Short drama marketing: Buzzword or blue ocean market in China?

In July, McDonald's China debuted its first short drama, elevating the trend of short drama marketing to unprecedented levels in the market. Short drama (or microdrama) marketing has surged in recent years, turning into a trendy topic in late 2023, and ranking fifth among the top 10 buzzwords in Chinese marketing for the first half of 2024.

In China, short dramas have evolved beyond product placement—promoting everything from burgers to medicine. Brands can now harness the power of celebrity endorsements and tailored narratives, or even become the principal sponsor to deeply integrate the brand with the short drama, gaining increased exposure and attention.

Another advantage of short dramas is the ability to provide direct links to product pages. If viewers are interested in a product showcased in the drama, they can simply click to buy it, offering a fast track to sales conversion for brands in an increasingly competitive marketing world.

Recently, agencies have released numerous reports on short drama marketing in the Chinese market. Dentsu China published ‘A crash course in the science of short drama marketing’, summarising three keywords: “Good looking, good for fun, and good to buy”. The report analysed the short drama marketing process ‘SHORT’ into five steps: Sense, hit, optimise, remix, and technique. The procedure begins with an insightful understanding to hit pain points, optimising content and placement while remixing other resources with supporting techniques to achieve the goal.

According to Shengnan Zhan, managing director of Dentsu China, who is spearheading the team responsible for this report, “The essence of a short drama lies in its fusion of the production quality and storytelling of a long-form drama variety video with the communicative and interactive elements of a short video.”

Dentsu is building a model to gauge short dramas from three aspects: “Alignment with brand benefits, attributes of content quality, and the ability to drive promotion." The model will assess whether the short drama is appropriate for the brand’s stage, whether it can generate enough brand influence, and whether it can stimulate peripheral buzz and conversions.

The Centre of Excellence (COE), a research group under Omnicom Media Group, too, has coined the term ‘Short Drama 2.0 Era’. Their recent studies uncover the rich content of short dramas on the Kuaishou platform, which reached a total viewership of 270 million in 2023, marking a year-on-year growth of 3.8%. The COE also finds that nearly 80% of short drama users tune in weekly, with daily viewing duration seeing a year-on-year increase of 17.2%.

In the 2.0 era, based on COE data, the user base is predominantly young people—especially females—with the majority from the post-2000s generation and over 60% from the post-80s generation. Approximately 70% of users live in third to fifth-tier cities. For them, viewing short dramas on Kuaishou has become a significant form of relaxation and amusement.

Both reports revealed that most short drama audiences are female.

A recent hit has also made the most of co-creation and a mutually beneficial approach between placement and content. To present Bactroban Ointment, Haleon sponsored a short drama telling stories between a mother and daughter. As Riki Li, managing director, platform solution, Zenith China, pointed out, “In ‘Deskmate with My Daughter’, the creative approach to product placement generated huge social buzz. When the first episode went online, it immediately topped China’s viewership ranking platform Maoyan.”

She calls it “synergistic, flavouring a joint approach in developing the right content rather than a 50-50 weightage."

“Beyond an excellent script, innovative product placements that seamlessly integrate into dramatic scenarios are crucial. Unlike conventional long dramas and variety shows, short dramas offer unique psychological insights and focal points, making product placements more engaging and relevant to target audiences. Creative sound effects and impactful copy further amplify the memorability and media buzz surrounding the product,” Li added.

Behind the hit work, Publicis Media adopts a 'Pulse' solution for short drama marketing, which includes, pinpoint brand objective, understand TA preference, locate right platform, segment potential drama,  and evaluate performance. 

In reality, it could take up to two months to implement a short drama plan from the very beginning to the final evaluation stage. Li summarised it into three dimensions: “The first dimension primarily determines the value and requirements for the proposed co-creation, which may take up to a month. We engage the client in thorough discussions, considering market trends, media case studies, client benefits, and partnership strategies for various media scenarios."

"The second dimension centres on developing the execution outline, detailing the specific actions and methodologies to be employed. The final dimension assesses the efficiency of resource utilisation. Based on the marketing goals, we define quantitative objectives as KPI guidelines for media buying. This phase, from initiation to final resource allocation, typically spans two to three weeks.”

L-R: Shengnan Zhang, Riki Li and Rickie Hao

Is short drama still a blue ocean market in China?

For brand marketing experts in China, despite fiercer competition, short dramas remain a blue ocean with high market potential.

Zhan observed that in China, a variety of short and long video platforms are delving into the novel format of ‘short drama+’. With the advancement and proliferation of new technologies like AIGC, the short drama sector is also seeking to discover more varied points of engagement and excitement for consumers.

