Internet moguls are being held hostage by the entertainment system!

Chapter 329 Short Films Will Ruin Movies? Bullshit!

"To help everyone understand the Detective Chinatown universe more clearly, our crew specially filmed a 7-episode short series to introduce the story."

"The short drama has been posted on this account. Interested netizens can check it out later."

"That concludes today's live stream. Thank you everyone."

Yu Xiaodong stared at the end of the live replay on the screen, then opened the official account of "Detective Chinatown 2" with a gloomy expression.

The seven newly released short films are each about two minutes long.

In addition to introducing the newly added important characters, the plot mainly introduces the new concept of the World Detective Organization, and there will also be detective and case-solving plots corresponding to the characters.

The short drama's plot flows very smoothly, and instead of spoiling the movie, it further heightens the suspense and foreshadows new characters.

It was posted an hour ago, and has already received over 10,000 likes and comments.

Yu Xiaodong pondered for a while, and when she had a clue, she made a phone call to Chen Yongxiong, the company's vice president and one of the producers of "Operation Red Sea".

Ten minutes later, Chen Yongxiong arrived at the office.

"Mr. Yu, you wanted to see me?"

"Hmm, come and take a look at this."

Yu Xiaodong showed Chen Yongxiong the content of the short drama on the computer.

In just over ten minutes, the number of likes for the seven-episode short drama increased by several thousand, and Yu Xiaodong was certain that Datang Pictures had bought Dou+ (a promotional feature for the short drama).

After watching the short drama, Chen Yongxiong asked, "President Yu, what does this mean?"

"The promotional short film for 'Detective Chinatown 2' was very effective. You are the film planner for 'Operation Red Sea.' I'd like to ask if we could also make a similar promotional short film?"

"This one……"

Chen Yongxiong hesitated for a moment, then shook his head with a troubled expression.

"There are only 5 days left until the movie's release. There's not enough time. How did they manage to film the Tang Dynasty movie?"

"How would I know!"

Yu Xiaodong leaned back in his chair, feeling frustrated. He had been confident of victory in this film promotion campaign, but unexpectedly, things took an unexpected turn.

Chen Yongxiong stared at the short film for a while and exclaimed, "Tsk tsk, someone who can come up with this kind of publicity is a genius."

"how to say?"

“Normally, movie promotion is nothing more than releasing some exciting trailers, but we are not sure if they can attract moviegoers. By using these spin-off prequel short films, we can introduce some background information, help moviegoers understand the movie more easily, and attract people who are not interested in movies before, without affecting the movie itself.”

"You mean, the promotional strategy for this short film is excellent..."

Yu Xiaodong's voice turned somber, and his expression darkened as Chen Yongxiong nodded.

Seeing the number of likes keep increasing after the page was refreshed, Yu Xiaodong felt that all the promotion he had done in the early stages had been overtaken.

After a long silence, he suddenly realized: since he couldn't improve things on his own, he could only try to influence his opponent.

"Mr. Chen, could you contact Weibo and tell them... understand?"

"Will this kind of argument be of any use?"

"Let's try anything, even if it's a dead end! It won't cost much anyway. Monster Hunt 2 is already a flop, so if it can affect Detective Chinatown 2, that would be the best for us."

"Okay, I'll do it right away."

Yu Xiaodong nodded with a gloomy expression. Publicity is nothing more than elevating oneself and belittling the opponent; the methods he is using now are perfectly reasonable.

……

With the support of Dou+, in just three days, all seven episodes of the short series "Detective Chinatown 2" received hundreds of thousands of likes and tens of millions of views.

Live broadcasts are one-off events, but short dramas can continuously boost film promotion.

However, just three days before the start of the Spring Festival film season, a trending topic suddenly appeared on Weibo: "Douyin's short drama promotion is ruining the movie."

The content of the entry boils down to saying that the way short dramas are promoted will affect the viewing experience and also steal the attention from other movies... It's quite illogical, but trending topics on Weibo never care about logic.

Although this trending topic did not directly target Datang Pictures and "Detective Chinatown 2", "Detective Chinatown 2" is currently the only company using short dramas to promote movies on Douyin.

By the time Datang Pictures noticed this trending topic, the hype had already become uncontrollable.

After learning about the trending topic, Zhang Zili immediately went to the office to report the situation to Chen Xiu.

"Boss, this must be a reverse marketing campaign launched by other film producers against 'Detective Chinatown 2'!"

Upon hearing this, Chen Xiu not only marveled at the fierce competition in film promotion during the Spring Festival season, but also showed a thoughtful expression on her face.

Seeing Chen Xiu troubled by this matter, Zhang Zili, who had previously suffered a setback in promoting Douyin, immediately became interested.

"Boss, this is actually easy to solve."

"How to say?"

“Weibo trending topics can be bought with money. This post they made won’t actually affect many people, but we can use this popularity to promote the movie.” “Okay, go on.”

Chen Xiu adjusted her posture and moved closer to Zhang Zili.

Zhang Zili immediately said seriously, "There are only two days left until the movie's release. I suggest we find a well-known figure in the film industry to speak out about this trending topic and help us finish this last wave of promotion."

