ALIBABA’S NEWEST 11.11 GMV RECORD: US$38.4B

Eleven years in, and Alibaba Group, the e-commerce and media giant that created and grew 11.11 into the world’s largest shopping festival, is still delivering record results – and the innovations necessary to make them happen every November.

By the time 11.11 ended at midnight on Monday, Alibaba had generated RMB268.4 billion (US$38.4 billion) in gross merchandise volume in just 24 hours, a 26% jump over last year’s numbers. GMV in 2018 was RMB213.5 billion, or US$30.8 billion.

“Today we showed the world what the future of consumption looks like for brands and consumers,” said Fan Jiang, president of Taobao and Tmall. “We are meeting the growing demand of Chinese consumers and helping them upgrade their lifestyles, while introducing new users to our digital economy from across China and around the world.”

WATCH: Highlights from 2019’s 11.11 Global Shopping FestivalPlay

In addition to a new record GMV, the total number of delivery orders also reached a new high: 1.292 billion, up 59% from 812 million last year. There were 299 brands to reach RMB 100 million in GMV, including Apple, Nike, Estee Lauder and Giorgio Armani. The top 10 countries selling to China through Alibaba’s cross-border platforms were Japan, the U.S., Korea, Australia, Germany, France, the U.K., New Zealand, Italy and Canada.

Last year’s festival was all about the Alibaba ecosystem, and certainly that ecosystem continues to play a critical role in setting new GMV records and generating greater levels of consumer engagement, as Alibaba draws additional businesses into 11.11. 2019, however, was all about consumers: where they are in China, how to reach them and providing them with the best possible selection of products.

Capturing Lower-Tier Consumption

Increasingly, those consumers are in China’s lower-tier cities and rural areas. Alibaba had said that it expected most of the 100 million new users participating in this year’s 11.11 to come from these areas, where China’s biggest consumption growth is happening. In fiscal 2019, more than 70% of Alibaba’s 102 million newly acquired annual active consumers were based there.

“Lower-tier areas are the most important business strategy for us this year and a strategic direction for the company, because China’s less-developed markets have a lot of potential for growth when you consider their population, geography and shopping habits,” said Liu Bo, general manager of Taobao and Tmall Marketing, at a press conference on Monday afternoon.

Alibaba is leveraging its powerful consumer analytics and supply-chain capabilities to create new products for lower-tier consumers, Liu said, firstly by partnering with multinational brands, such as P&G and L’Oréal, and secondly by working with China’s vast network of manufacturers. The company provides both brands and manufacturers with the data they need to develop and market products tailored directly to these new online shoppers.

By delivering better-quality goods at affordable prices, consumers in lower-tier areas “have a lot of potential to make frequent purchases,” Liu said. And Alibaba wants to capture that consumption.

New Products to Meet New Demand

As essential as lower-tier areas are to Alibaba’s growth strategy, the company’s focus on new products is not bound by geography. In fact, this year’s 11.11 alone included 1 million new products on the company’s e-commerce platforms.

“We take new products as a major strategy for this year’s 11.11 has become the largest platform to launch new products,” Liu said. “Many international brands are leveraging the platform and the results have been excellent.”

For example, cosmetics brand MAC sold 60,000 units of a limited-edition, just-for-11.11 lipstick in five minutes of pre-sales. And brands are committed to developing even more new products for Alibaba’s platforms going forward. Ten global brands, including Olay and Shiseido, have committed to incubate more than 50% of their new products with Tmall this year, Jiang said.

The Must-Do of Livestreaming

Once just a single marketing tool among many for brands selling to China, livestreaming has since become a must for any company that wants the attention of Chinese consumers.

These consumers use livestreams, typically hosted by popular key opinion leaders, to find and learn about new products, making it an essential part of product discovery. That’s a stark contract to the West, where most livestreaming platforms are focused on gaming and entertainment.

Just how popular is the trend? Taobao is home to over 4,000 livestream hosts who generate 150,000 hours of content each day. For 11.11, more than 100,000 brands and merchants used livestreaming to market their products.

“It’s a brand-new experience. Livestreaming is becoming ubiquitous for merchants and a new [shopping] channel for consumers,” he said.

