Chen Jincheng hadn't expected Liu Qing to bring this up again. He maintained his smile and said, "President Liu, I'm very sorry about this. We've already reached an agreement with Jinghong Clothing upstairs. We're bound by our contract, so I can only express my regrets."
Liu Qing was taken aback for a moment, then she smiled and said, "Mr. Chen, there will be other opportunities in the future. The price Jinghong Women's Clothing offered surely can't compare to our Jing Lan. Li Ya is famously stingy in this industry!"
Hearing this, Chen Jincheng felt he had to say a word in President Li's defense. "President Liu, that might be a misunderstanding people have about President Li. I personally don't think she's that kind of person. After all, she was willing to pay three million for a proposal from an influencer agency like ours."
"What?" Hearing the three million figure, Liu Qing clearly couldn't process it for a moment.
"President Liu, we still have things to attend to, so we'll be going now," Chen Jincheng said with a faint smile, then walked towards Second-Life Star.
It took a moment for Liu Qing to react. Jinghong Women's Clothing upstairs not only chose to work with this Second-Life Star, but they actually paid three million?
That was only one million less than what she had offered Li Yueling.
But she really didn't think an influencer from Second-Life Star could compare to a rising second-tier celebrity like Li Yueling.
'Looks like Li Ya has lost her mind after I got the better of her again,' Liu Qing muttered to herself. A smile then touched the corners of her lips. A competitor who had lost their wits was always easier to deal with. Perhaps soon, there would be only one clothing company left in the Jinmao Building.
Sister Hong followed Chen Jincheng towards Second-Life Star and teased, "Boss, it seems that President Liu really doesn't take us seriously. Otherwise, she wouldn't have tried to negotiate a deal under these circumstances, and even offer to raise the price by 20,000."
"It's normal when we haven't made a name for ourselves yet," Chen Jincheng chuckled. He had seen many powerful women like Liu Qing. 'Perhaps in her eyes, continuing to negotiate and even adding more money is her way of giving us a chance.'
However, having struggled so much in his past life, he wasn't going to get worked up over something like this. It wasn't worth it.
Upon entering Second-Life Star, Sister Hong said, "I'll go prepare the contract for Xiaobai to sign, and then I'll file the application with Tiao Yin!"
She was naturally aware that Jiang Xiaobai was sleeping with the boss. She knew this opportunity would definitely go to Jiang Xiaobai; she wasn't so unperceptive as to miss that.
"Mhm," Chen Jincheng nodded.
He did indeed intend to give this opportunity to Jiang Xiaobai.
'Although this girl gets carried away easily, I've slept with her so many times, after all.'
During the initial explosive growth of MCNs, Tiao Yin's advertising video features weren't as developed as in the other world, which had launched the "Starmap" platform where advertisers could post ads.
However, at this stage, any advertising using Tiao Yin's traffic naturally required Tiao Yin's involvement. This meant giving Tiao Yin a 5% cut, which was still far from the 20% cut during the era of the mature Starmap platform in the other world.
Tiao Yin would monitor the data for these types of ads in real-time to prevent fraudulent activities meant to deceive advertisers. If such a situation occurred, Tiao Yin would deal with the account directly.
Although the ultimate success of an ad depended on conversion rates, this data represented the promotional reach and target audience, making it a key reference point.
Chen Jincheng naturally knew that Tiao Yin was laying the groundwork for Starmap at this stage. With its immense traffic, advertising revenue was a huge potential sector.
In the other world, the steps of Tiao Yin's development were no secret later on.
And for a promotional video ad, besides the agency and the platform, a portion of the fee naturally went to the talent. So this time, in addition to the popularity from the video, Jiang Xiaobai would also earn some extra cash.
This was also stipulated in the contract. After all, Second-Life Star didn't use predatory contracts; they followed industry standards. Therefore, they naturally had to abide by the contract.
Agencies that used those kinds of predatory contracts never lasted long.
Aside from the five-year term—with the account belonging to the company during the contract and returned to the individual with compensation upon completion—Second-Life Star's profit-sharing with its talent was currently divided into three main areas.
The first was livestreaming revenue sharing.
The second was for standard business and advertising deals, where new talent received 40%.
For example, if another bar held an event and hired Jiang Xiaobai to DJ, her current rate was 30,000 per hour. Or if someone hired her to shoot a ten-second video ad, her current rate was 20,000 per video. Jiang Xiaobai would get a 40% cut of these jobs.
The third type was the revenue share for projects involving agency resource investment.
For instance, if the agency wanted to run a livestream event for Jiang Xiaobai and invested cash or other resources, the revenue from that stream wouldn't follow the normal split. Instead, it would use the resource investment split. Another example was the current ad for Jinghong Women's Clothing; since he was going to use a trending clothing promotion card, it naturally fell under the resource investment split.
Under this model, Jiang Xiaobai would only get a 5% cut.
As she gained more fans in the future, this percentage would increase to 10%.
Of course, if a talent didn't agree to this resource investment split, there were plenty of others who would. They would just find someone else to invest in.
Therefore, from this three-million-yuan advertising fee, after taxes, Jiang Xiaobai could still earn 120,000 without lifting a finger.
Afterward, Chen Jincheng went to the boss's office that Sister Hong had prepared especially for him. It was in the best spot in Second-Life Star's entire office.
After sitting down in the boss's chair, he started to search his memories for clothing-related videos that had gotten over three million likes. In his past life, practically all the long-legged influencers had shot clothing-related videos.
