The monthly income of "million Internet celebrities" is only a few thousand yuan? Where do the players in the industry solidify

　　Attracted by the super-high income of some top anchors, "Internet celebrity" has become one of the most enviable careers for young people nowadays.

　　So you know, what is the salary of most million fans?

　　A Wei (pseudonym), a game internet celebrity who has two million fans on Douyin, told the First Financial Reporter that in today's era of "popular Internet celebrities", the vast majority of Internet celebrities are working with platforms such as Kuaishou and Douyin. And the "wrestling" of MCN institutions does not actually take advantage of it, acting as the "last role" in the industry chain.

　　"Many million (fans) Internet celebrities may earn a few thousand yuan a month, and at the same time have to endure the work intensity exceeding 996 for a long time." Awei said helplessly.

　　However, many of these "Internet celebrities" have to receive at least three advertisements per month, and the unit price of each advertisement is "minimum 20,000".

　　Awei said that even in his most popular period, he created a revenue of 150,000 yuan for the company in a single month, but he actually got only more than 10,000 yuan, which is in stark contrast to Wei Ya's income of hundreds of millions of yuan.

　　A number of interviewed industry insiders revealed to reporters that the most fundamental reason for "the death of droughts and floods" is the "imbalance of supply and demand" in the Internet celebrity industry.

The income is deducted in layers, and the termination of the contract faces sky-high liquidated damages

　　As a graduate of the 2021 class, A Wei, before entering the "Internet celebrity circle", was engaged in the profession of editor.

Because of his "good internet sense", he was invited by a small MCN organization to become a Douyin game anchor.

　　The so-called MCN organization is generally defined by industry insiders as "an organization that cultivates Internet celebrities and realizes profits through business."

The advantages of MCN are: on the one hand, it helps content producers focus on content creation;

　　But there are big differences from institution to institution.

　　According to Ah Wei, there are currently a large number of small MCN organizations with less than 10 people on the market, and it is difficult to provide any effective help to their influencers in "creating content".

　　Take Awei as an example. When he entered the business, the MCN agency matched him with a "master" Abin (pseudonym). Abin has 5 years of experience in the Douyin game anchor industry and has nearly 5 million fans.

　　"In the early days, the account that A Bin gave me has accumulated millions of fans in just 3 months, but other than that, the agency has not helped me much." A Wei said.

　　According to him, in the later stage, a series of work including copywriting, dubbing and finding materials were done independently, and even the props needed in the video had to be paid for by themselves, and the company did not provide any help.

　　However, some larger-scale high-quality MCN institutions can really generate more revenue for their "net celebrities".

　　For example, Miracle Mountain, a large MCN organization, and its tens of millions of Internet celebrities, "Poverty Cuisine", opened an offline restaurant together, diverting online traffic to offline, and opening up a new revenue growth curve.

　　"However, 80% of the MCNs on the market are sucking the blood of the UP master, Dracula the vampire." The UP master "Jizhi Dongmeng" described the existence of the MCN organization in the video.

　　Awei said that under the premise that the MCN agency could not provide himself with too much help, he even took away 80% of the income, which made him feel particularly unfair.

　　Another point that Awei can't understand is that the rebates for business also need to be extracted from their own income.

For example, the business rebate for Pinduoduo is 2,000 yuan, and this 2,000 yuan needs to be extracted from Awei's income.

Under all kinds of deductions, a business order of 150,000 yuan a month is finally implemented in the hands of "net red" individuals, and the income is only a little over 10,000 yuan.

　　This situation is not unique.

　　Li Shuai (pseudonym), who has 20 years of experience in the industry, told reporters that after organizations generally promise Internet celebrities a basic salary, they will divide it according to the twenty-eighth or thirty-seven that the organization takes the most money, which is an "unspoken rule in the industry".

　　Ma Sen (pseudonym) and Awei have similar experiences. He has 3 million fans but has to endure the "squeezing" of the MCN agency for a long time. He told the first financial reporter that it is not an easy task to terminate the contract and then fly out alone.

　　"At that time, I signed a 5-year contract. If I breach the contract, I need to pay the agency 2 million yuan." Mason said.

　　Li Shuai introduced that some so-called MCN companies have unimaginable sources of revenue. They recruit young people who are not deeply involved in the world but have a dream of being an internet celebrity for trial broadcasts. After signing a 3-5 year contract, they found that At that time, it was said that the good support was the moon in the mirror, forcing the Internet celebrities to terminate the contract in disguise and earning the termination fee.

