時光網幫好萊塢打開中國市場

Now that Hollywood has mostly figured out how to get its biggest movies approved for release in China, studio marketers here are grappling with a new puzzle: What is the best way to woo China's ticket buyers?

如今好萊塢已經基本上摸清如何讓它們的頂級大製作影片獲得在中國的放映許可，但電影公司的營銷人員又要應對另一個謎題：怎樣纔是吸引中國電影消費者的最佳方式？

Trailers and television advertisements, the two most effective methods to drum up interest, are difficult marketing tools to use in China. Chinese theaters do not typically play trailers. The cost of advertising on TV can be exorbitant, in part because studios must buy time at the last minute. China usually limits foreign films to an advertising window of a few weeks.

電影預告片和電視廣告是激發人們對電影好奇心的兩種最有效的手段，但在中國，這些方法使用起來有些困難。中國的電影院一般不放映預告片。而電視廣告的花費則過高，這部分是由於電影公司必須等到最後一刻才能購買廣告時間。因爲中國通常會給外國電影的廣告限定一個幾周的窗口期。

Instead, film companies pay for outdoor banners and signs, advertise online, team up with local promotional partners and, increasingly, call a company with enormous reach that few people outside of China have ever heard of: Mtime.

電影公司因此改爲出錢打戶外橫幅和廣告牌、網絡廣告，與當地市場推廣夥伴合作，並越來越多地求助於一個外國人很少聽說、但影響力巨大的公司：時光網。

Founded in 2005 in Beijing by Kelvin Hou, a former Microsoft executive, Mtime started as an online listing of movie times, hence the name. Then a film database was built and added. Next came a movie-news service, aggregation of user-submitted reviews, a movie-scoring system and an online ticket service for 3,000 theaters. Now attracting 160 million unique desktop and mobile users a month, according to Mr. Hou, Mtime is effectively Fandango, IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes and Yahoo Movies rolled into one.

2005年，時光網由前微軟高管侯凱文(Kelvin Hou)在北京創立，一開始是一個分享電影放映排期的網站，網站的名字正由此而來。後來公司加入了一個電影數據庫。隨後又開始提供電影新聞服務、用戶影評聚合、電影評分系統，以及一個包括3000家影院的網上購票服務。據侯凱文說，如今該網站每月吸引1.6億電腦和手機用戶。時光網相當於是Fandango、IMDb、爛番茄(Rotten Tomatoes)以及雅虎電影(Yahoo Movies)的綜合體。

And for a fee, Mtime will promote movies through all of these services, helping studios to quickly cover a market they covet but do not yet fully understand.

時光網還有在這些渠道推廣電影的收費服務，幫助電影公司迅速覆蓋這個它們覬覦已久卻又不完全瞭解的市場。

Next comes merchandising: Mtime, which counts Fidelity Growth Partners and CBC Capital among its backers, has started designing movie-themed products that are sold on its website and inside Chinese multiplexes. Mtime began opening these "merchandising centers," many in partnership with Wanda Cinemas, China's largest theater operator, in January. Mr. Hou will have 80 of these centers operating by December.

下一步就是衍生品開發：在富達亞洲風險投資(Fidelity Growth Partners Asia)和寬帶資本(CBC Capital)等公司的支持下，時光網已經開始設計電影主題的相關產品，並在其網站和中國的電影院內銷售。今年一月，時光網還成立了衍生品銷售體驗中心，其中相當一部分是與中國最大的院線萬達影城合作。到今年十二月，侯凱文將開辦80家這樣的中心。

In itself, the ability to sell merchandise inside Chinese theaters is tantalizing to Hollywood, which is trying to improve the profitability of releasing films in China, a movie market that is soon expected to surpass the United States as the world's largest. Ticket sales totaled $4.8 billion last year, a 34 percent increase from a year earlier, according to the Motion Picture Association of America. But foreign studios typically receive a 25 percent share of ticket sales from China; Hollywood's cut from movies released in North America is closer to 50 percent.

好萊塢一直想增加在中國上映電影的利潤，因此僅在中國影院內銷售衍生品這一項就已經極具誘惑力。據預計，中國電影市場很快就將超過美國成爲世界最大的電影市場。根據美國電影協會(Motion Picture Association of America)數據，去年中國的電影票房總收入達48億美元，較前一年增長了34%。但國外電影公司通常能拿到中國票房收入的25%；而好萊塢從北美票房的分成接近50%。

American studios have long relied on sales of movie-themed products elsewhere in the world, but China has been difficult to crack, in part because cheap knockoffs proliferate overnight. But there appears to be a shift at hand. Disney, for instance, in May opened its first Disney Store in China. Zeng Maojun, president of the Wanda Theater Group, said in a statement that the Mtime partnership "marks an important milestone in China's movie market," with movie merchandise shifting from a niche to "a vital part of the lifestyle market."

在其他地方，美國電影公司很早就已經開始依賴電影主題衍生產品的銷售，但中國市場一直都很難打開，迅速蔓延的廉價冒牌產品是其中一個原因。但似乎轉變即將到來。比如迪士尼五月在中國開設了第一家迪士尼商店。萬達影城總經理曾茂軍在一份聲明中說，與時光網的合作"標誌着中國電影市場的一個重要的里程碑，"電影衍生產品從只服務特定用戶羣拓展成了"生活用品領域的重要部分。"

Mtime is not alone in this arena. Douban, an arts-focused social network, has as much sway in the movie-review realm, if not more, operating a scoring system based on critiques from tens of thousands of users. For those seeking movie news, Mtime competes with the entertainment sections of Internet companies like Sina, Tencent and Sohu.

時光網並不是這個領域的唯一一家公司。關注文藝的社交網絡"豆瓣"同樣也拓展到了電影影評領域。豆瓣在成千上萬的用戶評論的基礎上，建立了一個電影評分系統。對那些搜尋電影新聞的人來說，時光網同諸如新浪、騰訊和搜狐等網絡公司的娛樂板塊是存在競爭的。

Tencent — which owns the wildly popular WeChat messaging service that, marketing executives say, has itself becoming a crucial movie promotional tool — is also a major movie ticket seller, along with Baidu and the Alibaba Group.

騰訊公司擁有廣受歡迎的微信，其市場部門高管表示，微信已經成爲電影推廣的一個關鍵工具。騰訊、百度和阿里巴巴集團都是主要的電影售票商。

But no competitor has integrated all of these functions under one umbrella in the way Mtime has. That integration plays a role in its influence on Hollywood, and not just because Mtime has created an environment of one-stop promotional shopping.

不過沒有任何一個競爭對手像時光網那樣，把所有的功能都整合在一個體系之內。這種整合也是它對好萊塢產生影響的地方，不只是因爲時光網爲一站式促銷購物創造了一個環境。