Rekindling the Youthful Era

Chapter 778 Is my sister feeling guilty?
"My sister is so cunning."

Just as Ying Chanxi was secretly hugging Li Luo in the bathroom, Yan Zhusheng's voice came from the bathroom door.

Ying Chanxi leaned against Li Luo's chest. Upon hearing this, she turned her head and looked towards the door. She saw Yan Zhusheng with most of his body huddled in the doorway, only showing half of his face as he looked at them. She immediately showed a speechless expression.

"What do you mean by cunning? What were you spying on outside for?" Ying Chanxi said irritably. "I just woke up and found Li Luo wasn't there, so I followed him to the bathroom to look for him."

"And then they hugged?" Yan Zhusheng asked, tilting her head. "If I hadn't come over, would they have kissed next? And then taken off Li Luo's pajama bottoms, and..."

"Shut up! Don't say anything more!" Ying Chanxi found it increasingly absurd and immediately ran to Yan Zhusheng, reaching out to cover her mouth.

Yan Zhusheng turned and ran away, dodging Ying Chanxi's pursuit, while shouting, "Sister, are you feeling guilty? You must have been thinking something similar to what I said just now, right? Otherwise, why are you in such a hurry?"

Ying Chanxi was both embarrassed and angry at what she said, but her little sister was too agile. She darted around the desk and sofa in the huge living room, and Ying Chanxi really couldn't catch her for a while.

Finally, Li Luo came out of the bathroom, separated the two girls, and said helplessly, "Zhusheng, go wash up quickly, and Xixi, rest for a while."

Yan Zhusheng obediently went to the bathroom to wash her face and brush her teeth, while Ying Chanxi grumbled in dissatisfaction. But since Li Luo had spoken, she obediently went to change her clothes and didn't bother arguing with her bratty younger sister.

Not long after, the three of them changed into clean clothes, went downstairs for a quick morning run, and then returned to the hotel for breakfast.

Around nine o'clock, everyone gathered in the hotel lobby on the first floor, where they met the people from Douyin.

"This is Miao Yifeng, the head of the Douyin team and the current operations director of Douyin." Ying Chanxi introduced Li Luo to the Douyin team after they met.

A man who looked to be in his thirties or forties, wearing frameless glasses, smiled at Li Luo and gestured to him, saying, "You must be Teacher Chongran? I've heard so much about you."

"Hello, Director Miao." Li Luo shook hands with him and exchanged a few simple pleasantries. "I'm very happy to have reached a cooperation agreement with Douyin this time."

"Not at all," Miao Yifeng replied with a smile. "It's an honor for us that you chose to join Douyin. Of course, I believe you will feel that this choice was absolutely right in the future."

"We chose to cooperate with you because we are optimistic about the future development prospects of Douyin," Li Luo said with a smile.

After exchanging a few compliments, Miao Yifeng got down to business, saying to Li Luo and Yuan Wanqing, "President Zhang asked me to take you on a tour of the headquarters first. Around ten o'clock, she will personally receive you in the company's conference room."

"no problem."

Led by Miao Yifeng, Yuan Wanqing's studio and the group from Chongran Culture, led by Li Luo, followed behind him and walked a few steps to the ByteDance headquarters building across the street.

This was Li Luo's first time visiting the headquarters of such a large company in both his lives, and the interior was indeed very impressive.

Ying Chanxi followed closely behind, also looking on with curiosity. With a learning mindset, she followed closely behind Miao Yifeng and asked many questions.

It's clear that she intends to learn more from the experiences of large companies to see if there's anything suitable for reigniting the company's culture.

In contrast, Yan Zhusheng didn't cause as much trouble. She stayed by Li Luo's side the whole time without saying a word. Wherever Li Luo went, she followed.

As for Li Luo, no matter how grand ByteDance's headquarters is, it has little to do with him.

In my past life, I worked on short dramas and was essentially working for Douyin. I never imagined that after being reborn, I would be someone Douyin would pay to invite to join.

When Li Luo was reborn, he even fantasized about replicating Douyin and reaching the pinnacle of life.

Even later, I couldn't help but feel a little regretful.

But after visiting Douyin's headquarters with Miao Yifeng, his previous thoughts quickly vanished.

It's fortunate that they didn't actually take any concrete action, otherwise they would really be throwing money away.

