Chapter 33: Who Can Tell Me Where This Sea of Flowers Is?

Chapter 33: Who Can Tell Me Where This Sea of Flowers Is?

Zhang Lin returned to the service center and checked the equipment once more.

The ticketing, printing, and ID scanning at the ticket counter were all working fine. Many tickets had already been printed, each priced at 50 yuan.

He had set this price after inspecting various seas of rapeseed flowers. Prices varied widely, ranging from 9 to 50 yuan, depending on the quality and size of the flower fields.

Smaller fields, often just a few dozen acres, offered limited views, making it hard to justify a high ticket price.

Some larger fields, despite their vast size, had short, sparse, and unappealing flowers, so even fields spanning thousands of acres only charged 20 yuan. A notorious example was a certain southern location, where the stark contrast between their online and real-life views had often been highlighted.

However, the three top-tier rapeseed flower fields in the country all charged 50 yuan.

Given that his flower field was of superior quality, he could have set an even higher price. With the +1 Scenic Value and +1 Screen Presence attributes, he wasn't worried about attracting visitors.

However, for a scenic farm, ticket sales were not the primary source of income. Instead, they served as a means to draw in visitors, as the era of traffic and flow was upon them. Traffic could be leveraged for various purposes.

For instance, the restaurant in the service center would benefit from the influx of visitors, ensuring a steady stream of customers.

Additionally, he could sell agricultural products. Although his farm didn't produce much yet, there were many fruit farmers in You County from whom he could buy in bulk, using this as a cover.

With a steady flow of visitors, selling fruit wouldn't be a problem. As the game's wholesale quantities increased, he could also sell to tourists, treating them as premium products.

In the future, with a steady flow of tourists, selling any new products would be much easier.

Zhang Lin then checked the entrance barriers to the flower field, where visitors would have their tickets checked before entering.

At this moment, his phone rang. It was a message from his Xiangyin backend, informing him that his online ticketing application had been approved.

He took out his phone and opened his Xiangyin account, which he had renamed to Liyuan Farm. In the current era, online promotion was essential for any scenic attraction. While on-site ticket sales were still important, online bookings were the norm.

This was why so many popular tourist spots had emerged.

With the online ticketing link now approved and the flower field about to open, it was time to start online promotions.

He pulled out some of the videos and photos he had taken earlier, selected one, added a soothing soundtrack, and wrote a grandiose title before uploading it.

Thanks to the +1 Screen Presence attribute, the video's quality, both in terms of camera work and artistic value, had the potential to go viral.

If the Xiangyin traffic pool rules were followed, this video would definitely stand out.

Unfortunately, reality was harsh.

Half a day later, the video had only reached 2,000 views, slightly more than the typical 500 views for a regular video.

This was not right.

The +1 Screen Presence attribute should have made the video superior to those that went viral online.

However, as a network specialist, he quickly understood the issue.

It was the network competition protection protocol.

In similar products, those who paid for promotion were given priority, with the highest bidders appearing first. Those who didn't pay were throttled, to protect those who did.

This was most evident on a certain search engine, where the first three results for a search were often not the most relevant, and sometimes even included scams, simply because they had paid for promotion.

Xiangyin also had this issue, so there were likely other rapeseed flower fields currently paying for promotion.

He searched and found that the Zhou flower field was indeed being promoted, with over a dozen videos receiving more than 200,000 likes each.

This flower field had matured earlier and, with its vast size, was one of the most popular rapeseed flower fields in the country. They had definitely spent a significant amount on promotion, at least on DOU+.

Thus, for his flower field to go viral without spending money was impossible, as it would undermine the interests of those who had paid for advertising. Who would pay for advertising in the future if it didn't work?

To gain traction on Xiangyin, he would need to spend money, ensuring fair competition with the Zhou flower field.

It was all part of the capitalist playbook.

Zhang Lin closed Xiangyin for the moment, not eager to spend money on promotion just yet. He planned to first attract locals from You County. Given the quality of his flower field, visitors from You County would likely take and share videos and photos on Xiangyin. Quantity could sometimes lead to a qualitative change, and when that happened, spending money on promotion would have a much better effect.

Additionally, he wanted to start with a trial run to get things moving.

With that in mind, he left the farm and headed to the RT-Mart Plaza.

In You County, the best place to advertise wasn't the local TV station, which almost no one watched.

Instead, he headed for the advertisement screen at the RT-Mart Plaza.

