Chen Dazhi

Suddenly want to see a concert?

The last day of May, May Day is in Tencent.An hour-long online concert was held on the music platform, which led to a wave of screen brushing.

A number of concert-related topics are on the list of Weibo CorpAmong the most popular searches, "Concert on the Antenna in May" has been read nearly 800 million times. Many netizens left messages, "it's great, but the time is a little short", "the lineup is excellent, thanks to the organizers", "realized the dream of grabbing tickets for May days concert" and so on.

The May Antenna Concert was broadcast live on four platforms: QQ Music, KuGou Music, Kuwo Music and National singing. Tencent MusicThe data provided show that the online platforms (including four music platforms and Tencent video, CCTV, etc.)The total number of viewers exceeded 35 million.。

As a TOP-level Chinese orchestra, May Day's first online concert brought obvious screen brushing effect, and TME Live, which hosted the concert behind, also received more attention.

Will TME live be a new growth point for Tencent Music?

TME live is a live music brand launched by Tencent Music in March this year, positioning "integration of live performances, online live streaming, fan economy, ticket sales, performance agents" and other performance ecology. According to Tencent Music, TME live has entered the preparatory stage since last year and was originally scheduled to launch this spring. The models mainly include "offline preparation + online live broadcast" and "pure online presentation". But people related to Tencent Music told 36Kr HoldingsAt this stage, because of the epidemic, we can only adopt a "pure online" model.

Before May, TME live has held 9 live concerts by Rainie Rainie, Lin Junjie, OST, Liu Ruoying, A-Lin, Huaze coriander, Xiao Huangqi and Yuan Yawei. These online live have drawn up themes according to the musicians' respective styles, and the performance venues and forms of performance are also different. For example, A-Lin chooses to perform on the terrace, while Liu Ruoying sings in a small theater.

On the one hand, the rapid rise of TME live has a lot to do with the star musicians invited by the platform, who have a large number of fans and a wide audience of songs, such as May Day, which has more than 20 million Weibo Corp fans as a whole. On the other hand, Tencent Music has also accumulated some experience in live music since 2017, such as livehouse live projects "musician live", "Big Music + Super Live" and so on.

36Kr Holdings observed that during the live broadcast of musicians' concerts, the TME platform has set up some relatively simple interactive functions of virtual gifts, mainly in the form of free gifts. Of course, music fans can also reward music money through "music money". QQ Music sets a minimum recharge threshold of 6 yuan (1 yuan = 10 yuan). The following is the number of viewers who participated in the live broadcast of TME live musicians and the gift income collected by 36Kr Holdings.

Although we have only counted QQ Music as a channel, we can see that at present, compared with the millions or millions of offline concert ticket revenue earned by musicians, the overall scale of live rewards by users is still very small.Some Tencent Music insiders revealed to 36Kr Holdings that generally speaking, the group is still playing quality and word-of-mouth, and commercialization mainly does not depend on this, and there is no hint to guide fans to reward at this stage.

With regard to the way TME live is commercialized, Tencent management mentioned at the performance meeting in the first quarter of this year that online ticketing, virtual gift reward, and opening up "fan space" for fans to communicate and interact during live streaming are all optional monetization paths.

Online paid live streaming of the concert is a feasible way to push up Tencent Music's paid households and music income. Under Weibo Corp, who finished the live broadcast on TME live in May, some netizens left a message saying "willing to pay to watch it." And NetEase, Inc of the same tradeCloud Music has launched an online paid live broadcast model for music performances at the end of April, and 100% of the live revenue for 100 music performances is given to musicians.

There is more room for imagination about the prospect of commercialization of TME live. In the long run, TME live will probably lead users to pay to listen to music and buy digital albums / singles on Tencent Music's platforms through live music. OrThe brand effect of TME live is gradually accumulated and magnified, gathering more live traffic, which may also attract advertisers to place advertisements in the future.。

Tencent Music actively strives for change

For Tencent Music, TME Live is just one of many new businesses it has launched this year. In late April, Tencent Music launched Cool I listen to App, the layout of audio books and other long audio market, hoping to enhance the user stickiness and duration of the platform. A few days later, Tencent Music announced that he would take a stake in offline public broadcasting company Redeo, taking a fancy to the copyright business of background music in public places.

In terms of traditional business, TME has also made a lot of moves this year. In the social entertainment section, for example, this year's focus is on QQ Music Live (FanLive App), which will be launched in June. At the same time, Tencent Music also reached a cooperation with Tencent Games, and its platform introduced game live content.

Tencent Music is actively seeking change this year, and there is a certain degree of realization anxiety behind it.

The social entertainment business, which has been the bulk of TME's revenue and high profit margin, showed signs of slowing in the past two years and fell to single digits in the first quarter of this year due to a decline in the willingness to reward live broadcasts during the epidemic.

After all, the impact of the special factors of the epidemic is temporary, and the intensification of competition in the live broadcast industry as a whole is a longer-term factor. At present, including Douyin and Bilibili Inc.Several high-traffic video platforms are laying out music and other pan-entertainment live broadcasts. This means that if social entertainment wants to get more revenue, it needs Tencent Music to make new investment first.

According to a recruitment document for the live broadcasting association obtained by 36Kr Holdings, QQ Music will launch live broadcast App in June, mainly recruiting three types of core anchors: good-looking acting, talk shows and skills learning (such as games). The percentage given to the guild and the anchors is 40%, 57%, but this proportion does not have an advantage in a large number of live streaming platforms.

Compared with the social entertainment section, Tencent Music's income growth is relying more and more on online music. In the first quarter of this year, online music revenue grew 70% from a year earlier, accounting for a further 32% of total revenue. The increase in payment rates for music users is the main reason, with Tencent Music's conversion rate of paying users reaching 6.5 per cent as of the first quarter of 2020.

The increase in payment rates is mainly due to Tencent Music gradually increasing the proportion of paid songs in the music library. The proportion of paid songs on Tencent Music's platform reached 10 per cent by the end of 2019, and officials say it will rise to 20 per cent by the end of this year. In addition, Tencent Music is also speeding up the conversion of paying users by opening the user experience for both members and non-members. Some time ago, QQ Music tested "interspersing voice ads" among non-green diamond members. However, if the above strategies are not implemented properly, there is a risk of a rebound in user sentiment or even user loss on the platform.

In addition to user experience, Tencent Music's online music business also faces copyright competition. This year, NetEyun Music has successively won the rights to a number of record companies such as Rolling Stone, Warner copyright, Japanese Studio Ghibli, as well as a number of head ensemble songs such as "the year of the Singer" and "immersive".

The action of NetEyun music makes Tencent Music unable to relax his control over the copyright of head music. After formally acquiring a 10 per cent stake in Universal Music in March, Tencent Music was recently rumoured to be buying a stake in Warner Music for $200m. However, compared with the previous buyout of song rights, buying a stake in the record company means that Tencent Music is going deep into the upper reaches of the industrial chain to increase his say in tapping the commercial value of music.

On the whole, under the background of intensified market competition, Tencent Music is going deep into more links of the industrial chain (such as performances, buying shares in record companies, etc.), and integrating musicians, live broadcasts and other resources on the platform to launch new business and seek change. It will take time to see whether this new change will bring it real income.