"The headquarters here was just moved here this year. Douyin's expansion has been too rapid. The team has recruited a lot more people this year, and the original office space can no longer accommodate so many people."

Miao Yifeng introduced it from the front.

"Our company's organizational structure is quite different from that of typical companies. We promote business using a large middle platform and a small front platform model."

"For example, the technology platform is responsible for integrating the company's algorithms and big data framework. No matter which project team develops the APP, it can quickly access the company's algorithms and obtain technical support."

"The same principle applies to Douyin, except that 99% of apps die out, and Douyin is one of the few that survived and has made great strides."

Upon hearing this, Li Luo understood that this thing was indeed not something an ordinary person could handle.

The cost of trial and error is too high.

Their core asset is actually a complete technical platform architecture, and the key is the accumulation of algorithms and big data technologies.

Without this, simply creating a Douyin app is completely useless.

In fact, Tencent launched Weishi much earlier, and Douyin was not among the first batch of short video platforms to be launched.

Ultimately, standing out from a crowd of apps is far more difficult than the average person imagines, and it's not as simple or easy to replicate.

"Back then, Mr. Zhang led a small team to develop Douyin. The initial team consisted of only seven or eight people," Miao Yifeng chuckled. "After the initial launch was successful, the team expanded further."

"It has now grown to several hundred people."

"This entire floor is now used by our Douyin team."

Miao Yifeng was considered a veteran of the initial team. Following Zhang Nan, the head of the Douyin project, his status rose accordingly. Riding the wave of Douyin's rise, his identity and status changed dramatically.

After showing Li Luo and his group around the headquarters building, he led them to the conference room.

Not long after they were seated, a very capable-looking woman with short hair walked in and greeted everyone with a smile, exuding a strong aura.

After exchanging pleasantries, Li Luo looked at Zhang Nan, who was sitting at the head of the table, and felt quite emotional.

In his past life, he made short dramas, which cost Xu Youyu a lot of money, and he also spent a lot of money on traffic on Douyin.

Of the 800,000 yuan invested, at least half was used for investment.

Unfortunately, the short drama market was already highly competitive at that time, and in the end, they only made a small profit, which was a complete waste of money.

"We attach great importance to the arrival of Professor Yuan and your team."

Sitting in the head seat, Zhang Nan had someone open the PowerPoint presentation and then began her presentation.

"Miao Yifeng has already discussed the contents of the contract with you. This afternoon, we're just going through the motions."

"The main topic is actually this morning, please take a look."

"This is our team's detailed marketing plan for everyone after joining Douyin."

As the person in charge of the Douyin project, Zhang Nan taking the time to personally explain the marketing plan is truly a great honor. It's clear that Douyin attaches great importance to Yuan Wanqing's joining the platform.

Previously, when Miao Yifeng and his team were in contact with Yuan Wanqing's studio, they had already explained the relevant marketing plan in detail. This time, Zhang Nan went a step further and openly discussed some inside information.

Although Douyin's short videos are pushed by big data, once Yuan Wanqing joins the platform, it will definitely not rely solely on algorithmic pushes; there will certainly be additional human intervention for precise traffic delivery.

Various topics and hashtags surrounding Yuan Wanqing will receive a certain amount of traffic subsidies.

The highlight of the song is Yuan Wanqing's new song, "Misplaced Time and Space".

Originally, Zhang Nan did not intend to meet Yuan Wanqing and would have simply let Miao Yifeng take full responsibility.

After all, although Yuan Wanqing is a big star, she is only in the entertainment industry.

Douyin has collaborated with other celebrities this year, and Yuan Wanqing is neither the first nor the last.

However, Douyin's current public image is that of a music short video platform, and every song with a wide enough reach is a booster for Douyin.

So after listening to the song "Misplaced Time and Space," Zhang Nan decided to meet with Yuan Wanqing's team.

This is not because she has any particularly high level of expertise or research in music and songs.

On the contrary, she is a very ordinary person when it comes to music appreciation.

However, as the person in charge of a wildly popular product, Zhang Nan's keen sense of smell allowed her to clearly perceive that the chorus of the song was very catchy.

Especially when the line "I've felt the evening breeze you've felt" came out, Zhang Nan knew she had it in the bag.