A Green 11.11

Jiang said that Alibaba’s logistics arm, Cainiao, had delivered 100 million packages before 8 a.m. on Monday, just eight hours into 11.11. But he said the company was committed to fulfilling those orders sustainably.

“Green is the most important keyword for this 11.11,” Jiang said. “We’ve shipped 1.292 billion packages, but through this we want even more to promote the concept of green consumption.”

To that end, Cainiao has set up more recycling stations – 40,000 of them – across China through its Cainiao Smart Logistics Network, while its express-courier partners is hosting an additional 35,000. Consumers will also be rewarded “green energy” points on Ant Forest for their recycling efforts.

Alibaba has established Nov. 20 as “National Cardboard Box Recycling Day” in China, as well, to further promote its push for a green shopping festival.

JD expands the partnership with Camus Cognac

JD will work with Camus to launch exclusive products based on the opinions of Chinese consumers

Camus Cognac, the world’s largest family-owned independent cognac home, has announced an expansion of its partnership with JD.com, the largest Chinese retailer. As part of the extended partnership, in addition to offering several Camus premium brands to consumers, JD will work with the parent company to launch exclusive products, based on consumer opinions about Chinese market trends. Taking advantage of its various offline resources, JD will help Camus develop innovative marketing programs; a project in line with JD’s “Boundaryless Retail” strategy.

JD’s analysis of Chinese imported liquor consumers has found that many of them belong to a wealthy age group, aged between 26 and 35, curious to try new products. Based on this, Camus Cognac recently launched a Cognop VSOP gift pack on JD. The product has rich flavours and is ideal for young consumers interested in exploring new spirits.

The new partnership enthused both parties at stake

Cyril Camus, fifth-generation owner and president of Camus Cognac, said: “We are excited to grow our partnership and collaboration with JD.com. While Chinese consumers of wine and spirits continue to mature in refinement, I am confident that this partnership represents the perfect combination, mixing the incessant drive of Camus Cognac for JD’s utmost refinement and dedication to an impeccable omnichannel shopping experience “.

“We are excited to expand our strategic partnership with Camus Cognac,” said Carol Fung, president of JD FMCG. “We look forward to leveraging JD’s capabilities in customer analysis, marketing solutions and technology to increase the recognition of the Camus brand among Chinese consumers who are passionate about high-quality liquor.”

The number of imported spirits consumed in China will grow by 20% in four years

The extended partnership comes as demand for high-quality spirits in China continues to grow. According to industry estimates, the number of imported spirits consumed in China should grow by 20% within four years, from a total of 4.4 million boxes in 2018 to 5.3 million boxes in 2022.

In 2018, as a testament to the importance of the market, China surpassed Singapore for the first time, becoming the world’s second-largest cognac buyer after the United States, with over 255 million bottles consumed.

Douyin? Here the Future of Social E-Commerce

Today it’s clear how Douyin is showcasing the future of social and e-commerce. Focus on Douyin if you want to win in China. Let’s see why

Chinese e-commerce sector is booming, having a higher e-commerce spend this year than the rest of the world combined. Last data show us, again, how China is such a big opportunity for brands. As we know, the Dragon, once known as less connected country in the world, has become the land of the e-commerce giants with Alibaba and JD amongst many others all dominating online spend right now. But other new players are growing behind the curtain. Pinduoduo, Meituan, Kuaishou, Little Red Book and Douyin some names.

© Weibo. Zhang Yiming recognized the importance of the social networks environment, so Douyin also integrated social sharing with major platforms such as QQ, Weibo, and WeChat.

That’s why is not wrong to say that the opportunity for brands isn’t in the Alibaba’s & JD’s. Whilst they account for over 50% of Chinese e-commerce, it’s more effective as a brand to go after the other portion that isn’t the lions share that is found through other e-commerce channels. Let’s see how Douyin is becoming month by month an important player in e-commerce sector. We’ve mentioned Douyin but also the “underbelly” of Chinese commerce, such as private communities, for example social sellers on WeChat.

