Discourse analysis of knowledge-based live streaming: a case study of East Buy streamer Dong Yuhui

4.1.1 Disseminating encyclopedic knowledge

Knowledge-based live streaming, as its name suggests, is featured by an abundance of knowledge. As the most famous representative of this type of live streaming, Dong Yuhui boasts a wide range of knowledge and makes an easy mention of it when he is working. The first and most frequent discourse strategy he uses is thus to disseminate encyclopedic knowledge.

In Discourse Episode 1, Dong Yuhui touches upon different fields of knowledge, the range of which is so wide that it is truly encyclopedic (see Table 1). It is amazing that he can talk so much in great in-depth when he is asked by East Buy to sell rice. What sets Dong Yuhui apart from traditional streamers is that he does not shout the price at a loud voice and push his viewers in an aggressive way; instead, he talks to his viewers calmly and leisurely by tapping his wide knowledge. Even if the viewers do not have any purchasing needs, they are still willing to watch him and listen to what he says. In fact, many people find it a spiritual pleasure to listen to him talking extensively. The fact that Dong Yuhui spends much more time and energy on knowledge sharing than rice selling attracts an unexpectedly large number of viewers, making him a famous and popular streamer. Many people make purchases of Dong Yuhui’s rice not because they are short of rice, but because they are impressed by his profound knowledge. Overall, they are more interested in the encyclopedic knowledge embedded in Dong Yuhui’s rice selling process than the rice itself.

Dong Yuhui adds much panache to the rice he sells with his profound knowledge. The pursuit of knowledge is one of the most primal desires of humanity. The search for knowledge is one of the three major passions of life, as described by British philosopher Bertrand Russell (2009), along with the longing for love and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind. Customer needs have different types and levels. According to Maslow (1954), human needs were organized in a hierarchical order, with physiological needs at the bottom and self-actualization needs at the top. Maslow argues that the satisfaction of lower-level needs is a prerequisite for individuals to fulfill higher-level needs. Since China adopted the reform and opening-up drive in 1978, the living standards of Chinese people have greatly improved. A milestone came in 2020 when China successfully built a moderately prosperous society in an all-round way. Since the satisfaction of lower-level needs of Chinese people is well ensured, they are more concerned about the satisfaction of higher-level needs. As far as the purchase of commodities is concerned, Chinese people have shifted from seeking the use value of commodities to looking for their symbolic value. That is, Chinese people are paying more attention to the spiritual and cultural aspects of the commodities purchased. Since Dong Yuhui’s encyclopedic knowledge can greatly enhance the cultural value of the rice he sells, it is only natural that he successfully stimulates customers’ desire to purchase.

4.1.2 Telling intriguing stories

Stories can increase the appeal of commodities. Compared with hard facts and statistics, compelling stories are more likely to influence customer perception, motivation, and justification for purchasing. As a former teacher of the New Oriental School, which encouraged storytelling in classroom teaching from its inception, Dong Yuhui has years of experience in telling stories to his students. When he transformed from a teacher into a streamer, he had no difficulty sharing stories with his customers. It is only natural that telling intriguing stories is the second major discourse strategy he adopts.

In Discourse Episode 2, Dong Yuhui tells a very common story – a tale of social engagement fatigue. In contemporary society, many professionals live with masks on, exhausted from the constant social obligations and interactions. As Chinese poet Tao Yuanming (Yang and Shao 2019) once said, “[a] caged bird longs for its old forest and a pond fish yearns for its former abyss. After being trapped in the confines for a long time, can one return to nature?” Individuals who have spent a significant amount of time in the workplace long for a warm family life, hoping for a place where they can rest their weary bodies and souls. By contrasting the stressful social engagements with the relaxing and joyful family life, Dong Yuhui’s story successfully evokes a strong resonance among the audience.

Dong Yuhui is brilliant in that he tells stories in his live streaming. Stories occupy a substantial portion of human cognitive engagement. As Sarbin (1986) indicates, stories are one of the fundamental means of human conduct. For this reason, storytelling has emerged as a powerful marketing tool in that it is key to attracting and retaining customers (Pulizzi 2012). Storytelling also works for live streaming in that storytelling is essential to any e-commerce business for a successful way of selling (Ghantasala 2017). Through storytelling, Dong Yuhui manages to connect himself with the audience on an emotional level, bridging the gap and earning their trust. This emotional resonance and trust make his viewers more willing to listen to him and, after hearing the story, place an order for purchase.

4.1.3 Using poetic language

“The poetic language makes use of elements of expressiveness which are characteristic to poetry, relying upon figurative language, the opposite of literal language, figurative language is the language of imagination, and which demands the reader to understand the meaning” (Manoliu 2017: 61). What sets Dong Yuhui apart from other streamers not only includes his profound knowledge but also his poetic language. That is, he can easily put his vast knowledge into beautiful words. Using poetic language is thus the third major discourse strategy he uses.