This plaza is the heart of You City, where almost everyone goes for dining, entertainment, and daily necessities. Most people visit the plaza every day for shopping, fun, and even exercise.

Therefore, by placing the flower field promotional video on the screen, Zhang Lin could ensure that the majority of You City's residents would see it.

Arriving at RT-Mart, Zhang Lin parked his scooter and went straight to the plaza manager's office.

In fact, the advertisement screen was often available for booking. In a small place like You City, how many companies needed such advertisements? And how many people were willing to spend the money on them? The number was very limited.

Without ads to play, most of the time, the screen showed the plaza's own promotional ads or even movies.

So, when the manager saw Zhang Lin, he welcomed him warmly, "Mr. Zhang, here are the available advertising slots and their corresponding prices!"

Zhang Lin took a look and was surprised. Apart from prime time in the evening, which was mostly booked, the rest of the slots were mostly empty.

Even the prime time slots, at 10 minutes per night, only cost 2000 yuan a month. Other time slots were even cheaper.

In the city, a 2-minute ad on any outdoor screen at a plaza would cost more than 3000 yuan a month.

Seeing this, Zhang Lin didn't hesitate. He chose three time slots: the evening, and 6 PM and 8 PM, which were the times with the most foot traffic at RT-Mart Plaza.

The total cost for a month was only 5000 yuan, with the two evening slots at 2000 yuan and the afternoon slot at 1000 yuan. The manager even threw in an additional afternoon slot for free, showing how little business they had.

After signing the contract, the manager said, "Mr. Zhang, the free slot can be used immediately. You might see it as soon as you go downstairs."

Zhang Lin nodded and left the office. As he was about to head down, he ran into Zhang Dong.

"Zhang Lin!" Zhang Dong was also surprised.

"Got some free time? Did you sell out all your fruit today?" Zhang Lin asked, equally surprised.

"My mom is watching the store," Zhang Dong said, glancing away with a bit of embarrassment. Following his gaze, Zhang Lin saw a young girl on the phone.

She looked much younger than Zhang Dong's ex-girlfriend, Liu Rui.

"Nice one, what's she up to?" Zhang Lin asked, teasingly.

He had thought that the best way to get Liu Rui to stop bothering Zhang Dong was to find a younger girl and even buy her a BMW 5 Series, just like Liu Rui's current boyfriend. No one likes to see their ex with someone better.

He hadn't expected Zhang Dong to take the first step so quickly.

Men do have a preference for younger women, after all.

Zhang Dong explained, "I just hired her to help with the store. We've got 500 pounds of Sun Rose grapes, and many customers are placing orders through WeChat. I need to deliver them."

"Smart move, you're taking advantage of the situation," Zhang Lin teased. "Admit it, you hired her because you have a crush on her?"

"It's not like that!" Zhang Dong shook his head. "This is all thanks to Yingzi. She suddenly started being nice to me out of nowhere, and it felt like she was trying to hit on me. I was so scared, I had to use Liu Li as a shield."

"After dealing with Yingzi, I thought I'd take Liu Li out for a meal. We talked, and she seemed like a good person. We went out a few more times, and I decided to give it a try."

Zhang Lin was genuinely surprised.

He had deliberately told Yingzi about Zhang Dong's situation, and she had actually gone for it.

Impressive!

But in a way, she was doing a good deed.

"Brother Dong, who is this?" Liu Li asked, hanging up her phone and looking curiously at Zhang Lin.

"This is my friend, Zhang Lin. You can call him Lin Brother," Zhang Dong smiled.

"Lin Brother!" Liu Li greeted politely.

Zhang Lin nodded in return. The girl seemed very well-mannered, a good match for Zhang Dong.

"Zhang Lin, what brings you here?" Zhang Dong asked curiously.

"I'm here to book an ad spot at the plaza," Zhang Lin explained.

As he spoke, a few people nearby exclaimed in surprise:

"Look at that video on the ad screen, what a beautiful sea of rapeseed flowers!"

"I wonder where those rapeseed flowers are!"

"Yeah, it's so well-shot!"

"..."

More and more people were drawn to the screen, and they were captivated by the video. Thanks to the "Entry +1" attribute, the beautiful and poetic sea of rapeseed flowers was incredibly attractive.

Liu Li was also drawn in, hugging Zhang Dong's arm. "Brother Dong, those rapeseed flowers are so beautiful. I really want to see them, but I don't know where they were filmed!"

...

(End of Chapter)

Chapter end