This is Bilibili
Bilibili is a South-East Asian video streaming platform, an equivalent to YouTube. Typical content includes anime, comics and games, but you can find all types of content, including videos, live broadcasting and mobile games. The platform is targeted and mostly used by young generations, where generation Z plays the main role. Bilibili claims to be built on strong emotional connections between its users, the content and communities.
Getting started
You will be able to watch videos and broadcasts without an account just like on YouTube, but to comment and have better quality videos you need an user account on their website. The way of process is very much the same as on YouTube but with a different UI, one major difference is that on Asian video streaming websites the comments flow on your screen, but this feature can be turned off as it can be very distracting.
The users of the channel are a young generation, and the most popular content are anime and games. Using this information, brands and destinations can partner up with the producers. An episode of a popular series happening in a Lappish scenery can raise awareness about the destination and attract this target group. Similarly, Lappish forest filled with reindeer in the background of a mobile game will draw attention to the north.
Who is it for?
The target group is any age as it is a video streaming website, but as it has a lot of comics and anime which are more aimed at young people,I can see the majority of the user base is young people.
Communication happens in the form of videos, games, and in the comment section. The comments on the platform work in a little different way than on YouTube. Bilibili has a real-time captioning system that displays user comments as streams of scrolling subtitles overlaying on the screen. This means that all the people watching can see the comments as they appear while watching. The system was made to resemble a danmaku shooter game.
How to get visibility
This is quite an interesting topic, as we did research on different keywords. There are some promoted videos that appear on the top with a tag “Bilibili only”, these are actual TV-shows or programs that are produced for the website. It seems that the algorithm favours views but as we did different searches with different keywords the results varied quite a lot. Sometimes videos with 10 views could be seen quite high while other times you had to scroll quite a bit down to see less viewed videos.
Another factor is that you can categorise your search by livers or Anime. Livers begin live streamers and Anime.
Followers, likes, subscribers and comments and views are metrics of ones success on the platform. Just like on YouTube so if you are familiar how it works
Tips and tricks and best practices
When creating content, try to look up the ‘trendy’ category (from the menu on the left). This will help you know what type of content is the most popular at the moment. Try to mimic the trends, when it comes to for example to the length of videos, the style and narration. Make sure your content is entertaining and your message simple and easy to understand. Use visual help (pictures, videos…) of the destination to raise interest.
Our impressions
For me, the platform seems to have plenty of undiscovered potential when it comes to its use in tourism. It could be of great help when reaching to the younger generation and promoting to them. From my impression you should be careful to make your content entertaining, if you want to catch and maintain the interest of your potential customers.
Right now it seems Bilibili is appealing to the Asian markets’ needs of Video streaming and live broadcasting as YouTube is banned in China. Right now they are competing with Twitch (for live streaming) and YouTube for video content who have a much bigger audience in the west. Maybe if they try and attract more western people on their platform they could make a bigger break in to the western market but as of now they don’t seen to have bigger plans to expand.
Sources
Bilibili website Accessed 30.03.23
Hi Zuzanna and Camilla,
This is my first time hearing about this flatform. Honestly, I’m not really into Anime, comics or games. However, I think this is this is the most suitable flatform for people who like these. The great point of this is that Bilibili is a hub for abstract culture and a fantastic site for sharing and posting videos. It demands that there be no commercial break before the video and has accumulated a sizable number of top-notch video content creators and works. YouTube monetization is via ads that companies pay on videos. While bilibili has such videos too, the monetization from ad tevenue is actually very small. Thanks so much for introducing this.
Hi Marble,
Thank you for your interest in our topic! I’m happy that the post made you discover something new, and agree with you about how niche the target group of the content is. It calls for completely different methods of reaching to potential customers than other channels.
Hi,
It was very interesting to get familiar with Asian analog of YouTube. Back home we also have our own platform which gaining more and more users nowadays, however I still love the cozy YouTube place.
Hello Pavel,
I’m glad we got you interested in this topic! What is the name of the platform? I would love to check it out just out of curiosity 😀
Hello!
I think this platform could be nice for people looking for anime, comics, and games. Bilibili could also be an excellent place to network with like-minded people.
Also with tourism, it could be a creative place and since people using the platform have similar interests they could invent a lot of new for the industry. Thank you for introducing this.
Hi Henna,
I definitely agree – the platform is not for everybody, it targets people with specific interests. There still is some potential to use it for tourism, but it must be done with taste not to get immediately rejected by the audience used to specific types of content.