Chapter 134 - Question Marks
Xu Yang truly couldn't quite believe it.
There are many factors for a program's viewership ratings to rise, but judging from the situation of the 'Zhou Zhou Show' premiere, it shouldn't have had such a margin of increase!
As far as he knew, the 'Zhou Zhou Show' absolutely had no other promotion, so where did so many viewers come from?
Even if the quality of the 'Zhou Zhou Show' was excellent, without promotion, who would come watch it?!
With just the premiere's viewership ratings, although it hadn't reached the point of being axed, it was impossible for the station to increase promotion!
The ones feeling somewhat baffled were not only Xu Yang, but also Wang Mingyi.
For this small program, only the two of them who had entanglements with it were paying attention.
Last week he had asserted that the viewership ratings for the 'Zhou Zhou Show' would definitely drop. Who knew the facts would be completely the opposite; right now, his head was full of question marks.
"This shouldn't be!" Wang Mingyi muttered.
He usually also paid attention to the 'Zhou Zhou Show' and had only heard that the program was being treated coldly, to the point that the Director wasn't even willing to bring it up. He had never heard of them increasing promotion.
But without promotion, where did the audience come from?
Wang Mingyi lit a cigarette, furrowing his brows in thought.
He was a fairly earnest and stubborn person, not to mention that the 'Zhou Zhou Show' concerned his own ideological issues. He definitely had to figure it out clearly; otherwise, he would feel suffocated in his heart.
"Could it be the internet?"
The moment this thought arose, Wang Mingyi felt a sense of sudden enlightenment. He hurriedly opened a webpage and typed 'Zhou Zhou Show' into the search bar.
After pressing the enter key, a massive pile of search results popped out!
Looking at the densely packed search results, the font of the very first news article was even enlarged and bolded.
He looked carefully for a long time, then leaned back in his chair, truly unable to figure it out.
Wang Mingyi took a deep drag of his cigarette, feeling a bit stifled.
……
During the premiere last time, Director Zhao Peisheng didn't really mention the 'Zhou Zhou Show'; the viewership ratings truly weren't presentable.
He had hoped the program could have a miracle and had lent a helping hand, but the station's attitude towards this time slot was just like this. With the viewership ratings performing poorly, he had no other way either.
With the viewership ratings suddenly rising this week, he was indeed very surprised.
After understanding the whole story, he repeatedly sighed with emotion that the 'Zhou Zhou Show' truly had exceptionally good luck.
Who could have imagined that a program with such disastrously cold viewership ratings, and moreover a late-night slot program on a workday, would spark discussions on Weibo and even get onto the trending search list?
Originally, Zhao Peisheng had already given up paying attention to the 'Zhou Zhou Show' last week, but this week it returned to his field of vision.
"Let's observe a bit more. If this program can still rise next week, we really can give it some importance!"
Zhao Peisheng muttered in his heart.
It was a normal thing for program viewership ratings to fluctuate. With the traffic drawn from Weibo, the rise in this episode's viewership rating was within expectations.
Next, they still had to see if the 'Zhou Zhou Show' could retain people.
Not to mention being able to rise, if the next episode could just maintain the current viewership ratings, presumably there would be commercials knocking on their door.
……
With the 'Zhou Zhou Show' viewership ratings rising, the most excited person was still Director Zhang.
This time he couldn't wait until getting off work and called Chen Ran ahead of time.
"See? Was your Uncle wrong? I told you this program was very good; all it lacked was an opportunity!"
With Director Zhang's excitement, just by hearing his voice, Chen Ran could imagine him smiling from ear to ear.
After his initial joy, Director Zhang asked again:
"I remember your program's funds were stuck right at the production budget limit. Where did the money come from to promote on Weibo? Did your Director fight for a budget for you guys?"
Chen Ran laughed and said, "No. With those viewership ratings, how could the station possibly increase the budget? It was all an accident."
Director Zhang sighed with emotion:
"This is a good accident! Otherwise, your program would have been buried. Now the station should take it seriously, right? Judging from the program's quality, as long as the promotion keeps up, this program of yours will definitely succeed! It's a pity there's Tomato Satellite TV in this time slot; otherwise, your program wouldn't be this miserable."