Short-Form vertical video is going to be the dominant format over the next 5 years, and Douyin is the platform that will lead the way. We’ve always been confident on short-form video, and a large reason for that is the huge growth of Douyin, with over 500m monthly active users and rising, and over 50% of those using the app daily.

Today it’s clear that Douyin is showcasing the future of social and e-commerce, seamlessly integrating the two through content and future technologies. 

Douyin’s latest feature is a true game-changer. You can now select a feature in a video, for example, a person or item of clothing, and search for other videos or images containing them or directly buy the products recommended. What’s the meaning? It’s what we’ve predicted will happen: Next generation of social media led by AI. 

Could be a shock, but forget Tmall, Taobao and WeChat – focus on Douyin if you want to win. Let’s see why. Right now Douyin’s aims are to get as many users as possible and grow the platform, even outside China, and give exposure to great content, there is no ulterior motive like there is with other social platforms that are pay-to-win.

© Chinadaily. Video-based e-commerce is shaping up to be the next revenue battleground for China’s leading video apps, Douyin and Kuaishou.

On Douyin, content wins, and that’s the best time for brands to build an audience.  Digital experts always been bullish on short-form video and Douyin in particular, and this latest feature reinforces that and opens up a world of possibility for brands in connecting with their audience. Brands need to be working toward how they can leverage the direction that social is moving to, and they need to be doing that now – this is merely the tip of the iceberg. Are you going to start building an audience on Douyin?

China is a huge opportunity, but everyone should remember that it pays tenfold if you think outside the box, be bold and be creative. Think beyond the status quo platforms that everyone talks about and look at the opportunities everyone forgets. This is where the real arbitrage can be found, and Douyin is one the top player to interact with.

Alibaba Group To Improve The Experience Of Visitors To Universal Parks & Resorts

The two have formed a partnership to improve the user experience and to digitize the operations of the future Universal Beijing Resort, which will open in 2021

A cutting-edge theme park with the best technology that improves the user experience. This is the Alibaba and Universal Parks & Resorts project that intends to make the future Universal Beijing Resort, which will open in 2021, one of the most technological theme parks in the world.

The park will use facial recognition during park admission, app-based food ordering and more. To help is the ABOS project, which offers all the tools and services of Alibaba to companies so that they can better meet the pace and needs of the Chinese market.

Brian Roberts, president and CEO of US communications and entertainment company Comcast, owner of Universal Studios, said it was important to make sure that Universal makes it fun and easy for guests to enjoy their time with family and friends.

Visitors can use the local Koubei service app

“Our collaboration with Alibaba will help us do exactly that. Together, we can take the theme park experience to a new level, “Roberts said.

Visitors will be able to book tickets and hotels via Beijing’s Universal Fliggy flagship store and will also be able to watch the resort’s schedule and universal movies on Alibaba’s Youbu video streaming app.

Once at the resort, visitors have the opportunity to use Alipay’s facial recognition technology for anything. The use of Alipay mini-programs is also planned to improve the guest experience, such as travel planning or parking, as well as encouraging low-carbon lifestyle choices.

Alibaba’s cloud computing arm will support the technology infrastructure

The companies, which also collaborate with the Beijing Tourism Group, expect the collaboration to offer “the best experience for guests” and establish a new benchmark for the entertainment industry and theme parks globally.

Daniel Zhang, executive president and CEO of Alibaba Group, said: “This partnership will also bring to fruition a multidimensional, data-enabled operations-management solution for the industry and create a truly digitized theme park,” he said. “The future of commerce is driven by technology and big data, and digitization will be the source of brand-new growth opportunities for all businesses.”

The Alibaba Business Operating System (ABOS) program is a complete solution that helps brands use all the tools available in the corporate ecosystem, which includes marketing and branding, sales, product development, customer services, finance, logistics, supply chain and management channel and local services on request.

China, The New E-Commerce Trend Is Second-Hand Luxury

The trend is confirmed by Liu Bo, general manager of TusStar Venture

The Chinese luxury goods sector has received a steady stream of investments in recent years. TusStar is one of the capital investors that pays money in the sector, acting as the main investor for the high-end operator of used Ponhu-Luxury.

