The rise of AI influencers on Douyin: just how rudimentary some top sellers are
“80s Single Mother Tested, Click Below to Purchase from the Display Window"
This is a personal tagline on the homepage of the Douyin account "小姨妹," which has millions of followers. At first glance, it seems to be a blogger with a sunny persona and good looks. However, upon closer observation, one can notice that 小姨妹's skin is excessively smooth, and her hands are never showing, and her expressions can seem quite stiff. Many accounts have been flagged by the platform as "content suspected of being AI-generated." In fact, similar AI-generated influencers like 小姨妹 have recently been emerging in large numbers on Douyin. You can easily find another 10 like her within a few minutes.
Douyin shopping account "小姨妹"; and to the right, names of some AI influencers, their follower counts (万 = 10,000), and sales performance. Images are from @小姨妹on Douyin and 36kr
These bloggers all have the common approach of using AI-generated images of beauties to enhance their personas and then promote products. For example, the account "春香" has fewer than 100,000 followers, but has already sold over 110,000 items. There are no real individuals, no videos, and no novel product descriptions. They are just a series of AI-created images circulating of a lady. Most do not disclose that they are AI-generated, but compared to typical human influencers, the content of AI influencers can be described as rudimentary, yet they still generate significant traffic.
The rudimentary AI-generated videos, such as this one selling surprisingly high amounts on Douyin
Previously, the shopping account named 温柔 ("Gentle") released a ‘video’ of images promoting old Beijing cloth shoes. The content only featured an AI-generated beauty as the cover and product detail images, yet it received 4,202 likes. Some industry insiders believe that the sales path for AI influencers has been successfully established. In the past 30 days, the estimated sales for accounts like "温柔", "小姨妹" and "小九" have all exceeded ¥50,000 ($7,000).
