", from "scale expansion" to "quality leap", China's TV drama industry is undergoing a nirvana-like transformation. In this marathon without an end, only by insisting on content as king, innovation-driven, and ecological win-win can we build a beacon for long videos in the vast ocean of short videos.