Building an integrated offline platform for second-hand luxuries is what the market will need in the future, TusStar Venture’s general manager Liu Bo told TechNode.

“In Japan, the penetration rate for used luxury goods has reached a 1: 1 ratio, which means that every time a new stock is bought, an old one will be resold. In China, only 3% of the stock is sold. Basically, nobody bought second-hand luxuries,” Liu said.

TusStar invests in high-tech, high-growth start-ups

Liu expects growth in the market for the sale of high-end used products in China. “One must think that one day, if an economic recession hit China, second-hand luxuries would retain their value as they did in Japan in the past. The cultures of East Asia are similar. We see promising growth points in the luxury sector second-hand in China “.

In his current role, Liu keeps an eye on TMT investment opportunities, energy savings and the environment, as well as the new economy and new services.

Moreover, TusStar invests in high-tech and high-growth start-ups, focusing mainly on TMT, mobile internet, cleantech, new material, health care, advanced production, education, intelligent hardware and consumption area. The company, in confirmation of this, has signed agreements with over 300 startups and so far has invested over 2 billion RMB.

But China, despite strong progress, seems to appreciate offline trade more

Some argue that digitization is the main driving force behind luxury sales in China, but Liu argues that the real “battle” develops offline. “Only some users might consider buying luxuries online. Most customers, in fact, care little about the discount, aiming more at brands and quality.”

According to a report published by Bain Analysis in 2019, although online luxury sales have surpassed the global market in 2018, online penetration in other luxury categories remains very low, with the exception of cosmetics.

“There are still many opportunities to build platforms in this area,” Liu said. “But it’s not the kind of e-commerce platform on the Internet that people talk about today, but an offline platform that unites all the key nodes of the entire commercial chain.

Meituan Exceeds Baidu: It is The Third-Largest Internet Company In China

The delivery food platform is preceded only by Alibaba and Tencent

Meituan, the Chinese delivery food platform, closed at $ 89 per share on October 8th, up 5.08% from the previous day, reaching an all-time high of $ 89.25 per share with a market capitalization of $ 516.2 billion.

The evaluation currently makes Meituan the third largest Internet company listed in China after Alibaba ($ 428.3 billion) and Tencent ($ 394.3 billion).

On the other hand, Chinese Internet research and Baidu’s artificial intelligence engine closed at $ 99.53 on October 9 with a value of its US stock market at $ 34.69 billion, actually lagging behind Meituan as the fourth largest Chinese Internet giant.

Meituan and Tencent are currently the two kings of Hong Kong shares

As a Meituan pillar activity, the financial report shows that the transaction amount of food and beverage delivery activities in the second quarter of 2019 was 93.1 billion yuan, up 36.5% year-on-year; the number of food and beverage delivery orders was 2.1 billion yuan, an increase of 34.6% on an annual basis. Furthermore, the average value increased by 1.4% on an annual basis.

According to an analyst at Tiger Securities, Meituan and Tencent are currently the two kings of Hong Kong shares. The data also showed that Tencent Holdings, in recent days, recorded a turnover of 4.967 billion HK $, while the turnover of Meituan approached 3.238 billion HK $.

Focusing on its Users, Pinduoduo Has Become China’s New E-Commerce Giant

Pinduoduo is not the new kid on the block anymore. From lower-tier cities, it has made its way to the largest centers so much so that today, it is officially a viable competitor in China’s e-commerce arena

There is a Chinese app that embraces many of China’s contemporary trends and at the same time, faces the market’s modern challenges with extraordinary success. It is Pinduoduo, the e-commerce platform for group-buying deals, which is threatening Alibaba and JD.com’s duopoly in the Middle Kingdom.

Pinduoduo has been China’s third most popular shopping app since July 2017 but its daily active users have outnumbered JD.com’s for at least the past 12 months, turning it into China’s second-biggest e-commerce company by the number of users.

Its origins can be traced back to the US Silicon Valley where Pinduoduo’s founder, Colin Huang, started his career as a Google engineer. Mr. Huang, indeed, belongs to that group of Chinese entrepreneurs who, after a working experience abroad, have returned home to launch those hi-tech companies, which are making history today.

