How Your Content Can Get 1 Million Views on Average
A story about how you can turn a possibility into reality.
Since ancient times, China has been the most heterogeneous yet unique country. The Western region made many attempts to exchange with China, but only limited exchanges were actually carried out through the Silk Road until the Age of Exploration. Even in the 21st Century, where many things are connected through the Internet, many aspects of China remain veiled. While fearful of unknown territory, most people will agree that China has greater potential than any other country. Let us introduce two content creators who are turning the possibility of China into a reality through adoba.
The two creators, Dayi(大一的吃货生活) and Nama(Nanya姐姐), are much more popular in China than in YouTube. They even won an award at the ‘International Short Video Competition Awards: My China Story’, hosted by the Chinese Foreign Language Bureau in 2021 and 2022 respectively. The award selects and credits outstanding foreign creators within the market.
Dayi currently operates the ‘大一的吃货生活’ channel in Chinese platforms. His main content is traveling and introducing a wide variety of food and restaurants. The name ‘Dayi’ has a Chinese meaning of ‘freshman in college’, so his Chinese fans often joke about ‘advancing to a sophomore’ after winning the award.
Nama is also very active in China as ‘Nanya姐姐’. The name directly translates to ‘Big Sister Nanya’. True to her identity, she provides viewers with laughter and a lot of fun with a whole-hearted appearance as if she really is your friendly big sister in the neighborhood. Her reaction videos towards various Chinese cultures are receiving warm responses in particular.
Nama has nearly 500K subscribers with an average of over 1M views solely on her Douyin channel. Keep in mind that there are multiple platforms you can operate in China, so the total combined number that all of her channels are recording is close to being uncountable. Dayi’s strong point, on the other hand, is his extremely loyal fanbase. Unlike most channels where the number of views are not even close to the number of subscribers, his total view count is very consistent with his total subscribers.
The standout characteristic they have in common is that they are full of interest in China. They both have been immersed in Chinese culture for a very long time.
Dayi’s first encounter with China was back in 2011 while studying abroad in Beijing. He had a vague idea of wanting to do something in China, backed by the wonderful experience that he was having at the time.
Even after returning to Korea after the studying period, he simply could not forget his life in China. After graduating, he worked at various companies, such as cosmetics companies and beauty app developers. Then, by coincidence, he seized the opportunity to become a content creator in China.
In 2019, when he was working at a cosmetics company, he was in charge of live commerce. Live commerce was rising in popularity in China at that time, so he was able to generate outstanding results quickly. He himself also became somewhat of a household name in the process. He got attention from a lot of people, and he thought he had a talent for live broadcasting. He left the company and went to China to pursue his talent.
Nama’s likings for China had started even earlier. When she was in school, she fell in love with a Chinese singer named Jimmy Lin(Lin Chih-ying). So she went on to major in Chinese language in high school. Unlike her friends whose goal was to become a diplomat or get a job in a good company, she chose the Chinese language department to listen to Chinese songs and understand their meaning.
After she got into work after graduating, she always had content creation in her mind. She fell into a slump after working for over 10 years. She was very hesitant to start anew because of her age and her baby. However, looking back on the most enjoyable time in her life, it was watching Chinese dramas and ‘fantasizing’ Chinese stars. That’s why she gathered up the courage to upload content on Chinese platforms.
Nan Ya Jie Jie shared her secret to captivating Chinese viewers as a foreigner whose Chinese is not perfect, ‘authenticity’. Nama said that the viewers do not hate or resent her because of her inability to speak Chinese. Rather, it’s quite the direct opposite. She said that she always filmed videos with errors in her Chinese language, but the viewers simply appreciated her effort to try and learn.
Nama has been active on Chinese platforms for 5 years. She regularly uploads content once or twice a week. Her diligent upload frequency is for constant communication with her fans, though her content might not be of the highest quality every week.
There were also difficult times. She almost gave up her creative activities. While juggling through work and childcare, with the addition of filming and editing, her life was total chaos. It’s usually already past midnight when she finishes watching her kids after work, so she had to stay up until 3~4 A.M. to put work into her videos. At this point, she had made up her mind and told her fans that she was going to quit.
Then, to her surprise, the fans told her to never stop and keep going. One particular fan said that he watched Nama’s videos every night before going to bed, and he would re-watch old videos if there weren’t any new uploads. His story made her realize her genuine love for her fans, and why she has been persistent with her chaotic life.
