HuaYu97: Starting as a Singer

Chapter 403 [403] What does it mean to be the number one pop king in the Chinese music scene with a gap in popularity?
It's impossible for Huang Bo to spend 1599 to 2499 yuan to buy a VIP ticket for Qi Yuan's concert.

It's even less likely that the owner of a record store would do charity by sealing concert tickets worth one or two thousand yuan inside a record.

There's only one explanation: Warner Music gave away a portion of their concert tickets as freebies.

Purchasing Qi Yuan's physical English CDs gives you a chance to win a hidden prize: concert tickets.

Huang Bo couldn't help but marvel at Warner Bros.' generosity; they were really willing to give away tickets worth a couple thousand yuan.

Huang Bo explained to his girlfriend Xiao Ou that he hadn't bought the tickets, and then he went to Tianya to browse posts related to Qi Yuan.

A short-tempered guy has been posting several times in the past few days complaining about how Qi Yuan and Warner are doing things in a bad way.

"Now that you've become an international superstar, you look down on us poor fans, huh? Last time, tickets for your Guangzhou concert started at 100 yuan, and you still remember us poor folks? Now they're starting at 280 yuan."

"I've given up. I'll never buy your albums again."

“Brother Yuan, I was wrong, I apologize! A friend of mine bought your album, the cheapest standard edition, and he won. It's a mid-range record, worth 899 yuan.”

After the first person claimed to have won, more and more people followed suit by posting or leaving messages on forums saying they had won.

Huang Bo himself saw that nearly a hundred netizens said they had won the lottery, and two of them were just as lucky as him, getting VIP tickets.

"Fuck me!"

Huang Bo couldn't help but swear.

There were nearly a hundred winners on Tianya Forum alone.

There are plenty of people who don't use Tianya (a popular Chinese online forum), so how many tickets did Warner release as freebies this time?
When the discussion reached a certain level of intensity, Warner's public relations department issued an explanation.

Qi Yuan's Beijing concert will give away 12000 tickets as gifts, including 500 VIP tickets, 1500 high-end tickets, 3000 mid-range tickets, and 7000 low-end tickets.

This move shocked Huang Bo, all his fellow singers and record companies in the industry, and countless fans and passersby.

These 1.2 tickets are worth millions, and Warner Bros. just gave them away like that? Damn, Warner Bros. is really rich.

This series of moves left people in the industry speechless!

Many industry insiders believe that Warner Music's high ticket prices for Qi Yuan's concert are likely to offend domestic fans, leading to a large number of them leaving the fandom.

Qi Yuan's base of operations is domestically; if that base collapses, the consequences will be severe.

Everyone had considered various ways Warner Music and Qi Yuan could compensate their domestic fans, but no one expected them to do it so smoothly.

This move is tantamount to telling ordinary fans in China that Qi Yuan's concert is not for them, but for foreign fans and wealthy domestic fans.

You ordinary fans don't need to buy tickets, you want to see it, right? I'll give you 1.2 tickets.

What constitutes a high-end way to pamper your fans? This is it.

No singer in China has ever done this before, nor is any singer qualified to do it this way.

High-priced tickets require a large number of foreign fans and wealthy domestic fans to buy them in order to make this possible; otherwise, everyone would lose money.

The former Teresa Teng was not good enough, and the current Princess Zhang Xueyou is not good enough; only Qi Yuan has such appeal.

Qi Yuan wants to show people in the industry what a true international superstar is and what it means to be the number one king in the Chinese music scene with a single generation.

By the way, Warner Music also issued a statement advising domestic fans not to blindly buy Qi Yuan's records in hopes of winning a prize, especially fans outside of Beijing.

Of the 1.2 complimentary tickets, more than 1 were supplied to Beijing.

Only a little over a thousand high-value premium and VIP tickets were shipped to various parts of the country. The reason is simple: a fan from Zhejiang or Hubei province who won a low-priced ticket worth 280 yuan wouldn't fly all the way to Beijing to see the concert, right? Wouldn't that be a waste of the ticket? And the attendance rate wouldn't be good either.

"Qi Yuan, I was wrong, I want to apologize to you. Yes, I won the lottery."

"Damn it, I already had a legitimate CD. I heard there was a chance to get concert tickets, so I bought another one, but it turned out to be manufactured in June of this year. My hundred-plus yuan was wasted! Damn it!"

"To the person upstairs, I feel sorry for you for three seconds. A friendly reminder to everyone: remember to buy new discs produced after July 10th. The odds of winning are low outside of Beijing, so I don't recommend rushing in blindly."

"I'm a migrant worker in Beijing, and Warner and Qiyuan are really generous. The odds of winning are quite high; two of my friends won, but unfortunately I didn't."

……

With the help of Warner's powerful marketing team, the matter gradually evolved into "we owe Qi Yuan an apology."

Qi Yuanhe's concert is gaining immense popularity.

Even Stephen Chow in Hong Kong felt a chill run down his spine! He had a feeling that his luck had been sucked away.

The marketing methods are similar, but there are fundamental differences.

The later "owing Stephen Chow a movie ticket" was an overdraft of nostalgia to make audiences spend money to see a rather mediocre movie.

Qi Yuan is giving back to his fans with tickets worth several million yuan, which will help solidify his fan base in China.

From a fan's perspective, I'm so moved, I could cry! Shouldn't I be a fan of this kind of idol who dotes on his fans for life?
The fans were happy, and so were Qi Yuan and Warner.

They gave away 1.2 tickets, so they won't lose money at all. The increased prices of premium and VIP tickets have already doubled their profits.

Qi Yuan's English major saw a surge in sales in China, resulting in substantial revenue.

However, some media outlets that are at odds with Qi Yuan have subtly mocked him, saying that he is not giving back to his fans at all.

They held a ticket giveaway event to save face because they couldn't sell tickets and were afraid no one would go to the concert.

The sound disappeared quickly.

Because on July 23, the third day after tickets went on sale, all 59,000 tickets were snapped up.

Yes, they were all sold out.

When foreign fans who came to Beijing for tourism heard that Chris was having a concert and that VIP seats were only a couple hundred dollars, they thought it was incredibly cheap for them who earn dollars.

These tickets aren't even enough for them to grab.

Then scalpers arrived and started reselling tickets for the midfield area, which were originally priced at 899 yuan, for over 1,000 yuan.

Relatively high-end tickets for the front of the line are being resold for over two thousand yuan.

VIP seats were being resold for three to four thousand or even five thousand yuan, while the first few rows closest to the stage were being resold for ten to twenty thousand yuan.

Both Qi Yuan himself and Warner were very surprised!
This is 2001, and tickets are being resold for tens of thousands of yuan? That's outrageous!
At the last Guangzhou concert, a wealthy woman also bought front-row tickets at a high price, but that was an isolated case; the highest price ever reached was only a little over 10,000 yuan.

This time, hundreds of seats were resold for over ten thousand yuan.

Furthermore, with the concert starting on July 29th, there's still room for scalped tickets to rise further.

In an effort to combat rampant scalping, Qi Yuan was forced to add an extra concert on July 30th, which somewhat quelled the scalpers' arrogance.

This terrifying appeal is something that industry peers can only envy; they can't learn it, they really can't.

(End of this chapter)