In particular, Colin Huang has managed to combine Chinese love for bargaining with the force of recommendation among friends while also targeting and unlocking the most neglected market, that of low-income households. The mission is clear: “The future of the Chinese digital economy is not to give a Shanghai resident the life of a Parisian. The future is to provide handkerchiefs and fresh fruits to those living in the province,” said Huang.

However, Pinduoduo’s history does not stop in the province. The company’s new challenge is to compete with the big ones on the same battlefield. Therefore, the next step is to develop an in-house logistics network and shipping information technology.

Currently, Pinduoduo is the second most used e-commerce platform and the fastest growing app in the history of the Chinese internet. Although it is mostly associated with lower-tier and lower-income buyers, last June, orders from Tier 1 and 2 cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, and Hangzhou accounted for almost half of the platform’s total order value.

© 123rf. Although Taobao and JD.com are still the e-commerce market leaders, Pinduoduo is the app that benefits from the highest loyalty rate.

The startup, whose name is roughly translated as “buy more together”, was launched in Shanghai in 2015. It turned into a Unicorn after just 21 months, reaching $1.5 billion gross market value much faster than its older peers like JD.com and Alibaba’s Taobao.

The explosive growth of Pinduoduo is essentially due to two main factors. The first factor is the significant number of funds received, such as that of Tencent and IDG, which allocated an investment of $110 million in 2016. The second factor is the app’s ability to take hold in smaller cities.

Today, 483.2 million buyers use Pinduoduo for their online purchases and 135 million of them use the app daily. Numerous international brands such as Huawei and Apple have their flagship stores on the platform and the overlap in users between Taobao and Huang’s app has now reached the figure of 109 million people.

In June, Pinduoduo’s average monthly active users were 366 million, an increase of 88% from 195 million in the same quarter of 2018. It represents almost half of monthly active users of the total Alibaba ecosystem.

However, compared to its peers, Pinduoduo works differently, allowing users to participate in group buying deals. More than a simple digital shopping platform, it is a social commerce app, which uses a “team purchase” model and leverages social sharing on Chinese social networks.

The consumer can buy an item at full price or get a discount if he invites other people to join the purchase. This is a model that applies perfectly to the Chinese cashless society as about 583 million people used mobile payment last year. But above all, it makes the most of the sharing-with-friends potential, creating a viral environment.

Therefore, Colin Huang’s experience in the digital landscape together with a forward-looking approach made him build a completely different kind of marketplace, whose appeal is the satisfaction of taking advantage of a great deal instead of the lower price of products. This explains its virality and addiction primarily in lower-tier cities where salaries are still lower compared to first-tier ones.

© 123rf. Although the average order spending on Pinduoduo is lower than its peers, its users have nearly doubled their annual average spending to $208 in the last 12-month.

Nevertheless, although the competition with China’s e-commerce giants is strong in higher-tier cities, the app is moving away from the frame of a second-level platform for lower-income buyers to finally make its way in the Chinese high-end market. Here, China’s internet titans, Taobao and JD.com, dominate the market, keeping off potential rivals.

To reach its goals and be a viable competitor in the market, the Shanghai-based company thus plans to develop its own logistics network and, therefore, speed up its deliveries. According to Pinduoduo, with the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and big data technologies, new services will include route planning, parcel sorting, and the improvement of fresh produce deliveries.

Pinduoduo aims to answer the demand for fast and reliable delivery, especially since these two claims have overtaken the demand for competitive prices and a wide selection of products.

The plan is, therefore, to invest in advanced technologies like AI-powered routing in order to develop and then improve its logistics network.

The Vice President of Strategy at Pinduoduo, David Liu, said that the decision to implement the orders’ fulfillment has come after the company received customer complaints about the deliveries. He also explained that many merchants on the platform were using the competitor’s logistics network. Therefore, the app had no control over these shipments.

Since its launch, the app relied on Alibaba’s logistics arm Cainiao to track and handle about $70 billion of its annual shipments. Over these years, the rival Alibaba has, therefore, had access to Pinduoduo’s activity and its customers’ shopping habits. But this is all about to change, especially since the platform launched its own shipping information technology early this year.

