Micro-dramas make big impact

Recognizing the huge market potential, Wang reveals that Douyin has partnered with major television production companies and internet influencers to create a total of 40 micro-dramas earlier this year, with 15 amassing over 100 million views each.

Among these, one standout is Da Guo Nian De (The Spring Festival), a thought-provoking series delving into the challenges women face in maintaining their marriages. With each episode spanning four minutes, the series has garnered over 1.2 billion views online, with the most popular episode receiving 1.92 million "likes".

Shen Hongxiang, the director of the program, reveals that the key to crafting a successful micro-drama lies in developing the script from the audience's perspective, through understanding their challenges, difficulties and dilemmas to make the drama serve as an emotional outlet.

Interestingly, some cutting-edge technologies, which are still limited in use in traditional showbiz sectors like the movie and TV industries, have already made their way into the emerging micro-drama industry.

An internet celebrity who goes by the name Huihuizhou, with 15 million fans on Douyin, says that her show Qi Liang Ren Sheng (The Weight of Life) has utilized virtual reality production — which enables scenes captured by the camera to instantly merge computer-generated scenes with actual imagery.

The 16-episode series tells a suspenseful story unraveling the case of a missing child. It begins with a tense scene in a moving cable car where the desperate mother confronts the suspects.