“American Hollywood movies, Japanese anime, Korean idol dramas and Chinese online literature”
These are the “Four Great Cultural Wonders of the World” that were circulated on the Internet a few years ago. Although many people just take this as a joke, it is undeniable that the development of China’s online literature industry in recent years is remarkable.
According to the “ Research Report on Chinese Online Literature Going Overseas in 2020” released by iResearch, the scale of China’s online literature market reached 20.17 billion yuan in 2019, the scale of overseas markets reached 460 million yuan, and the number of overseas Chinese online literature users reached 31.935 million.
Another issued by the Chinese Writers Association, “2020 China Internet Literature Blue Book” showed that, there are 1 million overseas Chinese network literature works, over 4000 authorized physical books, and 3000 online translation works. The reading website and App have more than 100 million subscribers and users, covering most countries and regions in the world.
The rapid development of online literature has enabled the platform and authors to obtain huge dividends.
01
App is the next main battlefield
In the survey report of iResearch, more than 88% of overseas online readers read through mobile apps.
Although the industry generally regards the rise of a series of translation websites such as WuxiaWorld.com as an important milestone in China’s online literature going overseas, it is undeniable that the main battlefield of Chinese online literature has gradually migrated from web pages to apps. The leading manufacturers of online publications have also noticed this.
Source: App Growing Global
Head publishers such as Zhangyue, ChineseAll, and Stary all operate multiple reading apps at the same time , and even derive products such as audiobooks, interactive games, and animation platforms to build a complete content ecosystem. But there are also companies that focus one app, like Yuewen.
02
Is North America / Southeast Asia still a blue ocean market?
From the App Growing Global monitored mobile advertising data, North America and Southeast Asia are the most important target markets for Books & Reference app.
Source: App Growing Global
Users in North America have good reading habits and have a continuous demand for content. Their payment habits have undergone market adjustments and the user quality is high. At the same time, due to fierce media buying competition, the cost and difficulty of acquiring customers in North America are also High.
The Southeast Asian market has also attracted the attention of Chinese literature publishers due to the huge user and market potential. And Southeast Asian users have a higher acceptance of Chinese literature content due to similar cultural backgrounds. However, the monetization path in Southeast Asian market is not clear. The paid subscription service could not fully satisfy Southeast Asian users. Many manufacturers are exploring mixed monetization business models.
In addition to North America and Southeast Asia, where English-speaking users account for the majority of the market, there are also manufacturers who choose to turn to the small-language market including Spanish bookstores “ManoBook” of Changdu, and Stary’s Tagalog-language “Yugto”, Spanish-language “Sueñovela”, Russian-language “ЧитРом” and so on.
03
Advertising & Operation
After several years of precipitation and accumulation, the Chinese online literature apps have got a systematic method of media buying and customer acquisition. Both advertising medium and materials have shown certain characteristics, and the overall advertising volume has also increased year by year.
3.1 Hinovel
According to the recent media buying data of “ Hinovel “ on Google Play, it can be seen that this app is widely advertising in the global market. App Growing Global has captured its ads in 42 major regions around the world, and the ads were evenly distributed without tendency. The media is mainly the Facebook platform, and the in-feed based advertising form is a relatively standard online literature app promotion model.
From the point of ad content, there are both “betrayal & counter-attack” stories for males, and “twisted love” for females. The materials are usually clips of film and television works.
Perhaps because of the need for transnational advertising, the video has no lines or dubbing, but a pure music BGM.
Ad 01：
Source: App Growing Global
Ad 02：
Source: App Growing Global
3.2 Bravonovel
The media buying of another popular online literature app “Bravonovel” is just the same. It also uses Facebook ‘s various advertising platforms as the main channel, and carries out a large number of ads around the globe.
In terms of advertising materials, compared to Hinovel, Bravonovel has a higher proportion of picture materials, and it has a prominent feature, which is to leave a copy box on the picture. The copy is usually only a few sentences, but it can quickly reflect the stories’ contradiction and arouse users’ curiosity. Although it affects the look of pictures, in fact, there are many advertisers that process picture materials in this way.
Ad 01:
Source: App Growing Global
Ad 02:
Source: App Growing Global
In our observations, we also found that most of the advertising materials for online literature apps are general materials. On App Growing Global, some materials that performed well in user acquisition are related with dozens of reading apps at the same time.
The number of related advertisers on App Growing Global represents the number of apps that have used this material.
These materials are usually themes that people all over the world like to hear and see, such as “dominant CEO”, “counterattack stories”, “marriage, love and childbirth”, “monsters and ghosts” and so on. The source of the material is generally film and television to cut out and paste.
What’s interesting is that images of pregnant women often appear in such materials. Perhaps it is the hope that pregnant women & tragedy plots can inspire users’ sympathy.
Ad 01:
Source: App Growing Global
Ad 02:
Source: App Growing Global
Ad 03:
Source: App Growing Global
The above is “Chinese Online Literature App: With Giant Leading the Way, How to Succeed in Advertising”, log in App Growing Global now to get more mobile advertising information.
- The above-related advertising creatives are sourced from App Growing Global, which are only used for research and analysis. All Rights Reserved.
