Jackie Chan attracts 130 million on Kuaishou as Chinese short video operators take advantage of celebrity live-streams to lure users

Hong Kong martial arts legend Jackie Chan has taken strong first steps to venture into live-streaming business after his live-stream session attracted over 130 million users.

During the three-hour livestream event on Saturday, Jackie Chan drew 130 million users at its peak, 220 million views as well as 320 million “likes”, according to Kuaishou. Celebrities including actor Nicholas Tse and C-pop star Huang Zitao were invited to join the live-streaming session, where they talked about his life story and performed songs.

Chan opened his official Kuaishou account last October, his account has amassed 57.5 million followers as of Monday. He has posted 23 short videos on Kuaishou so far, it has received over 1 million likes for each video.

Apart from social media, his live-stream was also heavily promoted by Kuaishou in the forms of large-screen advertisements on landmark buildings in major cities, including Beijing, Shanghai, Hangzhou.

What makes sponsoring Jackie Chan really important for Kuaishou is not only Chan’s huge popularity to draw in massive fans to the platform, but also it helps Kuaishou to get rid of the image of being a video-sharing platform for users living in smaller third-and-fourth tier cities.

In addition, Kuaishou drew Mandopop superstar Jay Chou exclusively onto its platform in 2020. Chou’s Kuaishou account now has 31 million followers.

TikTok’s Chinese version Douyin is biggest short-video platforms in China, with more than 600 million daily active users in 2021. In comparison, Hong Kong-listed Kuaishou reported 345.5 million daily active users in the first quarter of 2022, up from 295.3 million from a year earlier.

For Kuishou to challenge Douyin as the marketing platform for international brands entering China, it faces a similar challenge as to Pinduduo’s attempts to expand into premium consumer market in an effort to meeting growing consumer demand for quality goods and challenge Alibaba’s Tmall.

In order to attract more international brands and followers, Kuaishou’s effort to sponsor super star and TV programs shouldn’t come as a surprise. Its notable moves included an exclusive partnership with the China Central Television for sponsoring Spring Festival Gala and a copyright deal that allows Kuaishou to host Jay Chou’s music clips on the platform, which users can incorporate into their own short videos.