Climbing trees, chopping firewood and fishing, embroidering the mountains and rivers of Shu, singing and dancing around the fire... Li Ziqi's life attracted the attention of urbanites who live a fast-paced life, and also attracted the attention of capital in a short period of time.

"Cold" capital seems to have found a "warm" way to realize cash.

Huaying Capital, when Li Ziqi had only a few hundred thousand followers on Weibo, paid attention to the operating company behind it, Wei Nian Technology, and became the lead investor in the latter's Series A round.

Recently, China Investment Network conducted an exclusive interview with Huaying Capital to explain the development process of Weinian from MCN company to new consumer brand communication group.

Regarding the logic of investing in Weinian, Huaying Capital said, “In addition to focusing on the scarcity of celebrities such as Li Ziqi, Weinian’s high-quality content production capabilities, unique operational thinking, brand scaling capabilities and in-depth layout of the supply chain,

It is also what we are optimistic about.” So, after looking at more than 50 MCNs, the project leader of Huaying Capital caught up with Liu Daxiong, the founder of Weinian Technology, on the high-speed train back to Hangzhou, and confirmed his investment intention that day.

"We don't think that capital must be eager for quick success, and we don't think that the logic of capital should be ruthless." Huaying Capital said, "What we care about is really good content, good brand stories, and thinking about how to break through the ceiling of MCN." In an interview,

Li Ziqi once said that the reason why she holds hands with Wei Nian is because this agency understands and tolerates her, is willing to give her more time to grow together, and accompanies her to decline advertising worth tens of millions to do more meaningful things.

For Li Ziqi, accepting advertisements is obviously the fastest and easiest way to monetize her business, but her and Weinian Technology’s goals go far beyond that.

At present, most MCNs in China are still mainly monetized through advertising and marketing, but the potential of content e-commerce is gradually being unleashed, and its proportion in the revenue structure of major MCN organizations has increased.

Weinian Technology claims to be an "early starter" and its current e-commerce monetization revenue accounts for more than 70% of its total revenue.

MCN (Multi-Channel Network) is a company that has the ability and resources to help content producers continue to produce and promote monetization.

At present, the overall scale, business formats and presentation forms of China's MCN industry have far surpassed overseas, and the overall market size has reached tens of billions.

"If you just rely on traffic to convert e-commerce or purely product placement, the business ceiling is very low." In Liu Daxiong's view, Weinian Technology's business exploration mainly revolves around the incubation of consumer brands.

Huaying Capital believes that MCN organizations that can rely on content to incubate consumer brands can truly break through the ceiling and "do something different." "Li Ziqi has more than 40 million fans on the entire network, and Lin Xiaozhai has more than 30 million. They have formed a

A system that starts from scratch and relies on the ability to purchase and distribute content and network traffic to quickly cultivate giant celebrities at low cost, "Huaying Capital said, "In the final analysis, the value of valuable MCN institutions and individual big Internet celebrities.

The biggest difference between individual studios is the replicability of Internet celebrities and the height of the ceiling.” Huaying’s investment vision for Weinian has also been continuously verified in subsequent financings.

In addition to VC institutions, subsequent investors include platform investors such as Sina Weibo and Mango Cultural and Creative Fund.

At the same time, whether it is the strategic cooperation between Weinian and Maoyan Entertainment, or the powerful alliance between Li Ziqi and Forbidden City Food, National Treasures, etc., Weinian's operating capabilities in branding have been continuously verified.

Liu Daxiong revealed that Weinian Technology's future positioning is as a new consumer brand communication group, and it will continue to seize the two main lines of "front-end traffic" and "back-end supply chain": on the one hand, it will continue to use incubation, contract signing, and resource replacement.

The layout covers the KOL matrix from head to mid-waist; on the other hand, on the basis of providing high-quality content, it further enriches the product and brand matrix of the supply chain.

In other words, the "next Li Ziqi" is still being looked forward to.

Regarding the recent national discussion triggered by Li Ziqi, Huaying Capital said, "Huaying invested in Weinian very early and witnessed their iteration from an MCN company to a new consumer brand communication group. In order to build a viable brand, Weinian Company

It has always been clear that Li Ziqi's original living conditions should be used as the source to portray a more authentic brand image. As for concepts such as cultural export, it is not the focus that Wei Nian wants to emphasize. The discussion may be just because of the yearning for a better life and the desire for a better life.

The love of life is the only common language of human beings. "As traffic content, celebrities are very common in advertising, selling traffic, and opening Taobao stores to sell goods, but it is not possible to really rely on individuals to establish a consumer product brand.

not easy.

"Li Ziqi's competitiveness, in addition to the premium of her personal brand, is also one of the barriers to strict control of the supply side. Weinian's set of playing methods and logic have also been copied to other KOLs, and can be expanded from one brand to another.

matrix, the value of this company will be very high," Huaying Capital told China Investment Network.

“How IP maintains long-term vitality is very important, and the timing of monetization is also very critical. At the same time, IP will obviously bring a longer life cycle and room for growth to the brand.