Virtual Characters Are The New Opinion Leaders In China’s Beauty Industry
In China, more and more brands are adopting virtual characters synthesized by computer graphics for their promotions, and the beauty industry is no exception. The following are some examples of how cosmetic brands and retailers are actively using them in their marketing.
According to iiMedia Research, a Chinese research firm, the 2020 market size for virtual idol-related activities in China, including commercials, promotions, and video distribution, grew 69.3% YoY to 64.56 billion yuan (US$9.8 billion). And it is expected to increase 66.5% to 1.074 billion yuan (US$1.66 billion) in 2021. In the first half of 2020, more than 4,000 virtual idols were distributed monthly on the Chinese video hosting platform bilibili.
L’Oreal launches a series of virtual characters
L’Oréal China is launching a series of virtual characters for the Chinese market.
In September 2020, MG, a Chinese brand under L’Oréal’s umbrella, launched the virtual character “Miss M” at the China International Import Expo. Dressed in a white Chinese cheongsam dress, Miss M is modeled on the image of a traditional Chinese woman. Her movements in the video are somewhat clunky, but that hasn’t stopped her from appearing in live commerce at Tmall flagship stores and other locations, and from gaining a fan base.
In addition, L’Oréal China released a virtual character group called “欧爷 (Oh Yeah)” in March 2021. It consists of four men and three female assistants who are half-Chinese and half-French. The fresh-faced men take on the roles of an ingredient expert, a newspaper department manager, a social networking professional, and a sustainability guru, respectively. They frequently appear on the official L’Oreal China WeChat account to provide information about L’Oreal and skin knowledge.
MAKE UP FOR EVER collaborates with Tencent-based characters
One Chinese brand that is focusing on virtual characters is Florasis, one of the most promising emerging brands today. The brand released an avatar with the same name as the brand on June 1, 2021. On its official WeChat account, the brand ran a campaign where people who shared posts about the virtual character in their groups or wrote comments on them could win products in a lucky draw.
There are also brands that collaborate with existing characters instead of original ones. “MAKE UP FOR EVER collaborated with the virtual character “Xing Pupil” from Tencent’s online game series “QQ炫舞” to offer gift items at the “618” sale event.
Xing Pupil, with silver hair and blue eyes, is a popular virtual character with more than 420,000 followers on its official Weibo account. She has been releasing her original songs and holding online live performances, and she became the art fashion makeup ambassador for MAKE UP FOR EVER after the collaboration.
Virtual idols performing with popular KOLs
Brands are not the only ones using virtual characters. The drugstore Watsons released its own AI virtual character, Wilson, in 2019. The blond character targets a female fan base and is drawn in a cartoon-like style.
Wilson appears in Watsons’ WeChat mini-program, but there is also a mini-program for Wilson alone. In an online game-like screen, you can talk to Wilson, play games with him, and even perform AI skin tests. The company also has an official account on Weibo, where it announces campaigns and other events, and has over 190,000 followers.
The use of virtual characters is also spreading to e-commerce platforms. In August 2020, Tmall announced that it would use the avatar of the idol Jackson Yee as its image character, and launched a virtual space in the app called “LXSH Parallel World” where users can interact with each other.
According to reports, about 50 million users have visited the LXSH Parallel World. Although the service has now been discontinued, the number of views of the hashtag “Jackson Yee Virtual Avatar Tmall” on Weibo alone exceeded 3.7 billion, indicating that the promotion was quite effective.
In December last year, Tmall launched the cat-eared virtual idol “喵酱” (“Miaojiang”) on bilibili, drawn in a unique anime style. On International Women’s Day on March 8 this year, she shared the stage in a live commerce event with Austin, a top KOL, to spice things up.
Platforms that automatically generate virtual models are also emerging
Virtual characters are a great way for brands and platforms to reach out to Generation Z because they create buzz, but the introduction and use of these characters is also driven by the rising cost of using real-life KOLs.
According to marketing firm The Drum, the global influencer marketing market size in 2020 was US$9.7 billion and is expected to grow to US$15 billion by 2022. By then, some estimates suggest that 20% of marketing budgets will be spent on influencer content, a heavy burden for brands. In fact, Estee Lauder is reported to have spent 75% of its marketing costs on influencers in August 2019.
Because live commerce is so common in China, the percentage of costs spent on influencers (KOLs) is likely to be greater than in other countries. The development of virtual characters is also aimed at lowering that cost.
Compared to flesh-and-blood humans, it is difficult to promote the actual effects of products with virtual characters that are almost two-dimensional. And this is where the virtual human “AYAYI”, who looks almost like a real human being, comes into focus. Since its appearance in May 2021, it has become a hot topic on the Chinese Internet, with an account on RED and nearly 100,000 followers.
As represented by AYAYI, virtual characters are evolving in the direction of being more realistic. Currently, it is too costly to make them move naturally in three dimensions, and it seems difficult to put them to practical use in live commerce immediately, but Alibaba has already shown the potential.
In December 2020, the company implemented Taji, a solution for automatically generating virtual models on its platform for store owners, Alibaba Original Creation Protection. This allows users to easily generate images of clothing and a virtual model wearing it.
According to the Alibaba-affiliated owned media “Tianxia Netcom”, it was originally developed for the purpose of creating Caucasian virtual models. The labor cost of foreign models in China is skyrocketing, with hourly wages ranging from 1,000 to 3,000 yuan (US$152–456), which can exceed 10,000 yuan (US$1,500) if you hold them for a day for a photoshoot. Using Taji is a great way to cut costs.
The sample videos on the platform are still not smooth in some respects, but the still images in the article on Tianxia Netcom look so elaborate that they are comparable to human models. If these can be generated automatically, it will be a great advantage for store owners who use Alibaba’s e-commerce platform.
This function is mainly targeted at the apparel industry, but if the quality of the videos improves, such as the detailed changes in facial expressions, the service is expected to expand to the beauty field as well. On China’s e-commerce platforms, the future of two-dimensional and virtual characters almost indistinguishable from real humans is just around the corner.
Text: Ching Li Tor
Original text (Japanese): Team Roboteer