“In addition to a handful of beauty and FMCG brands, numerous brands are still adopting a cautious approach towards short drama, lacking a systematic and professional methodology for short drama marketing. However, as the format becomes more mature and standardised, and as more high-quality works emerge, there will be significant potential for growth in [this kind of] marketing, ” she adds.

Rickie Hao, content marketing group business director at Initiative China, reflects on the initial phases of short drama. It first emerged in China in 2013 but only gained popularity since the summer of 2020 due to changes in regulations and policies. Alongside competitions on major short video platforms, short drama seized this opportunity to experience substantial growth.

She predicts that “the timeframe for achieving systematic commercial value in China is projected to be within the coming three to four years. Meanwhile, the international market for short dramas has already matured and exhibited substantial commercial value.”

Hao also provides data for a deeper understanding. The year 2023 was a turning point, with an increase in numbers, variety of content themes, and production quality. Statistics show that in 2023, the short drama market was valued at approximately 37.5 billion RMB (about US$ 5.17 billion). By 2027, the market for short dramas is projected to expand to a staggering 100 billion RMB (about US$ 13.78 billion).

Li analyses this emerging content medium, emphasising the interaction between data, content, and audience behind the scenes. “Its popularity also stems from having a data-driven platform which helps refine strategy based on audience tagging to more effectively amplify content distribution. This enhances data collection and evaluation, which helps short dramas enhance their content and offerings to brands.”

She anticipates that short dramas have the potential to become marketing sites that integrate the three goals of ‘traffic + scene + conversion’ in the future, enabling brands or products to achieve different communication tasks at different stages of the marketing lifecycle.

A challenging but rewarding new advertising format in China

Zhan thinks it is challenging to tell a compelling story in such a short period. “Brands shouldn’t merely serve as promotional content. They should also possess a storyline, setting a high bar for storytelling prowess in content creation.”

She believes that the primary merit of collaborating on short dramas stems from its amalgamation of content power, communicative strength, and empathetic resonance. It merges high-quality content with enduring value, succinct content with potent dissemination points and relevance, as well as a robust response to societal trends and audience sentiments with interactive potential. This makes it an ideal medium for brands to express potent emotions and values, stir consumer feelings, supplemented by operational strategies, ultimately leading to a conversion.

Hao emphasises that “the ability to consistently innovate and engage the audience, sustain interest, and swiftly generate responses without sacrificing creativity or viewer appeal” are key challenges for short drama marketing. Besides, quality control, production time, and cost control are also key concerns.

Li admits that with the influx of short drama content into the market, estimating and evaluating its dissemination effectiveness has become more challenging.

But she is confident in large platform ecosystems, such as Douyin and Kuaishou. “The most valuable part of the short drama lies in the data-driven, fine-tuned operations within large platforms. They do a better job at developing themes, scenes, and commercial entry points based on consumer behaviour insights. Based on viewer tags, targeted streaming can be improved, thereby reducing costs and increasing efficiency to drive traffic. These platforms have integrated a brand value evaluation system that allows brands to methodically assess both the short-term and long-term effectiveness of their investments in short dramas. It truly provides clear insights into the brand impact and conversion for investment in short dramas.”

Striking the balance between content and product is the ultimate goal

Zhan shares her production experience with brands working on short dramas. Her team focuses on increasing exposure and improving user sentiment. “Firstly, we need to utilise content evaluation and data models to select good dramas and bet on potential hits. Secondly, product placement needs to serve the content. We should choose scenes that match the tone and are memorable. Thirdly, brands need to understand the art of ‘leaving white space’, avoiding overloading with professional jargon, and appropriately using operational means and content packaging to highlight the brand’s presence and product points.”

Hao thinks that “When a brand prioritises content, it has already struck a balance between product placement and the content itself. This ensures that the brand’s message aligns with the short drama, making it engaging to watch. A straightforward solution to this issue is for the brand to conduct a thorough evaluation of the short drama’s content, or a series of short dramas. This includes understanding the audience, plot arrangement, production, delivery platform, etc., to determine whether the content will support product integration or create a disconnect, rendering the communication ineffective.”

Li believes that the ultimate goal is to balance the costs of content creation with media buying while maximising ROI.

“We leverage social media data analytic tools, including Fluency and BrandRadar. These tools provide deep insights into consumer product preferences and social media content, combined with genre-specific themes. We co-create short dramas that resonate with the target audience. These analytic tools also enhance media buying more cost-efficiently as it attracts a broader and more relevant audience."

"They enable us to target core and potential users while also estimating media costs based on industry CPC calculations with great precision, thereby assessing the feasibility of media resource allocation under budget. To further maximise ROI, continuous engagement is deployed to spark and spread the content virally.”