Soon, Jiang Xiaobai walked into his office with a huge smile on her face, shut the door behind her, and brazenly sat down on Chen Jincheng's lap.
The girl seemed to be wearing a rather seductive perfume today; the scent that reached his nose was quite pleasant.
But seeing her hands wrap around his neck again, Chen Jincheng reminded her, "We've already laid down the ground rules. No getting carried away."
"I'm not getting carried away!" Jiang Xiaobai rolled her eyes at him, speechless. Then she said, "Sister Hong had me sign the advertising contract. I just came to thank you!"
"Holy shit, why are you taking off your clothes to thank me?" Chen Jincheng was fucking speechless.
"Because I'm happy!" Jiang Xiaobai said triumphantly.
She was indeed happy. According to the contract Sister Hong had her sign, not only was the scumbag Cheng going to create a video plan for her designed to get over three million likes, but there was also an advertising fee. After calculating her cut, she realized she would get over 100,000.
As soon as she finished speaking, an article of her clothing was already tossed onto the desk.
…
Half an hour later, Chen Jincheng said to Jiang Xiaobai with a perfectly straight face, "Xiaobai, you have a great figure, and you're very pretty. This ad is perfect for you. Make sure you do a good job tomorrow!"
"I will," Jiang Xiaobai replied, leaving the office with a huge smile on her face.
The news that the company was about to tailor-make a three-million-like video ad for Jiang Xiaobai naturally spread to the other girls signed with the agency.
It's safe to say every single one of them was incredibly envious.
Especially Yinyin, the girl who had benefited the most from the last two marketing plans. Both Sister Hong and the boss had always said she had potential.
Now that the chest-shaking dance had gone viral, her follower count was catching up to Jiang Xiaobai's 1.4 million.
Therefore, she didn't think she was any worse than Jiang Xiaobai. At least, given the current situation at the company, she felt she could compete for the top spot.
But watching Jiang Xiaobai emerge from the boss's office, she felt immense pressure.
'Once the agency promotes this ad video for Jiang Xiaobai, it will be impossible for me to surpass her.'
Her phone vibrated. It was a WeChat message from a close friend: "My dear, congratulations! You've really blown up! 1.28 million followers! You have to help me out!"
Yinyin replied helplessly, "I don't even know what's going on myself. Right now, it's all up to the company's arrangements. It's not certain if the boss will promote me after this video. Besides, another influencer is very close to the boss, and he gave the latest project to her."
After sending the message to her friend, she looked at the smiling Jiang Xiaobai, her eyes once again filled with envy.
「Time passed.」
That night, Chen Jincheng checked the data for the girls' chest-shaking dance and chest-out dance videos.
The chest-out dance was inferior to the chest-shaking dance in terms of quality and appeal. Although it became a trending topic, besides Jiang Xiaobai and Lin Qing, who did alright, the other girls' videos were just so-so.
On the other hand, the girls doing the chest-shaking dance gained a lot more popularity. One girl who originally only had 200,000 followers after filming the "window-wiping" video jumped to 600,000 after the chest-shaking dance. Her Big Pendulum had brought her much better traffic this time.
But she was still far behind Yinyin. Yinyin's video already had 2.67 million likes, and breaking three million tomorrow would be no problem.
Her follower count also reached 1.52 million, officially surpassing Jiang Xiaobai and making her the most-followed influencer at Second-Life Star.
Chen Jincheng checked the chest-shaking dance trending topic and found that besides Yinyin, there were two other girls whose videos had surpassed 2.5 million likes. Both had amazing "pendulum" talent.
These three had the best-performing videos, surpassing everyone else by a landslide.
He even noticed that the title "Tiao Yin's Three Great Pendulums" had appeared in the comment sections of all three girls' videos.
'This girl looks a little familiar... I think she's Qianqian from my past life.' Chen Jincheng realized one of them was an influencer who had also existed in the other world. In that world, she seemed to have built her brand on the "Big Pendulum" route.
'Sure enough, the Big Pendulum is popular in any world.'
He clicked on this Qianqian's profile and saw that she had already signed with an agency. The agency's name surprised him: Ah Hao Media.
'Isn't that Lin Hao's company? The guy actually managed to ride my coattails and produce a viral video.'
「At Ah Hao Media.」
A Big Pendulum beauty was sitting on Lin Hao's lap—it was Qianqian, the star of the viral video.
His arm was wrapped around her waist as he praised her, "Qianqian, you did a great job with this video. It's on track to break three million likes."
Qianqian said coquettishly, "It's all because Brother Hao spent the money. Otherwise, I never would have gotten this chance."
Lin Hao had indeed spent a lot of money, a fact he didn't deny. "At first, I thought they were fake. I had no idea they were so real until I checked them out myself."
"Brother Hao, do you want to check again? There's no one else in the office," Qianqian asked, her eyes full of seductive charm.
"Close the door," Lin Hao said with a grin.
The girl obediently got up and went to close the door.
At the same time, he found Chen Jincheng on WeChat and sent a message: "Cheng, you have to let me know when you go live. I promise I won't just be freeloading!"
When Chen Jincheng received the message, he chuckled. 'This guy is at it again.'
He replied jokingly, "You're always saying you won't freeload. How about you show me what you've got with a 500,000-yuan gift next time?"
"Let's round it up to a million!" Lin Hao replied.
"..." Chen Jincheng was speechless.
It took him a long moment to get a single word out: "Damn!"
He was truly envious of these rich second-generation kids.
'That Lin Hao... he's the type who really does what he says he'll do.'