In China, social media means shopping

Chinese smartphone users on the subway. Photo credit: Pedro Serapio.

When a Chinese fashion blogger who calls himself Mr. Bags last week sold US$174,000 worth of designer handbags in just 12 minutes, he showed that social media in China is as much about shopping as sharing.

Using WeChat, China’s most popular messaging app with over 800 million active users, the blogger – real name Tao Liang – partnered with Givenchy for a flash sale of 80 limited edition pink handbags each costing just over US$2,000.

The eager buyers paid Mr. Bags through WeChat, using the social network’s built-in payments function. The Givenchy bag, while pricey, was within a user’s US$7,270 daily payment limit on WeChat.

Comedian laughs all the way to the bank

Across China’s social media landscape, ker-chings mix with the chatter, ‘likes’, news articles, videos, and emo stickers on virtually all the country’s top apps.

Over on Youku, the Alibaba-owned site that’s China’s equivalent to YouTube, a squeaky-voiced star named Papi Jiang is selling products within her comedic skits.

Papi Jiang in action in one of her fast-paced routines. GIF by Tech in Asia.

Papi, a 30-year-old drama student turned comedian, is believed to be the first viral star in the country to receive funding from tech investors, securing US$1.9 million in early 2016. While her content is funny, the institutional investors are no joke – Zhen Fund, Lighthouse Capital, and Xingtu Capital. Zhen Fund is one of China’s most prestigious investors with over 300 startup investments in its portfolio. One of its biggest investments is Chinese drone maker Ehang.

Live streaming is now continuing China’s vanguard melding of social media and ecommerce.

Her rise to fame was fast – appearing out of nowhere and accumulating millions of fans across social media in just a few months. On Youku she now has 2.9 million subscribers, and her skits have been collectively watched 240 million times.

Papi’s videos – usually no more than three minutes long – are a draw for her fast-paced and high-pitched voice, which sounds like something out of Alvin and the Chipmunks. Her videos are self-contained skits, usually featuring the funnywoman in a dialogue with herself in quick-moving video edits. She talks about stuff millennials in China care about – like all the embarrassing questions older family members ask when you go back to your hometown for Chinese New Year. She does all the performances, the scripts, and the editing.

Shortly after pocketing the VC cash, which effectively turned her into a media startup, Jiang started selling ad space in her videos. Her first deal with a cosmetics company was worth US$3.3 million. And after that she started selling products – her first being T-shirts with three unique artworks inspired by the popular Warcraft game.

Like with Mr. Bags’ flash sale, Jiang’s T-shirts were limited-edition designs. All three versions sold out on Alibaba’s Taobao marketplace in 36 minutes.

They were so popular that knockoff T-shirts started appearing on other stores shortly after.

Doing it live

China’s newest social media craze, live streaming, is continuing the nation’s vanguard melding of social media and ecommerce. It’s something that began with Renren, China’s answer to Facebook, just over a decade ago and then evolved on Weibo, a Twitter-like service which first solidified the notions of viral stars and social media influencers for the nation’s netizens.

Hustlin’. GIF by Tech in Asia.

On the dozens of live streaming mobile apps that have popped up in China in the past year, viewers are paying entertaining streamers – karaoke singers in front of their laptops, a young woman painting her nails on her bed – by giving them virtual gifts that can be cashed in.

But that’s not all. For some broadcasters, live streaming is a chance to make their own infomercials.

‘Una’, a host on Inke, demonstrates how to use a face injection mask. “You can add me on WeChat if you want something,” she tells her 20,000-odd viewers, giving out her WeChat ID so that she can take orders and payments via the messaging app.

A woman sells skin care products on her Taobao Live stream. Screenshot by by Tech in Asia.

“Live streaming is just like [a] TV station when they do live TV,” Ivy Wong, CEO of VS Media, a network of online content creators, told Tech in Asia late last year. “It’s like a live entertainment event.”

A big chunk of that live action is dedicated to shopping.

See: Live streaming in China moves beyond cleavage and dancing

Strong personalities

Not to be outdone by all the upstart live streaming apps, China’s top two online stores – Taobao and arch-rival JD – have set up their own streaming platforms, aiming to divert fashion bloggers and other web celebs away from selling their wares through WeChat or a competing ecommerce site.

Alibaba, which runs Taobao, has rolled out an incentives program for influencers. The company anticipates that live streamers on its shopping app will pocket US$300 million in commissions on products they sell in the first three years of the program.

“The younger generation in China spends lots of time on their mobile phones and on social media,” says Chen Lei, a manager at Mobile Taobao. “Cyber celebrities are strong personalities and thought leaders who show others products that fit their attitudes. They fit right in with [the mobile and social] trend.”

Live streaming is just like live TV.

Taobao claims it sees 320,000 items added to a shopping cart per one million live views.

Streamers who gain a following can try shopping themselves out to brands in search of endorsements.

Tan Yuanwu, a 34-year-old mom and internet celebrity who blogs about skincare products and cosmetics, charges around US$440 per hour for broadcasting on behalf of a particular product. A less well-known streamer quoted a minimum of US$295 per hour when my colleague, Eva Xiao, investigated the industry last year.

But using social apps for sales comes with all the risks associated with China’s censorious internet.

Papi, the VC-funded comedian, got a scare last year when she was “disciplined and corrected” by authorities for using “vulgar and coarse content,” resulting in a handful of her videos being taken offline.

“As a self-made media figure, I will also be more careful of my words and image, resolutely responding to requests for corrections in internet clips, and broadcast positive energy for everyone,” Papi said in a statement.

Live streamers also need to be careful about what they say as they sell products – as well as what they wear. A number of apps last year came under pressure to ban users who streamed whilst wearing revealing outfits or eating bananas in a “seductive” fashion.

Chinese consumers spent US$911 billion online last year, rising to a projected US$1.2 trillion in 2017, according to data from Emarketer.

Converted from Chinese yuan. Rate: US$1 = RMB 6.86.

This post In China, social media means shopping appeared first on Tech in Asia.

from Tech in Asia https://www.techinasia.com/china-shopping-on-social-media
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