In Discourse Episode 3, Dong Yuhui employs poetic language to talk to his audience. Despite focusing on the commonplace food of rice, this discourse brims with poetic and romantic imagery. Through the abundant use of premodifers and parallelism, Dong Yuhui depicts the various beauties of nature. It encompasses the purity of snow-capped mountains, the pleasant autumn breeze, and the joyous abundance of harvest fruits, all evoking a sense of romance and longing. However, rice serves as a beneficial complement to it all because true love is not only about admiring scenic landscapes with a loved one but also about sharing daily meals and staying at home together. Owing to poetic language, Discourse Episode 3 has been highly praised by customers and widely circulated on the Internet. Now, it has been transformed into a tag and affixed to the rice bag with the logo of East Buy (see Figure 1).

Figure 1:

Tag bearing Dong Yuhui’s poetic language.

Dong Yuhui is skillful in using poetic language to foster audience empathy, which is highly beneficial for his live streaming sales. Poetic language, often conveyed through expressive and figurative means, has the power to evoke emotions and stimulate the imaginations of people. When customers encounter poetic language during shopping or brand experiences, they may find it easier to establish an emotional connection with the products or brands and gain a deeper understanding and experience of the conveyed messages. Poetic language can create a unique and memorable atmosphere that stimulates customers’ curiosity, interest, and resonance, thus promoting an emotional bond between them and the products or brands. It is found that “increasing a customer’s empathy with a service provider can increase that customer’s satisfaction with the service” (Davis et al. 2017: 229).

Poetic language resonates more with educated customers who have a certain economic background compared to traditional sales discourse. The German philosopher Heidegger proposes that the human dream is to dwell on the earth poetically. The simple approach of relying solely on high-pitched voices and fast-paced delivery by streamers to introduce commodities gradually fails to meet the needs of the customers. In the fast-paced world, what people need is not an intensified marketing language that may provoke aversion, but rather poetic language that slows them down and momentarily transcends the real world. Dong Yuhui is both a user and exemplar of poetic language. His unique language, unlike other streamers, successfully arouses customers’ longing for a better life. Dong Yuhui’s popularity is therefore inseparable from his use of poetic language.

4.2.1 Satisfying customers’ intellectual needs

Desire for knowledge is a fundamental need of human beings. This need becomes even stronger with the development of society. The great popularity of Dong Yuhui is underpinned by the fact that his live streaming discourse can effectively satisfy customers’ intellectual needs.

In Discourse Episode 4, Dong Yuhui fulfills customers’ thirst for knowledge by quoting several famous lines from the 16^th Century British poet William Shakespeare’s poem “Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day?”, which is one of his famous sonnets of love. However, many customers have no knowledge of this foreign poem. They are incapable of recalling Shakespeare’s famous work at the mention of summer, let alone being able to recite it. Only a small number of customers who have been exposed to English literature know this poem. Therefore, Dong Yuhui can, by quoting Shakespeare’s poem, fill the knowledge gap of his customers who are not aware of this poem. Even for those who know this poem, they can derive a sense of spiritual satisfaction by hearing this poem, which may bring about a spiritual resonance in them.

Dong Yuhui satisfies customers’ intellectual needs through his erudition because he fulfills their desire for knowledge. According to Steiner (2010), the desire for knowledge is fundamental to human beings. Curiosity, in essence, is the ability of individuals to acquire knowledge. Preliminary curiosity begins to emerge around the ages of five or six. As people grow older and engage in the process of life and learning, particularly in the systematic acquisition of knowledge, their thirst for knowledge further develops. The demand for knowledge among Chinese Internet users can be seen from the 2020 report by iResearch. The data show that after the pandemic in 2020, there was an average increase of interest of 16.7 % in serious content such as popular science documentaries and news facts. Content related to lifestyle also experienced a growth of 21.0 %, while entertainment-oriented content saw a decline of 3.2 %. Dong Yuhui’s extensive knowledge and erudition enable him to satisfy customers’ thirst for knowledge through his articulate and well-expressed language during live streaming for product promotion.

4.2.2 Satisfying customers’ emotional needs

Human beings do not lack emotions because they are not made of grass or wood. Neither do customers participating in live streaming e-commerce. Through telling intriguing stories and using poetic language, Dong Yuhui’s unique discourse can strike a chord with his customers, thus fulfilling their emotional needs.

