Why is Now the Time to Invest in Live Streaming?

“What do you do for a living?” 

“I’m a full-time live streamer in China.”

The popularity of live streaming has boomed in recent years, with the obvious explosive growth coming on the back of an increased global social media presence. Chinese streaming companies are at the forefront of this emerging trend. China Internet Network Information Centre announced that there were 425 million live stream users back in July 2018. The graph below shows the market size of online live streaming of recent years in China, with forecasts of 112.09 billion CNY ($15 billion) until 2020, according to Statistika.

What is Live Streaming?

Live streaming is the broadcasting of real-time video over the internet, live streamers can create their own live shows at home or anywhere to attract audiences, encompassing a wide range of topics, like showcasing talent, educational programs, playing a video game, selling products, etc. Additionally, they can interact with each other during the whole process as if in real life. Among 200+ popular streaming platforms in China, the top five are Yingke, Yizhibo, Douyu, YY, and Meipai.

Why people love it?

• Live streaming platforms give “ordinary people” the chance to create their own live shows without being a star or celebrity, to have their own fan group, basically, everyone can be a host or broadcaster.
• With the people of same interests in a channel, you can meet a large number of new friends with common topics, the engagement rate can be astonishingly high, and the streamers could build up a fan base very quickly.
• The platforms enable the users to earn money from their content, the host receives about 30% commission of the virtual gifts that the audience gives to them, which encourages them to produce interesting and high-quality content.

“They like to chat with me and feel like I’m talking to them face to face.”

These are the words of a 23-year-old girl from Douyu, she has more than 2 million subscribers and attracts a 400,000 strong audience every night on average by playing computer games and chatting through her webcam. Her yearly income is more than a million Chinese yuan yearly from her performances.

Another common practice for live streaming is in e-commerce, presented on Taobao and Tmall, the biggest Chinese online shopping platforms. Through such means interactivity is promoted, most-importantly the consumers aren’t just passively watching, they actually buy the products they see and otherwise interacting socially.

“E-commerce stores come to me and I will assign live streamers to promote their products, top streamers in my team can help sell more than 1,000 items within a day,” said Ma Tingting, a talent agency manager that represents more than 100 contracted live streamers, in an interview with CNBC Asia.

Top tips to help you become a popular live-streaming host:

1. As a live streaming host, it is important to find your niche, because it’s not easy to be famous for following the mainstream. Be creative, pay close attention to the little things in your daily life, and see if you can discover a gap in the market.
2. Once you find your niche, you need to secure the position, then the money will simply roll in, keep being active on the channel and maintain a consistent live streaming schedule.
3. You don’t necessarily need a special talent to share with the world, instead, if you can find an interesting point even eating, travelling, and sleeping can be a topic.
4. Don’t be afraid of being a foreigner, on the contrary, as being a foreigner itself among all the Chinese users is your biggest advantage, even better if you speak some Chinese, or at least find someone to help with translations. Teaching English or any language you speak will be educational, everybody likes a good lesson for free.
5. Use it in a positive way, don’t go over the edge. Due to the strict internet censorship in China, anything irregular can be blocked within seconds by the channel’s supervisors or reporters.

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