QUESTION: Why is Tudou developing its own drama series?

TUDOU: At its core it’s about what our users want.  With a few years of learning and observing what users are watching on Tudou every day, we know our Tudou audience is younger (than TV), cosmopolitan, fashion conscious, and responsive to what’s hot and new.

If you take a closer look at content offerings in the China market, you’ll find a lack of engaging content for this demographic that is actually produced here.  Most of the Chinese TV series plots are based on history, family, or war time and do not appeal to young viewers in China.  For those Chinese TV stations that want to make an appeal to younger viewers, they often have to acquire content originating from Korea, Japan or Taiwan.

Therefore, it’s not a surprise to us that many young viewers in China turn to online video platforms such as Tudou for a level of entertainment value that’s difficult to find on television. However, since almost all online video sites in China are showing similarly licensed programs, Tudou wanted a way to differentiate itself with strong relevant and unique content for online viewers. Therefore, we recently launched a new initiative called “Orange Box”.

“Orange Box” is Tudou’s initiative for “made-for-Internet” original production. Based on our understanding of China’s online viewers, Tudou has developed a deep level of insight and confidence to launch an initiative for creating original content that would appeal to young Chinese online. Another key factor for the “Orange Box” initiative is the ability to build a point of differentiation from other video sites that producing our own original content provides.  An example of this is our first series currently in production called “That Love Comes”. We are really looking forward to this as Tudou’s debut into the production field and are encouraged that early pre-promotion efforts have shown a positive response.

QUESTION: Will the drama series be distributed on internet only (on Tudou) or will it be aired on TV as well?

TUDOU: As mentioned, we are encouraged by the positive response to our first production “That Love Comes.”  Since the intent is to produce this series with China’s online viewers in mind, the web will be our primary distribution platform for its first run.  However, we are also in talks with a few  Chinese TV stations and new media owners for licensing.  Interestingly enough, we’ve already received interest from media buyers in Singapore, Japan, and Taiwan.  In addition to web distribution, we also plan to roll out mini versions of “That Love Comes” through mobile distribution including the potential for an iPad app.

QUESTION: Who is the target audience for this drama?

TUDOU: Tudou’s target audience for this initiative is the younger segment of the population in China between 18 to 35 years sold who are on average 10 years younger than the average age of television viewers in China. They are cosmopolitan in thinking, fashion conscious and drawn to what’s hot and new.  Specific to “Love That Comes”, the drama’s story plot also speaks to a broad audience with its universal themes of hope, dreams and romance.

QUESTION: What kind of advertisers does this project attract? Or how does Tudou earn revenue from this?

TUDOU: With this new initiative of producing our own content, we are also experimenting with a new revenue model as well.  Aside from “air time” ad revenue – meaning selling pre-roll, background and other ad formats around the video streams – we also will be launching “branded content” placement within the programs.  Being the creator and distributor of this series gives us the opportunity to work with advertisers in the areas of product placement, script placement and brand mentions that can be customized for the advertisers. This level of exposure that’s tightly integrated with content has been very well received by our client base of advertisers.  For “That Love Comes” we are currently finalizing a few major sponsors including FMCG, auto and other consumer goods categories.  Since our core audience is young, urban with high disposable income, we’re confident that being able to integrate the brands into the story plot throughout the creative process will prove very attractive to brand marketers in China.

QUESTION: Is there a high cost of production for developing your own drama vs. licensing. What are the benefits of producing your own drama?

TUDOU: On the business side of licensing content, we are limited to selling the air-time ads.  Developing our own drama provides a deeper level of monetization opportunities for Tudou and greater return on investment value for advertisers. There is definitely a cost for all the production that goes into creating our own drama series but since the goal is to create new revenue streams for Tudou and distribute unique content on our platform, we genuinely feel that this is a new strategy worth exploring compared to continuing to just spend money on buying the rights to what has been shown on TV already and/or available across all online video sites.

QUESTION: How is this new step different from online video sharing sites in the west and in China?

TUDOU: Honestly we haven’t seen other major video sites, both in the west and in China, getting into original content production on the scale and level of dedication that we’re working on.  While there are some variations of  “original production” initiatives out there, they are mainly in the form of joint funding or a production investment by the video sites who in return will own some or exclusive rights in broadcasting and licensing deals.  We are very hands on throughout the entire process of our content production because it ensures we are part of the learning curve towards building out a content production business that generates our own intellectual property and compliments the other areas we are already strong in such as online video distribution and the Tudou Video Festival.

Trailers for “That Love Comes” from lead female character’s perspective:

voiceover: ““There is someone in the world, waiting.  If you start believing in love at this very second, That Love Comes.”

Embed code for the above trailer here:

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Trailer for “That Love Comes” from lead male character’s perspective:

voiceover: ““There is someone in the world, waiting.  If you start believing in love at this very second, That Love Comes.”

Embed code for the above trailer here:

<object classid=”clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000″ width=”450″ height=”363″ align=”middle”><param name=”movie” value=”http://www.tudou.com/player/outside/beta_player.swf?iid=55710330″></param><param name=”allowScriptAccess” value=”always”></param><param name=”allowFullScreen” value=”true”></param><param name=”quality” value=”high”></param><param name=”wmode” value=”transparent”></param><embed src=”http://www.tudou.com/player/outside/beta_player.swf?iid=55710330″ quality=”high” width=”450″ height=”363″ align=”middle” allowScriptAccess=”always” allowFullScreen=”true” wmode=”transparent” type=”application/x-shockwave-flash”></embed></object>

Still shots for “That Love Comes” on Tudou’s Flickr feed:

Official site for “That Love Comes”: http://www.tudou.com/home/thatlovecomes

Starring: Joseph Cheng and Fei’er Li

Link to Tudou’s Flickr set for “That Love Comes”

If you’re interested in learning more, feel free to contact:

Anita Huang 黄蕙雯
VP of PUB – Product, User, Business Development Tudou – www.tudou.com
土豆网 产品和社区部副总裁
Tel: +86 21 51702355 ext. 6300
Email: ahuang@tudou.com

About Tudou

Tudou.com is the leading online video platform in China, where users can upload, view and share video clips. Tudou went live on April 15, 2005 and has grown into one of the world’s largest content delivery networks hosting 35 million videos, including amateur video-blogging and user-generated videos, professional content such as movie clips, TV series and music videos from our content partners, as well as made-for-Internet original programming produced by Tudou. Tudou has established extensive business relationships with over 2500 well-known content providers, content agents, traditional and new media, as well as mobile operators in the Asian region. With the brand slogan “Today’s TV Network, Tomorrow’s Tudou,” the company’s vision is building a video destination where people can find what they want to see, share what they create, and connect with like-minded people. Tudou never stops working toward this vision since 2005.