In Discourse Episode 5, Dong Yuhui reminds customers of the various good things in the world. Longing for what is good is a part of human nature. We strive and work hard for a better life driven by the pursuit of beautiful love, family bonds, and art. If we lose sight of what is beautiful, we may head toward destruction. However, the relentless pursuit of efficiency and money in industrial societies has distorted many people’s minds and souls. Dong Yuhui says that every viewer craves for what is beautiful in life and every one of them is an angel. His kind words can soothe souls, heal anxieties, and inspire confidence. His words are so encouraging that they sound like chicken soup for the soul, which can effectively satisfy the emotional needs of his audience.

Dong Yuhui’s live streaming discourse gives customers a special impression that he is not intent on selling commodities but on sparking or soothing emotions. Emotions are a fundamental drive for human actions, and it is essential to acknowledge that customers are consistently influenced by their emotional states (Barlow and Maul 2020). From the commodity perspective, commodities have not only use value but also other forms of value, such as emotional value. Dong Yuhui not only introduces commodities to everyone but also offers emotional value. Sometimes when people buy something, it is not about the practicality or the specific value it brings, but rather the emotional value it can provide. The reason why Dong Yuhui surpasses other streamers is that he does not strictly follow a standardized process for product promotion; instead, he sells emotions and invokes empathy.

4.2.3 Satisfying customers’ psychological needs

Customers make purchases not only for material comfort but also for psychological comfort. It has become a must for manufacturers or sellers to deliver both comforts to customers. Dong Yuhui has certainly done a good job in this aspect because his special discourse never fails to cheer his customers up, comforting their fatigued souls and thus meeting their psychological needs.

In Discourse Episode 6, Dong Yuhui makes every effort to enhance customers’ confidence in themselves. Competition in modern Chinese society is very intense, and people often feel unable to keep up with the pace of society. The pressures from work, study, and life can cause anxiety and unease, particularly among young people. In the online space, there has been a prevalent sense of decadence and negative self-deprecating emotions. A large number of young individuals facing various societal pressures have collectively labeled themselves as “Sang”, which is a term denoting a state of being dispirited (Zhu 2018). Dong Yuhui quotes Chinese poet Gu Cheng’s line, “[a]lthough one may be born as insignificant as an ant, they can live as beautifully as a god”, to tell customers that even though their birth may be as humble as an ant, they can live as gloriously as a god. Dong Yuhui encourages customers to stay strong and stay positive.

Dong Yuhui’s efforts to enhance customer confidence can effectively meet their psychological needs. Schneider and Bowen (1995) propose that customers in service industries have three major needs: the need for security, the need for self-esteem, and the need for justice. Chung-Herrera (2007) believes that this model can well capture customers’ psychological needs in service industries. After all, marketing is to some extent about meeting the psychological needs of the customer. Clearly, Dong Yuhui has done a great job because he enables customers to see their own value and boosts their confidence, greatly enhancing their self-esteem. As a result, his live streaming room often gives people a sense of revitalization and a pleasant mood.

4.3.1 Semantic polarities

Sentiment analysis aims at analyzing the sentiment of the feedback given by a user in an online document by classifying it as negative, positive, or neutral. The classification process depends upon the analysis of the polarity features of the natural language text given by users. Thus, it is possible to know Chinese customers’ overall comments of Dong Yuhui’s rice-selling discourse through the conducting of polarity analysis (see Figure 2).

Figure 2:

Percentage of sentiment polarities toward Dong Yuhui’s rice-selling discourse.

The ratio of positive, negative, and neutral comments toward Dong Yuhui’s rice-selling discourse is 72.20 %, 24.44 %, and 3.36 % respectively. The high percentage of positive comments indicate that Chinese Internet users like Dong Yuhui’s unique way of live streaming very much, which can serve as hard evidence for Dong Yuhui’s phenomenal popularity.

4.3.2 High-frequency words and word cloud

Table 2 lists the top 30 Chinese high-frequency words that appear in Chinese Internet users’ comments on Dong Yuhui’s rice-selling discourse. The English translations and frequencies of the words are also provided.

Table 2 shows that in the discourse evaluations of Dong Yuhui selling rice by online users, apart from the rice itself, there is no mention of the quality, taste, origin, or price of the rice. Among these 30 words, three of them are knowledge, talent, and culture, respectively, all of which rank within the top fifteen. Additionally, two of the top 15 words are good and excellent. These five words represent direct evaluations of Dong Yuhui. This can also be observed from the word cloud (see Figure 3). This indicates that customers’ purchase of rice is not solely based on its utilitarian value.

Figure 3:

Word cloud of the top 30 English translations.

Customers value not only the use value of a commodity but also the meaning it represents. Online users’ evaluations focus not on the commodity itself but on the abilities of the host, particularly their knowledge reserves. This characteristic reflects the essence of knowledge-based marketing: hosts sell not just products but also emotions. “Commodities are no longer defined by their use, but rather by what they signify” (Ritzer 1998 cited in Baudrillard 1998:7).