Since the launch of Pinduoduo’s waybill system, an average of 40 million orders per day has already migrated to the new system, which are almost all orders generated on the platform.

David Liu revealed he is well aware that there are many established logistics services in China that Pinduoduo can leverage. He thus pointed out that the Shanghai app will not try to copy its larger rivals. Indeed, contrary to Cainiao and JD.com, Pinduoduo has no plans to operate warehouses or build its own delivery fleet.

Pinduoduo aims, instead, to help sellers participating in the supply chain. Being one of China’s largest online retail platforms for fresh products, farmers will thus leverage the platform’s big data analysis to syncronize the harvest and shipments and avoid food waste.

© 123rf. The next battlefield for e-commerce dominance will probably be the fresh food e-commerce, of which Pinduoduo is one of the largest players.

Once again, this young company focuses on its users to enhance the platform. It started as a group-buying app for lower-income households and then spread in higher-tier cities through its social nature and a check-out system that allows automatic payment.

Today, Pinduoduo targets the sellers. Although the company has already allocated an over $505-million-investment to help farmers selling their perishable agricultural goods on the platform, it now aims to help all the merchants improve their understanding and participation in the retail supply chain. And by entering the higher-tier market and the logistics sector, it has now officially entered into direct competition with China’s e-commerce giants.

But its strength is still the focus on both the customers and the sellers, which is increasingly developing around the fresh produce market. This is not about “provide handkerchiefs to those living in the province” anymore. Now, it is about building a direct line between farmers in rural areas and consumers in bigger cities.

The next battlefield for e-commerce dominance will probably be the fresh food e-commerce and Pinduoduo is already in the front line.

Live-Streaming: China’s Answer to Consumers’ Need for Entertainment and Transparency

It’s not just entertainment. Live-streaming is the Chinese answer to consumer’s need for transparency. And now even WeChat enters China’s live-streaming squad, providing live broadcasts within its Mini Program platform

Live-streaming is not only the ultimate entertainment format but it is also the internet’s next form of digital communication. It is coming from China to reshape the whole e-commerce industry one stream after the other. After having pioneered social-commerce, the Dragon is now setting the model for video-driven e-commerce both at home and abroad.

According to statistics, more than 100 million viewers watch a live online video event every month while nearly 32% of users buy products through live-streaming videos. It is the “entertain-merce” era where commerce is inextricably linked to entertainment.

After Taobao revealed that goods sold via live-streaming in 2018 were worth a total of $14.9 billion, now even Tencent has accelerated the integration of live-streaming features into its WeChat Mini Program platform. The aim is clear: boosting e-commerce through real-time content.

© 123rf. Tencent opened up live-streaming on WeChat in early March and has already seen impressive sales results from the first tests.

WeChat is going to open up new e-commerce options by providing live-streaming features. According to a WeChat public account called Tencent Live Streaming Assistant, China’s internet giant, already started to test the live-broadcasting function with content managing companies and a limited number of e-commerce players in March. 

The sources have revealed that the firm is working to provide a smooth transition between watching broadcasts and buying online. Apparently, the user would be allowed to click the products listed on the live-streamed video and then, would be directed to the merchant’s Mini Program to finalize the transaction.

Streaming on WeChat was already possible before, but sellers had to link up with the Tencent Live app, which operates as a separate platform. Now, with the new features, merchants with official accounts will be able to live-stream their goods through an H5 marketing page – interactive pages written in HTML5 language, usually for mobile websites – embedded in their Mini Programs.

One of the best ways to gain instant reactions and engagement from the audience is to leverage live-streaming. After Taobao and JD.com, this function is finally available even on WeChat.

In addition to Alibaba’s Taobao and JD.com, Chinese vendors now have a brand-new channel to generate revenues, which among other things leverages WeChat’s enormous volume of users. With 1.1 billion monthly active users, WeChat ecosystem is, therefore, enriched by features that could turn the app into the next bigger player in e-commerce. It will become an even more powerful platform that satisfies all kinds of needs of the online community.

