Aiming for more goals

Zhu Feng brings her Xingzhan multichannel network into the spotlight.[Photo provided to China Daily]

Today, Zhu's ambitions have gone beyond being an internet celebrity.

"What I plan is a multichannel network with diverse centers," she says. "I have to consistently provide content in different categories, tailored to audience demand."

Multichannel networks work with video platforms like YouTube to offer assistance to a channel owner in areas, such as product and audience development, and program funding in exchange for a percentage of the advertisement revenue from that channel.

In 2015, Zhu founded her network Xingzhan, meaning "star station", in Shanghai. Now, programs on more than 20 topics covering a wide range from sports to child care, are operated by her team of 50 people. The average age of her team is around 25, because people in their 20s are considered "internet natives", she says.

"If some programs are no longer popular, we cut them out. But we can also resume them anytime we like," she explains her strategy to keep up with competition.

Speaking about the requirements for her staff, Zhu says the spirit of creativity is more important than experience and background.

A design director on the team used to be the owner of a photography studio in a small town. He was hired by Zhu because he was good at designing emojis.

In 2016, about 800 short videos were produced on Xingzhan that got more than 800 million views. Zhu says only 20 percent of that ushered in more streams, while the rest were "bullet shells" that helped her and her team learn about what needed to be done to make them successful.

Though most of her video programs are short, the production process is detailed.

For instance, during Euro 2016, a colleague stayed up all night to watch the matches and discovered interesting material on soccer. Another cut a raw tape from it. So, when Zhu arrived at her office on those mornings, she would take half an hour to record short programs based on the demos. The programs went online a few hours after match time each day and became hits.

Nevertheless, Zhu no longer watches soccer games that often now. As a diehard fan of FC Bayern Munich, she says this soccer season had ended for her when the team got eliminated by Real Madrid in a quarterfinal of UEFA Champions League.

There may be another explanation: For someone with such great expectations, time is precious.

"I think an era of social network, based on short videos, will emerge," she says. "Using short videos will be the first thing you do via smartphones, like the Chinese app WeChat."

She says when 5G becomes widely available and huge data usage is no longer a luxury, videos will start to function like search engines.

"What we see from Zhu is not only youth, but extraordinary passion and creativity in production and promotion of the short videos," says Hu Yu, executive director of the Institute for Cultural Creativity at Tsinghua University.

"China now has an unprecedented opportunity of progressive movement in cultural creativity industries."