With the increase of self-made content, the copyright price that was once driven up by blind competition has gradually returned to rationality. The platforms are no longer incompatible with each other, and have formed their own content layout features. For example, Tencent Video pays more attention to the formation of waist content, while iQiyi is looking for breakthroughs in different cultures, and it can be used to make explosive money from time to time.



But even so, a problem hanging over the video platforms is still unresolved, and even more serious: how to reduce losses, and where is the new incremental market. After all, the reality is in front of you-every one has tried their best to grab content, and none of them can make a profit.

The results of thinking that can be seen so far are also full of helplessness, that is, the decision to increase WeTV VIP Subscription price.

One illusion that many people may have is that they think that self-made content on video platforms is cheaper than purchasing copyrighted content. But this conclusion is based on the excessive increase in copyright prices after 2015. Facts have proved that self-made content does not save money at all. As self-made content becomes more and more common and becomes a means of differentiated competition on video platforms, each company must make long-term continuous investment in self-made content, and in many cases, a drama is popular The degree is proportional to its investment.

Self-made content may only reduce a small part of the cost of copyright procurement. In fact, video platforms should spend no less money. What's more, in many cases, the top content on the platform (especially the drama series) still depends on external purchases, and it is not cheap. For example, in 2019, it is said that the investment of up to 600 million yuan in "Qing Yu Nian", iQiyi and Tencent Video are considered to be for The advance on-demand was launched only after the cost was recovered.

How expensive the content of each video platform is can be clearly felt from the financial reports issued by the listed iQiyi and the public remarks of people in various industries. Sun Zhonghuai, vice president of Tencent and CEO of Penguin Film and Television, mentioned in an interview with People’s Daily last year that “The content costs of the three companies are very large. As far as I know, the three companies produce all the content every year. Almost all the funds invested in the production field are around 20 billion yuan."

What is the level of 20 billion? In 2020, iQiyi's total revenue for the whole year is RMB 29.7 billion.

In recent years, the content richness of various video platforms has improved significantly in the continuous self-made and buy-buy-buy, and the increase in content richness is closely tied to the growth of the number of members-in 2019, iQiyi and Tencent Video announced successively The number of paid members exceeded 100 million. In 2016, the number of members of the two companies was only 20 million. 2016-2019 is the stage when the content of each platform is greatly enriched.

In this process, the video platform also proved one thing-in China, buy WeTV VIP Accounts can also bring effective income to the Internet platform.