Livestreaming shopping a bright spot in e-commerce
Livestreaming shopping remains resilient, and leading players have pledged further investment as they aim to diversify services and offerings.
Livestreaming shopping experienced robust revenue and a rebound in profit, with key players promising more investment as the sector remained resilient.
According to the local consultancy and portal 100EC.cn, the livestreaming shopping market has enormous potential, with a 30 percent annual increase projected this year and a total value of 4.56 trillion yuan (US$642 billion).
With annual average spending per person estimated to be 8,660 yuan this year, a 17 percent rise over last year, it remains a bright spot for online shopping.
Rebecca Zhang enjoys handcrafting and discovering new cross-stitch patterns and short films on them on Douyin.
"It's easier to buy all the materials and tools needed from Douyin because it offers a one-stop service with easy payment and delivery," she explained.
Customers who prefer short videos for entertainment and to discover interesting themes and small gadgets or garments have accepted video and live-streaming sites as their go-to destination for online shopping.
According to the analysis by Bain & Company and Kantar Worldpanel, Douyin surpassed Tmall and JD to become the third-largest online shopping platform in terms of fast-moving consumer goods sales in the first quarter.
Benefiting from this trend, livestreaming platforms and e-commerce service providers have pushed to explore omni-channel operation models and diversify offers.
East Buy Holding Ltd, founded by tutoring company New Oriental as a livestreaming platform for agricultural products, also sells skin-care, electronics, and home appliances.
Starting Tuesday, Taobao works with East Buy Holding Ltd, a livestreaming platform for agricultural products set up by tutoring company New Oriental. The livestreaming session will promote about 300 products.
Skinc-are, electronics and home appliance products are expected to be added to East Buy's Taobao portfolio after it began livestreaming on its own independent app in late July rather than Douyin.
East Buy Holding Ltd's annual financial statements for the fiscal year ending May 31 reveal a profit of 971 million yuan and a livestreaming transaction of more than 10 billion yuan with 136 million orders. To mention, the private label products generated 2.6 billion yuan of its 3.9 billion yuan in income from livestreaming shopping.
Kuaishou also had a 40 percent increase in gross merchandising volume (GMV) due to promotional efforts in the second quarter, and its private-label goods accounted for roughly one-third of the total products sold on the platform.
Baozun has invested in its own video and photo shooting studios following online shoppers' demand for livestreaming and short videos.
Baozun, a Shanghai-based online and marketing service provider, stated that its e-commerce business, which includes revenue from brand-store operations, customer services, and value-added items, has benefited from customers shifting away from leading channels such as Tmall and JD.
For livestreaming and content production, Baozun's e-commerce unit maintains about 10,000 square meters of video and photo shooting studios in five cities, including Shanghai, Hangzhou and Wuhan.
In the second quarter, non-TMALL marketplaces and channels accounted for almost one-third of total GMV, and roughly 46 percent of companies that work with Baozun had at least two shopping channels.
With buyers' interests increasingly spanning a wide array of channels and specific themes, it's critical to combine content with a solid online buying experience, said Baozun Vice President Peter Liang.