Nevertheless, live-streaming and e-commerce have been a winning combination in China for some time now. In late 2016, only a few hundred of Chinese mobile apps had live-broadcasting features. But today, there are an estimated more than 900 real-time video platforms and over 10 million active hosts in the country. So much so that today, experts claim that this market in China is going to be worth $8 billion in 2019.

The popularity of this new format derives from two particular features: the chance for everyone to be seen by an audience and the complete transparency of the content as it is filmed live with no post-production. Therefore, from education to entertainment, from online gaming to live shopping, real-time videos now represent the ultimate form of communication for Chinese millennials. Indeed, of the over 800 million people with internet connections in China, nearly half of them use real-time video apps.

© Alizila. China has become the largest market for live-streaming, which is expected to be worth $8 billion in 2019.

Live-streaming’s interactive nature makes it suitable for many audiences with different purposes. And for what concerns education, real-time videos are making a life-changing difference in China’s rural areas.

CCTalk is part of a growing number of live-broadcasting services in China’s education industry. Similar to entertainment and e-commerce applications of live-streaming, educational live-streams open a real-time channel between a host and an audience, or a teacher and students. Today, over 10,000 individuals and organizations are teaching classes on CCTalk so that even larger players such as Tencent and YY now have their own live education platform as well.

However, before being China’s top form of communication, live-streaming is above all a form of entertainment. With the rising popularity of short-video apps, real-time content has quickly started to gain interest among viewers. With 59.7 million registered users, Yizhibo is one of the biggest live-streaming platforms in China, whose strength is to be fully integrated into the social network Weibo.

Even the online gaming industry is leveraging the live-streaming trend so much so that currently, the PRC is the second-largest eSports – electronic sports – market behind the United States. The two dominant players in China are Douyu and Huya where users can share and engage with videos of any sort including real-time gaming.

Live-streaming is not only booming but it is also fueling Chinese e-commerce with nearly 32% of customers now buying products directly on real-time video platforms.

Nevertheless, while many companies adapted their platforms to respond to the demand for entertainment and real-time content, live-streaming is now revolutionizing the entire e-commerce sector. As about 95% of e-commerce activity in China is made through mobile devices, live-streaming has indeed become a powerful tool for the online retail industry.

Even farmers from rural China have now become real live-streaming stars. Today, 1.15 million rural users sell local products on Kuaishou through both short videos and live-streaming. Their videos show the origin of food on sale and thus respond to the consumers’ need for transparency.

Broadcasting in the PRC, therefore, started as a non-commercial trend with young people sharing their lives and talents. However, today, e-commerce penetrates the majority of live-streams whether through fashion show broadcasts or via internet celebrities reviewing the latest cosmetic product, enabling consumers to buy what they see on the screen in real-time.

The biggest player in the business has always been Alibaba. Tencent has been trying to catch up after its own social features like WeChat public accounts and Moments started seeing declining numbers of views. Moreover, short video sites such as ByteDance’s Douyin – known as TikTok outside China – and Kuaishou, have both leveraged on live-streaming as a way to boost e-commerce.

© Abacus. Kuaishou live-streams. Even farmers stream on real-time video apps thus showing the origin of food on sale and becoming real live-streaming stars.

Live-streaming is working so well for e-commerce because very often, the result of instant interaction is impulse shopping. According to Jing Daily, the return rate from real-time content could range from 15% to 50%, with strong evidence that the higher the prices are, the higher the return rate is. This is because young luxury shoppers demand transparency. Therefore, live-streaming is the perfect channel for brands to give consumers what they demand while also being creative and entertaining.

Broadcasting allows room for spontaneity, giving the illusion of bringing the host and the audience closer through real-time interactions. In a country where the customer gives extraordinary importance to building relationships and sharing interests, live-streaming is certainly a powerful tool.

The real-time video trend has shown how in the Middle Kingdom, entertainment goes hand in hand with digital commerce. Live-broadcasts provide people with entertainment and a glimpse into the lives and experiences of others, attracting both viewers and consumers.

According to a report published by the China Internet Network Information Center, at the end of 2018, China hosted 397 million users on multiple live-stream websites while demonstrating also tremendous purchasing power. Therefore, the PRC is not only the first and largest live-streaming market in the world but its netizens’ purchasing experience is getting more fun, more efficient, and thus more productive year after year.