　　After searching with "Internet celebrity" and "liquidated damages" as keywords, you will find that similar cases abound in recent years.

　　Among them, the most representative is Lin Chen, the UP master of station B. When Wuhan was just "closed" in the early stage of the epidemic, a video of his had more than 8 million views on the entire network, and he was almost the first to pay attention to the "closed city" situation. the anchor.

　　Just after a series of Lin Chen videos went viral, he signed an exclusive business agreement with an MCN agency.

But according to Lin Chen himself, this is an extremely unequal agreement. There is no basic salary, no social security, and no signing or cooperation with other companies. The agreement has "only obligations, no rights" for him. If he breaches the contract To pay 3 million liquidated damages.

The extreme imbalance between supply and demand has led to the "stigma" of the industry

　　When the "small Internet celebrities" are suffering from being squeezed by the MCN agency, they have nowhere to complain and it is difficult to terminate the contract. On the other side of the coin, more and more "big Internet celebrities" are abandoning the MCN agency.

　　"Classmate Zhang", who released the first video on Douyin on October 4, 2021, has reached 16.62 million followers in just two months, with an average daily increase of nearly 400,000 followers, once publicly stated that he did not have any team support. , filming and editing all by yourself.

　　He said that some institutions were willing to pay 5 million yuan a year to buy out the right to operate his account, but he refused.

　　"These big internet celebrities have no shortage of resources and no shortage of fan traffic. Why do they want the MCN agency to come in and get a piece of the pie?" Li Shuai told reporters.

Not only the new generation of super-popular Internet celebrities are gradually abandoning MCN institutions, but the head anchors trained by those institutions are also drawing a clear line with MCNs due to entanglement of interests. The distribution of benefits is still the most essential issue.

"Internet celebrity ceiling" Li Ziqi is the most typical representative.

　　At the end of October 2021, according to the information from Tianyancha, Sichuan Ziqi Cultural Communication Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Sichuan Ziqi"), Liu Tongming and Hangzhou Weinian Brand Management Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Weinian") added new case registration information. Sichuan Ziqi was the plaintiff in the first instance.

This also means that Li Ziqi officially sued Wei Nian, his MCN agency, to court.

　　Prior to this, on October 14, 2021, some media published a report on "Weinian Investors: Li Ziqi does have a conflict with his brokerage company".

　　According to the report, Li Ziqi and Wei Nian had differences in the distribution of benefits.

　　Li Shuai pointed out: "Some big Internet celebrities with strong abilities and fan bases may start their careers because of factors such as seeking stability, such as the need for someone to pay him a salary, or someone to help him take care of some things, etc., signing a contract The MCN agency. When the wings are full, these top Internet celebrities think that their contribution to the company is gradually increasing. They think that I can sell 1 billion sales a year alone, why should I play with you, so The appetite has also become greater, and they want equity and salary increases.”

　　If they can reach an agreement, the institution will make concessions, and the Internet celebrity will become a co-founder of the company and have a greater right to speak.

"This imbalance of supply and demand is the most essential reason for the stigmatization of Internet celebrities and MCN institutions." Li Shuai told reporters.

　　He also introduced that

However, large and formal MCN institutions will not sign contracts with some "little whites" who are completely inexperienced and want to join the Internet celebrity industry with their passion, because from the perspective of input-output ratio, this is a very uneconomical business. Business.

Therefore, only small MCN institutions will sign contracts with many fresh graduates with "net red dreams", and many of them will make money through gray means.

This is the most fundamental reason why the industry has repeatedly reported that "small Internet celebrities are deducted from their wages by MCN agencies, Internet celebrities are squeezed, and high-priced liquidated damages".

　　Interviewed industry insiders revealed to reporters that one of the solutions to this question is that some MCN agencies choose to sign contracts with some second- and third-tier or out-of-date stars. They themselves have a certain fan base, but they do not understand how to play the Internet, so they can just contact MCN agencies. form a complement.

　　For example, former Winter Olympic champion Wang Meng revealed in an interview that he started a sports MCN after he resigned as a national team coach, and only recruited athletes. If they were athletes with a certain reputation, they would help them play their commercial value. Some athletes who have not gained popularity will be recruited to do some behind-the-scenes camera work, central control and other work to solve the re-employment problem they face after retirement.

Influencers with shorter and shorter life cycles

　　Of course, the MCN organization, which is "stigmatized" by the industry, has its own difficulties.

　　The person in charge of a small MCN agency told Yicai.com that in today's era when the competition of Internet celebrities is becoming more and more "introverted", if you don't sign a long-term contract with the Internet celebrities, once the Internet celebrities choose to leave, they will invest in the Internet celebrities in the early stage. Who will pay for the money and energy?

