The audio works are rich in content and warm people’s hearts. The audio is coming. Will you listen?
A lady is experiencing the "Audio Library". Xinhua News Agency reporter Tang Yushe
In the morning, smart speakers broadcast the weather and key news of the day to you; Smart cars automatically continue playing music that they haven’t listened to yesterday; Late at night, click on a new audio-visual book and slowly fall asleep … With the development of mobile Internet and the popularity of smart terminals, audio-related content is entering many people’s daily lives.
Not long ago, Tencent Music Entertainment Group released a long audio strategy and launched a new long audio product, "Cool I Listen". Audio platforms such as Himalayan, Litchi FM and Dragonfly FM are also actively adding long audio. At the moment when video products are on fire, how can long audio suddenly emerge? Can we achieve sustainable development?
"Good things are worth paying for"
Every night before going to bed, Ms. Huang, who works in a company in Beijing, will open an audio APP and listen to a program about Zhuangzi, which has gradually become a habit. Ms. Huang said: "The writer’s interpretation of Zhuangzi is very profound, which helps to calm the mental anxiety and find his own comfort during the epidemic prevention." She also spent more than 80 yuan to buy 33 highlights. In her view, "good things are worth paying for."
Cultivating more paying audience users like Ms. Huang is one of the purposes of many online audio platforms to lay out long audio.
At an online conference held on this year’s World Book Day, Tencent Music Entertainment Group released the long audio strategy, and at the same time launched a new long audio product-"Cool I Listen". The promotion contents include the healing programs "Radio Cheng Yi" and "Radio Ricci" that meet the emotional needs of users, the popular online drama audio book Joy of Life, and its own programs "Example Reading" and "Wonderful Journey of National Treasures".
"We will help the development of long audio business through the collaboration of online music and social entertainment services, and accelerate the integration of music and audio to provide users with richer and better audio-visual content and product experience." Cussion Pang, CEO of Tencent Music Entertainment Group, said.
In addition to Tencent, there are many companies in the long audio market. Himalayan, litchi FM, dragonfly FM, koala FM, Netease Cloud Music, etc., constantly explore the path of sustainable development through live voice, live video and audio books. For example, Himalaya has invested a lot of money to develop the radio drama of the sci-fi work "Three-body", and invited celebrities to endorse and produce interactive suspense dramas; Litchi FM and Dragonfly FM launched a star radio station and a star live broadcast room respectively; Tik Tok tried to spoil the voice field by making friends through live voice broadcast.
Analysts believe that with Tencent and other industry giants entering the field of long audio, the penetration rate of online audio content will be greatly improved, the market cake will become bigger, and user education and guidance will be further accelerated.
The user scale is expected to exceed 500 million
Long audio is widely concerned, which is related to the rapid development of online audio market in recent years. Lai Yilong, CEO of Litchi FM, believes that each media has its own characteristics, and the sound is full of emotion, which is different from the scene of video application. People need sound to accompany them and need sound to warm their hearts.
In Lai Yilong’s view, voice has two outstanding characteristics: first, it is interactive, for example, social activities can be carried out through "Lian Mai"; Second, it has the companion attribute, which makes it more advantageous in fragmented mobile scenes. Therefore, the online audio platform can establish a strong emotional connection and stickiness with users.
So, why is long audio suddenly favored? According to industry analysts, audio works play a unique role in the layout of the whole industrial chain of intellectual property rights, with short liquidation period and high efficiency.
A study by Ai Media Consulting shows that the number of users in the online audio industry is expected to reach 542 million in 2020. Among them, audio works will become an important direction of content payment, and more than 70% of the interviewed users are willing to pay for it.
In addition to paying for the content of audio works, the online audio platform also promotes the value-added services and advertisements of live broadcast services. Songlin Li, an analyst with Ai Media Consulting, believes that the audio payment model has great potential and is suitable for the spread of knowledge payment such as quality courses, and many platforms are strengthening the layout of content payment related businesses.
Vigorously support content entrepreneurs
Recently, 11 audio and video platforms, including 2 audio platforms, have submitted rectification reply letters to Zhejiang Consumer Protection Committee to rectify and implement the problems of members’ consumption experience mentioned in previous interviews. These problems include unclear description of advertising privileges, easy opening and difficult cancellation, and ineffective information collection authorization.
With the rise of long audio membership business, related problems have gradually emerged. Some media surveys have found that there are a lot of vulgar content suspected of "playing erotic edge ball" in some audio platforms. In response to these chaos, the national network information department, together with relevant departments, launched a special rectification work, and took punishments such as interviewing and shutting down platform services for multiple audio platforms with problems.
On March 1st this year, the Regulation on Ecological Governance of Network Information Content was officially implemented. The "Regulations" clearly require that online information content producers and service platforms should earnestly perform their responsibilities and abide by laws and regulations, and prohibit the dissemination and promotion of vulgar, vulgar, kitsch and other audio-visual content. This means that in terms of content control, relevant departments need to urge the audio platform to further assume the main responsibility.
Another question is, with the increasing popularity of long audio, how can the online audio platform avoid risks and achieve sustainable development when the subsequent profit and business model are not perfect?
Some experts suggest that after the user cultivation is completed, the audio platform should continuously deepen the content resources, expand more consumption scenarios, and comprehensively support audio content entrepreneurs from the aspects of capital, traffic and business incubation to create more high-quality works; At the same time, establish an all-audio ecosystem and strengthen the brand value of the platform.