Original title: Ad creatives up 150%, revenue up 34% — is Zhangwan & Tinghuadao’s FlickReels about to explode?
Author: DataEye Research Institute
Source: DataEye Short Drama Going Global
Cover image source | pexels
The DataEye Research Institute has noticed that FlickReels, the overseas short-drama app under Zhangwan, is gaining strong momentum. Not only has its ad spend kept climbing — holding a top-three spot in the overseas short-drama app creative rankings — its most-promoted dramas are also frequently near the top of the charts.
On the revenue side, DataEye’s September overseas short-drama monthly report shows FlickReels’ in-app purchase revenue approached US$8 million in September, up 34% month over month.
So why is FlickReels performing so well? What lies behind it?
In this edition, the DataEye Research Institute provides an objective, data-based analysis, hoping to offer some reference for industry practitioners.
FlickReels’ data performance
(1) Download trend
DianDian data shows FlickReels downloads have kept rising since mid-September, from around 46,000 on September 13 to a peak of around 307,000 on October 11, easing off slightly in recent days.
(2) Ad spend trend
ADX overseas short-drama data shows FlickReels’ ad spend has likewise trended upward since mid-September, with daily creatives rising from around 7,000 sets on September 13 to a peak of around 44,000 sets on October 13, with a slight recent pullback.
(3) Most-promoted dramas
On promoted dramas, ADX overseas short-drama data shows that all of the top 10 dramas FlickReels promoted in the last 30 days are AI dramas. “Fifty Cents to Find My Billionaire Dad” and “Testing Love: Married to a Crippled Billionaire” rank first and second, each with over 15,000 creative sets — clearly ahead of the rest — while “Even Billionaires Beg to Borrow From Me” ranks third with nearly 10,000 sets.
Overall, the 10 dramas FlickReels has promoted in the last 30 days span a fairly diverse range of genres. Among the top 3 are a cute-baby-finds-dad and wealthy-family redemption story, an emotional “billionaire pretends to be poor to test true love” tale, and a male-oriented “urban powers” drama in which the protagonist awakens psychic eyes to see through antiques, stone gambling and the stock market, completing an underdog comeback.
Within the top 10, FlickReels’ core silver-haired romance genre takes two spots, while mature genres such as revenge and winning back an ex are also covered with fresh twists. For example, the fifth-ranked “They Forced Me Out, Then Begged Me Back” blends revenge with the workplace: a diligent office worker is fired right before receiving a bonus and framed as the scapegoat for the company’s US$100 million debt. The protagonist eventually fights back with work records and professional expertise, exposing the truth, sending the fraud executives to prison and pulling off a workplace counterattack.
Cause analysis
Based on the data above, the DataEye Research Institute believes FlickReels’ simultaneous climb in downloads and revenue in September was mainly driven by a combination of rising creative volume and hit dramas.
(1) On creative volume: ADX overseas short-drama data shows FlickReels ran 147,000 creative sets in September (after smart dedup, same below), up more than 150% from 58,000 sets in August. In the first half of October (October 1–15), FlickReels already ran 169,000 creative sets — surpassing its full-month total for September.
The sharp rise in ad spend thus significantly boosted FlickReels’ numbers. As seen above, the 30-day download trend and ad-spend trend move closely together, both peaking in mid-October — a sign that FlickReels downloads are heavily driven by paid traffic.
(2) On promoted dramas: titles including “Fifty Cents to Find My Billionaire Dad”, “Testing Love: Married to a Crippled Billionaire” and “Even Billionaires Beg to Borrow From Me” have successively entered the top of overseas short-drama hot charts and overseas AI drama charts.
Meanwhile, FlickReels’ top 3 promoted dramas over the last 90 days are the same as the 30-day top 3, all being the three titles above. The top two, in particular, each sit at around 17,000 creative sets — far above the rest, a gap that looks almost cliff-like.
Overall, FlickReels’ explosive data this round is likely driven by hit dramas and heavy ad spend working together.
Hit dramas power FlickReels’ breakout
It is easy to see that the core driver of FlickReels’ breakout this round is those two hit dramas. Scaling up ad spend behind proven hits to win more downloads and revenue is a natural playbook.
So what exactly makes these two hit dramas so magnetic?
Take “Fifty Cents to Find My Billionaire Dad” first. By genre, it is a “cute baby finds family + wealthy-family redemption” story: a little girl is illegally adopted by a family that abuses her. After being cast out, she happens to spot a missing-child poster describing a girl who looks like her, so she uses the two coins left on her to call the number on the poster — eventually finding her biological billionaire father.
From the opening “last two coins to find a billionaire dad”, the drama already carries a strong emotional hook, with identity reversal, family and emotional redemption woven through the story.
The other drama, “Testing Love: Married to a Crippled Billionaire”, belongs to the “true love test” genre. The male lead, the world’s richest man, does not want to marry a gold digger, so he disguises himself as a disabled person to attend blind dates and run a “true love test”. Disgusted by this, the female lead’s cousin tricks her into replacing her at the date — and by a twist of fate, the two end up together. To sustain the “true love test”, the billionaire not only has to maintain the pretense of being poor and disabled, but also keep concealing his true identity.
The drama combines the sweet romance between the leads with the laughable situations that unfold during the “true love test”, blending sweetness, billionaire fantasy and comedy.
Data-wise, thanks to their unique premises and storytelling, both dramas have recently featured near the top of the overseas AI drama weekly charts.
Overall, across the dramas FlickReels promoted in the last 30 days, the top 3 — especially the top 2 — run clearly higher creative volume than the rest, meaning its ad resources are concentrated on a few market-validated hits rather than simply flooding the market with new titles.
Whether FlickReels can sustain its recent momentum may hinge on whether new hit dramas take the baton. How FlickReels adjusts its ad strategy and content supply next is something the DataEye Research Institute will keep watching.