"Have you chosen someone yet?"

"Yes, Director Feng Xiaogang!"

"he?"

Chen Xiu frowned in confusion, wanting to ask: Why would Feng Kuzi help out of nowhere?

Zhang Zili seemed to understand Chen Xiu's puzzled expression and chuckled, "Boss, I had a lot of contact with Director Feng when I worked at Huayi, so I know him quite well. Actually, Director Feng has wanted to meet you for a long time. As long as you agree, I'll make the contact, and everything will be fine."

"Then go and do it."

Chen Xiu felt that since this didn't cost any money, failure wouldn't have any impact, and success would allow her to promote the movie, so there was no harm in giving it a try.

With his approval, Zhang Zili left the office with a look of excitement on his face.

After everyone left, Chen Xiu turned on her computer to check the pre-sale box office results for "Detective Chinatown 2" during the Spring Festival.

On February 16th, the first day of the Lunar New Year, online ticket sales for "Detective Chinatown 2" had reached 200 million yuan.

This number should double in the next three days.

Other films also performed well in pre-sales. Dou+'s promotion brought these blockbusters to the attention of many people who didn't usually watch movies, leading them to go to the cinema and expanding the entire market.

According to system calculations, the box office revenue on the first day of the Spring Festival may reach 12 billion yuan.

This achievement is enough to break the record for the highest single-day box office in a single global market, previously held by the United States!

After closing his laptop, Chen Xiu leaned back on the sofa, gazing at the empty space ahead with a complicated expression. The conversation he had with Zhang Yiming yesterday when they had dinner together began to surface in his mind.

"How did you come up with the idea of ​​short dramas? I was still thinking about the next stage of Douyin's content development, but you quietly came up with it."

"Douyin has evolved from its rough and primitive content during its wild growth period to its current high-quality content, and the next stage will be story-driven content. This development is just like it was planned in advance."

"Xiu, have you already thought about the future development direction? I think if we really want to move towards story-driven content, then we need to introduce a reward mechanism and develop text-based IPs..."

Chen Xiu's eyes narrowed, and then she slowly sat up.

He was well aware of the impact Douyin short dramas had on TV series and movies, but he never expected that he was the one who started the fire in the first place.

However, Douyin needs to become a truly complete platform and a software that most netizens are accustomed to using. Only with Tomato, the source of text-based IP production, will short dramas find the most suitable environment to thrive.

At this stage, it is too early to talk about vigorously developing short dramas.

Chen Xiu shook her head, stopped thinking about work, picked up her phone, and dialed Luo Shikan's number.

"Hey, Xiao Luo, is the house in Shanghai all set up yet?"

"I don't care about the room decoration. I'll just stay there during the Spring Festival. I'll have plenty of time to decorate it next year."

"OK, book two plane tickets for me, for Lunar New Year's Eve, back to Shanghai."

After hanging up the phone, Chen Xiu frowned slightly, thinking back to the time when Su Xiao and Meng Ziyi met on the Spring Festival.

Meng Ziyi is going to accompany him to Shanghai for the Chinese New Year this year. It seems he didn't talk about this with the silly beauty last time...

……

The next day, Feng Kuzi, a well-known critic and influential figure in the film industry on Weibo, suddenly posted a message.

He retweeted the trending topic "Douyin's short drama promotion is ruining movies," and his first comment was: Short dramas can ruin movies? That's bullshit!
By placing this sentence at the beginning to express his stance, Feng Xiaogang added a long passage of content afterward.

“I noticed that someone posted on Weibo that the short drama ruined the movie. Based on this opinion, I specifically searched for what a short drama is, and then I saw the 7-episode promotional short film for 'Detective Chinatown 2' on Douyin.”

"After watching the short film carefully, I think the person who came up with the idea of ​​using short dramas to promote the movie is simply a genius! The length of a movie is limited, and there are many things that cannot be explained in detail, but the emergence of short dramas can fill in these omitted parts, making it easier for everyone to understand the movie!"

"So short dramas not only don't ruin movies, but they actually help promote them, allowing more people to see them. Every film industry professional should thank the person who invented short dramas..."

Such emotionally charged comments would be beneath Chen Xiu's dignity if she were to make them.

Taking Feng Kuzi as an example, it is more in line with his persona of daring to speak out.

However, most of the content seems to be openly or covertly fawning over someone.

Those familiar with Feng Kuzi wouldn't be surprised to see him behaving this obsequiously.

Only Wang Zhonglei would think one step further: When did that old bastard Feng Kuzi get involved with Chen Xiu?

After Feng Xiaogang's inflammatory remarks were released, the film successfully topped the Weibo entertainment search list. Combined with yesterday's trending topics, "Detective Chinatown 2" essentially enjoyed two days of free trending recommendations on Weibo.

Riding this last wave of momentum, the film's online ticket sales on New Year's Eve successfully surpassed the 3 million mark.

Everything is ready, just waiting for the announcement on the first day of the Lunar New Year.

(End of this chapter)