　　According to Zhiyan Information data, in 2015, there were about 160 MCN institutions in China, and in 2020, it has reached 28,000, an increase of more than 100 times; the size of the MCN market has also increased from about 800 million yuan in 2015 to 245 in 2020. billion.

However, while the number of players in the industry has exploded, a large number of institutions have begun to close down, and their time on the stage is getting shorter and shorter.

　　"If we don't take the opportunity to make money in a short period of time, how can we live by ourselves?" said the person in charge with a smile.

　　What's more, at the end of 2018, Douyin also launched the "star map function", which replaced the functions of some MCN institutions and squeezed the latter's living space.

　　Advertisers can directly select satisfied Internet celebrities to place orders through Star Map, and pay the money directly to Star Map. After receiving the demand, the master can issue a script, schedule a schedule, and execute the shooting needs, and then withdraw money directly from Star Map. Let MCN "make the difference without middlemen".

The life cycle of Internet celebrities is getting shorter and shorter, which is also one of the reasons why MCN agencies “hold them tighter and tighter and squeeze them”.

　　Ahua (pseudonym), as the earliest MCN practitioner, has hatched well-known IPs such as Sister Feng and Sister Furong.

　　She told reporters that there

　　For example, many people are still impressed by the Internet celebrities from more than ten years ago, such as Sister Feng and Sister Furong, and can blurt out their names.

　　"But now the popular Internet celebrity, you may forget other people's names in two or three months." Ah Hua said.

　　She analyzed that there may be two reasons for this:

　　First, the number of platforms and internet celebrities has surged.

　　In the PC era, everyone has less choice, and the Internet celebrities are concentrated in Maopu and Tianya, and everyone's attention is focused, and it is not easy to "empathize and leave love".

　　In addition, the net red more than ten years ago may be a boutique net red created by the whole company or even the entire network.

　　"We were really working on content at the time, but now it's all about capital. For example, if 1 short video is not enough, then investing in 2, 3, or even 100 short videos will always be popular. So simple and rude The law has led to a low threshold for creating Internet celebrities, which has led to the emergence of Internet celebrities in an endless stream." Ahua explained.

Supervision to standardize the industry

　　The industry has expanded too fast in a short period of time, and the corresponding policies of the platform have not been introduced in time, which has also led to repeated scandals in the Internet celebrity industry.

　　Lu Shan (pseudonym) is an online "old cannon" with nearly 15 years of experience in the industry. He told Yicai.com that because the industry's capacity has grown rapidly in a short period of time, the

　　On June 5, 2020, the National Cyberspace Administration of China and the National Office of “Crackdown on Pornography and Illegals”, together with the Supreme People’s Court, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Public Security, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the State Administration for Market Regulation, and the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, launched a six-month campaign. , A special rectification action for the online live broadcast industry, mainly involving bad behavior such as vulgar live broadcast content and inducing rewards.

　　After the regulatory measures are introduced, the platform needs to strengthen its own audit capabilities to avoid the risks of MCN institutions.

　　Lu Shan revealed to reporters that when the MCN agency he was in charge of registered on a large platform from 2017 to 2018, the platform would send people to fly from Beijing to Shanghai to inspect the shooting location, scenes, Whether the equipment is professional or not, MCN will be graded later, and how much content must be produced in January to achieve a certain number of likes and broadcasts.

　　If you do not reach the corresponding level, you may be downgraded by the platform, lose weight, or even be kicked out of the MCN channel.

"But with the rapid expansion of the number of MCNs, the platform does not have the energy to evaluate MCN institutions. For example, a large-scale platform's audit team with more than 10,000 people can only distinguish whether the terminal content involves pornography, violence and other illegal links, but There is no energy to assess whether the MCN institution itself is legal and compliant, and whether the corresponding licenses are complete." Lu Shan said.

　　On October 22, 2021, Li Ziqi said on CCTV's "Interview with Lu Jian": "I don't want teenagers to want to be internet celebrities in the future."

　　A group of industry "old guns" headed by Li Shuai and Lu Shan also told Yicai reporter more than once in interviews, "This industry has been solidified, and it is difficult for big anchors to appear again."

　　So, where will the players who are already in it go under the tide of the times?

Perhaps, young people who are attracted to the industry by the unusually high salaries of Wei Ya and other leading anchors should really take a comprehensive look at the industry before making a decision.

　　(Intern Li Xiang also contributed to this article)