When Douyin (TikTok) was first promoted, it limited video length to 15 seconds or less. This setting was not intended for so-called classical music.

What we need is something catchy enough, something that goes viral, something that can instantly immerse the audience—that's enough.

More importantly, after Zhang Nan learned about Yuan Wanqing and Chongran's situation, she became more interested in the lyricist and composer named Chongran.

After having an investigation conducted, Zhang Nan discovered that although the lyricist and composer named Chongran was always claimed to be Yuan Wanqing's exclusive lyricist and composer, he had actually been selling songs to others all along.

However, the quality of the songs he releases seems to vary quite a bit among fans.

Many of them are just pop songs.

However, after investigation, Zhang Nan and the Douyin team unexpectedly discovered that many of the catchy songs that Reignited had sold over the years had actually become popular on Douyin.

This is quite surprising.

Li Luo hadn't expected that President Zhang was more interested in him than in Yuan Wanqing.

Although Zhang Nan cared more about Li Luo, she didn't show it during their meeting.

He shared the internally developed marketing plan in detail and coordinated with Yuan Wanqing's team.

Both parties finalized the general intention to cooperate, raised objections to certain details, communicated with each other, and time passed quickly.

The meeting finally ended at noon.

Everyone got up and left the meeting room. Led by Zhang Nan and Miao Yifeng, they went to ByteDance's internal employee cafeteria for a meal.

At 2 p.m., everyone arrived at the conference room prepared by the hotel next door and officially signed the cooperation agreement.

Yuan Wanqing reached an agreement with Douyin to join the platform for a high price of 2300 million yuan.

Yan Zhusheng, Li Luo, and Ruan Lin were signed by Douyin for 400 million, 300 million, and 800 million yuan respectively.

In addition, 60 yuan will be used to pay for the copyright fees of "Misplaced Time and Space" for its first release on Douyin and subsequent legal cover versions.

Based on this calculation, Douyin's signing of this deal represents a hefty investment of nearly 4000 million yuan.

Yuan Wanqing's studio is still affiliated with Huayue Film and Television, and part of the money has to be shared with Huayue Film and Television.

Li Luo still felt a little heartache; if he waited until next year, the profit share would be in his pocket.

Meanwhile, Yan Zhusheng and Ruan Lin also received 200 million and 400 million respectively from Reign Culture.

However, there's no need to be so calculating with Yan Zhusheng; we're all family. The main thing we're making is the 400 million from Ruan Lin.

"Sister, look."

After signing the contract, Yan Zhusheng took his copy, moved closer to Ying Chanxi, poked Ying Chanxi's slender waist, and showed her the large characters "400 million yuan" clearly written on the contract.

"What's so interesting about it?" Ying Chanxi looked at her little sister with a strange expression.

“I made money for Li Luo,” Yan Zhusheng said. “I earned 200 million of that for him.”

"Isn't that still the price I negotiated?" Ying Chanxi's face darkened, and she said irritably, "Besides, I remember you bragged about this to me once before, didn't you? How childish are you?"

“Last time it was just a confirmation of intent, but this time the contract has already been signed,” Yan Zhusheng said seriously. “It’s different.”

“Signing the contract doesn’t mean the money has been deposited into your account.” Ying Chanxi said, speechless. “The initial 20% payment will only be issued after the account is fully verified.”

"The remaining payments will be disbursed quarterly after the videos are released according to the contract, until a year later."

"Are you going to brag to me every time the money arrives in your account?"

Yan Zhusheng thought it made sense and nodded in agreement: "That's not impossible, but I don't usually check my bank card information. If the money arrives, please remind me."

"I must be crazy to remind you," Ying Chanxi rolled her eyes at her. "It'll all be confiscated by you later."

“That works too.” Yan Zhusheng nodded in agreement. “Then I’ll earn Li Luo 400 million, which is double what I earned before.”

Upon hearing this, Ying Chanxi gritted his teeth: "...I'll embezzle it all and put it all into my own pocket!"

"My sister is so mean." Yan Zhusheng said this, then pulled Li Luo over and tattled to Li Luo, "Li Luo, my sister said she's going to embezzle all of my 200 million yuan income. You should fire her right away."

Ying Chanxi: "..."

Li Luo: "..."

(End of this chapter)