Chen Ran smiled and said, "It's just an increase for this episode, the higher-ups will probably still need to observe a bit more. At the very least, they will wait until commercials come knocking on the door before the station plans to increase investment."
Actually, looking at the program's positioning, the audience didn't overlap with 'Magic Cute Babies'. Their viewership ratings increased this week, but 'Magic Cute Babies' only had normal fluctuations; the relationship wasn't big at all. The audience for the 'Zhou Zhou Show' was mostly newly carved out.
"In a time slot that the station doesn't value, if the program can rise up, you'll be considered to have established a firm foothold in the satellite TV channel!" Director Zhang sighed slightly with emotion.
He hadn't had a very good week. With Chen Ran going to the satellite TV channel, he couldn't help with anything.
The program lacked promotion and the viewership ratings were poor, so he could only fret helplessly.
Aside from calling to comfort Chen Ran every time, the only thing he could do was turn on the TV to increase the viewership ratings a tiny bit.
Now that the program was showing signs of improvement, it felt as if a heavy boulder had been lifted from his heart!
Besides Director Zhang, Lin Fan also called.
This guy opened his mouth with congratulations. Chen Ran said, "The viewership ratings still aren't pretty right now, you're saying congratulations too early!"
"Your program has gone viral on Weibo, the viewership ratings will definitely rise steadily. Me saying congratulations in advance definitely isn't wrong," Lin Fan chuckled.
When the viewership ratings for the 'Zhou Zhou Show' came out last week, he wanted to call and comfort Chen Ran.
But thinking about it carefully, when Chen Ran was at the local station, every single program started high and went higher.
Now that he went to the satellite TV channel and had such an opening, wouldn't his calling over be exposing someone's scars and affecting their mood?
After some consideration, he held back from calling, and just kept paying attention to the program's movements, only calling over after seeing the viewership ratings come out.
Because it was working hours, they didn't chat for long on this call.
The two of them were both relatively busy right now and hadn't really met up recently. Occasionally they would chat in a WeChat group, and what they talked about was still matters regarding programs.
Sometimes Lin Fan also wondered: he had the same job as Chen Ran, and Chen Ran was even busier than him. Right now, he was serving as the chief planner for two programs and didn't even have the time to go on blind dates.
Then the question arises: how did Chen Ran get a girlfriend?
Now that he was getting older, Lin Fan also wanted to escape singlehood and wanted to find Chen Ran to learn from his experience, but with this kind of question, he just couldn't open his mouth!
Chen Ran naturally didn't know what Lin Fan was agonizing over. After hanging up the phone, he continued to throw himself into his work.
With the viewership ratings rising, everyone in the program crew's enthusiasm ran high, sweeping away the suffocating depression of the past two days, and they all worked with vigor.
Even Zhou Zhou's smooth, clean forehead was gleaming, as if he was radiating a second youth.
At night, Chen Ran was pondering over the script.
With everyone writing it out, he still had to act as the gatekeeper. Doing this kind of work truly made one lose hair, but he couldn't give it to others; he absolutely had to maintain the consistency of the script's style.
Ding dong.
The WeChat notification sound rang.
If it were in the past, with this kind of sound, Chen Ran would think it was a message sent by some official account and wouldn't even bother looking at it.
But it was different now; every time he heard WeChat ring, his heart would skip a beat.
He hurriedly picked it up to look, and saw that the pinned dialogue box had a new message.
Chen Ran took a look; surprisingly, it was a voice message.
He was slightly puzzled; Zhang Fanzhi never sent him voice messages on WeChat.
After clicking it open, he was instantly dumbfounded.
"Love really needs courage, to face the rumors and gossip, I only need one look from you...—–♪."
What came out from inside was Zhang Fanzhi's singing voice. The accompaniment was just a simple piano track; evidently, she was just singing it casually.
It wasn't Chen Ran's first time hearing Zhang Fanzhi sing. He had all of Zhang Fanzhi's songs in his phone right now, having purchased and downloaded them all, and would listen to them whenever he had free time.
But not a single one could be as pleasant to listen to as this current voice message bearing static noise.
It was just that...
Before Chen Ran even finished listening, the message was unexpectedly recalled!
Chen Ran: "......"
He was blank for quite a while, then sent a "?" over in the dialogue box.
After a long while, the other side also sent a "?" back.