Today, in China, it is almost impossible to separate entertainment from commerce, but live-streaming has so much potential that probably we have not seen it realized to the fullest yet.

E-commerce: JD.com Challenges Pinduoduo Thanks To WeChat

Alibaba and JD.com are penetrating lower-tier cities, challenging Pinduoduo in the e-commerce market

JD.com has launched its e-commerce service, also launching a clear challenge to the Pinduoduo platform. The new service comes in the form of a dedicated app, called Jingxi, as well as a mini-app that resides in WeChat. Jingxi users will be able to access the service via WeChat’s “Discover” tab from the beginning of October.

The move also marks China’s most recent heavyweight e-commerce effort to expand their presence in lower-tier cities in China and even in rural areas. The goal is to seek additional growth, as the one related to the online shopping market has grown in the cities and cities of the upper level of the Middle Kingdom.

What sets Jingxi apart is the Factory-to-Consumer (FoC) model

Jingxi is an update from its predecessor named JD Pinguo, which is aimed primarily at Chinese consumers and small-town shoppers with ultra-affordable items.

Jingxi offers flash sales and items at a special price. Furthermore, buyers can enjoy huge discounts both when they share an article with their friends, or simply by adhering to an ongoing group purchase contract on the app.

However, what could help distinguish Jingxi is the Factory-to-Consumer (FoC) model that, the service, offers in an attempt to provide cost-effective, yet quality items.

Both Alibaba and JD have launched their own initiatives

The rampant and almost miraculous growth of Pinduoduo has already enlivened the e-commerce world, with Alibaba and JD under pressure due to a slowdown in the Chinese economy and a saturated e-commerce market in the country’s cosmopolitan cities. Both Alibaba and JD, at this point, have launched their own initiatives, through Juhuasuan and Jingxi, respectively, to reach unexploited consumers in the Chinese hinterland.

Earlier this month, Alibaba made sales for Super Bargain Day, which mainly featured low-priced items and thus generated an approximate gross volume of goods of $ 8.3 billion in two days.

Even JD.com, for its part, has seen better growth from lower-tier cities than higher ones. Now about half of the users come from lower-tier Chinese cities, according to statistics based on their customers’ addresses.

According to official data, China’s online retail sales increased 17.8% year on year to $684 billion in the first half of this year. Alibaba and JD topped the list, but new platforms such as Pinduoduo are immediately behind.

Tencent Aims at E-Commerce With Live Streaming on WeChat

The H5 page allows users to click on the products listed in the live streaming video

Tencent, the Chinese internet giant, has accelerated the integration of live streaming features into its WeChat mini-program platform, with the aim of enhancing e-commerce, according to a WeChat public account called Tencent Live Streaming Assistant.

Tencent began recruiting content management companies to test the live streaming feature last March and recently also began selecting competitors for e-commerce to test the live streaming feature.

The solution is an H5 page embedded in a vendor’s mini program on WeChat

Tencent, as shown by some movements in the app over the past few months, has taken another step forward to allow a gradual transition between watching a live streaming show and the online shopping experience.

The solution is an H5 page embedded in a vendor’s mini-program on WeChat. The page, which can be added upon request, allows users to click on the products listed in the live streaming video and direct them to the provider’s mini program for a transaction.

Live streaming has become a valid source of income

WeChat, with 1.1 billion active monthly users, has opened its mini-program platform to various small suppliers, allowing them to generate revenue in a new channel as well as other e-commerce sites such as Alibaba’s Taobao or JD.com. Precisely on Taobao, as proof of the market trend, the goods sold in live streaming in 2018 are worth a total of 100 billion yuan ($ 14.9 billion).

Short video sites like Douyin of ByteDance, which has an equivalent app called TikTok outside the Chinese mainland, and Kuaishou supported by Tencent, both used live streaming as a way to boost e-commerce.

Live streaming has become a valid source of income thanks to the boom in the Chinese live-streaming sector in recent years. According to a report published by the China Internet Network Information Center, at the end of 2018, China hosted 397 million users on multiple live stream websites and demonstrated tremendous purchasing power.