On the early morning of November 12th, Alibaba and JD.com, two important participants in the "Double Eleven" promotion, successively released battle reports: JD.com summarized its promotion performance with "reaching new highs again", while Alibaba used "strong growth". On the other hand, the "Double Eleven" promotion has become increasingly quiet, with the numbers witnessing consumer miracles and the dazzling evening celebrations all disappearing, leaving only the earliest intention: selling goods.
Double the growth rate!
Alibaba and JD.com have achieved impressive results
On the early morning of November 12th, Taotian Group and JD.com successively released their "Double Eleven" performance reports.
According to data from Taotian Group, as of 24:00 on November 11th, the total transaction volume of 589 brands on Tmall's "Double Eleven" this year exceeded 100 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 46.5%. Among them, 45 brands such as Apple, Haier, Midea, Xiaomi, Nike, and Wuliangye have achieved a turnover of over 1 billion yuan. Trendy toy brand miHoYo, beauty brand Tom Ford, and Kelijin have entered Tmall's "Double Eleven" and "Billion Yuan Club" for the first time.
This year's Singles' Day, live streaming has become an important channel for promoting consumption. As of 24:00 on November 11th, there were 119 live streaming rooms on Taobao with transactions exceeding 100 million yuan, of which 49 rooms had a year-on-year growth rate of over 100%. It is reported that the overall transaction amount and number of purchasing users of Taobao live streaming during this year's "Double Eleven" have achieved significant growth.
According to data from Taotian Group, during the "Double Eleven" period, the number of brands in the beauty industry with a turnover of over 100 million yuan reached 79, and domestic brands such as L'Oreal, Shuangmei, Kelijin, and Lin Qingxuan performed outstandingly; The turnover of 7062 clothing brands doubled year-on-year, with 66 brands exceeding 100 million yuan. Bosideng, Gaofan, Yaya, and Xuezhongfei's turnover exceeded 100 million yuan, and Bosideng's turnover exceeded 1 billion yuan; In terms of household appliances, government subsidies combined with Tmall's "Double Eleven" full reduction have led to 139 brands such as Haier, Midea, Zhumi, and Dyson achieving a turnover of over 100 million yuan, while over 9600 brands such as Toshiba and Yaduoxing have doubled their turnover; In the digital industry, 34 3C digital brands including Apple, Xiaomi, Huawei, OPPO, Sony, Fuji, DJI, Nintendo, Xiaotiancai, and Tuozhu have achieved a turnover of over 100 million yuan. In addition, "emotional economy" such as miHoYo and Bubble Mart are still popular tracks.
According to JD data, as of 23:59 on November 11, 2024, the number of shopping users on JD's "Double Eleven" shopping festival has increased by over 20% year-on-year, and the number of live streaming orders for JD's procurement and sales has increased by 3.8 times year-on-year. The transaction volume of over 17000 brands increased by more than 5 times year-on-year, and the transaction volume of over 30000 small and medium-sized businesses increased by more than 2 times year-on-year. During the "Double Eleven" period on JD.com, the platform used JD Cloud's Yanxi digital live streaming to promote sales, driving a 40% increase in related brand transactions compared to the "618" period.
It is reported that on the JD platform, the transaction volume of down jackets, assault jackets, and thermal underwear doubled year-on-year. The transaction volume of multiple AI hardware categories has increased, such as the year-on-year increase of over 10 times in the transaction volume of AI learning machines, the year-on-year increase of over 100% in the transaction volume of AI computers, AI phones, AI keyboards and mice, and AI speakers, and the year-on-year increase of 200% in the transaction volume of AI smart glasses. Tech savvy consumer electronics products are favored, with sales of gaming CPUs, headphones, and sports cameras increasing by over 100% year-on-year.
The transaction volume of essential consumption has increased. JD Supermarket has launched a set of different brand product combinations for sale, including over 20000 items such as mother and baby, home cleaning, grain and oil seasoning, and leisure snacks. The overall transaction volume of JD Supermarket's combination set has increased by over 50% year-on-year.
In addition, this year's Taobao billion yuan subsidy support is combined with subsidies from local governments. After adding subsidies to categories such as home appliances, home decoration, mobile phones, and digital products, the double discount is as low as 40%, driving a wave of new consumer spending. Therefore, home appliances have become one of the main growth drivers of "Double Eleven" this year.
With the implementation of the subsidy policy for exchanging old appliances for new ones in various regions of China, the discount for first level energy-efficient products can reach up to 20%. As the first batch of subsidy actions, Tmall has partnered with other brands to provide an additional 6 billion yuan in subsidies, combined with official brand discounts and 88VIP multi-level surprise coupons, forming a triple discount. The prices of some household appliances will be reduced to 60% off.
According to data from JD.com, over 90% of rural areas in counties across the country have consumers using JD.com for trade ins, with large screen TVs becoming the preferred option. The transaction volume of 519 home appliance categories, including floor cleaning robots and dryers, increased by 200% year-on-year. From October 14th to November 11th, the customer flow of its stores increased by over 60%, and the trade in sales increased by 247%. Among them, the trade in sales of air conditioning, ice washing, and audio-visual products all increased by more than twice, and multiple brand categories set a sales peak in the past five years.
On November 11th, the volume of express delivery business reached a new high for the day in previous years
At the same time, as the express delivery business enters the peak season of the industry, its data also indirectly confirms the popularity of this year's "Double Eleven".
According to reports, the peak season for express delivery business in 2024 continues the characteristics of previous years, and the volume of express delivery business presents a "double peak" trend. The pre-sale mechanism of major e-commerce platforms was launched in mid to early October, diverting the peak business volume on the day of "Double Eleven", effectively alleviating the pressure of the sudden increase in express delivery volume during the peak season for postal and express delivery companies, and providing a time difference for postal and express delivery companies to reserve transportation capacity.
According to monitoring data from the State Post Bureau, on November 11th, postal and express delivery companies across the country processed a total of 701 million parcels, accounting for 151% of daily business volume and a year-on-year increase of 9.7%. Set a new high for Double 11 in previous years.
Since entering the peak season on October 21st, the size of the express delivery market has continued to expand, with an average daily business volume exceeding 580 million pieces. From October 21st to November 11th, a total of 12.783 billion express packages were processed nationwide, with an average daily processing volume of 125% of the daily business volume. Among them, the express delivery volume reached 729 million on October 22, breaking the record for daily business volume. The continuous expansion of the express delivery market reflects the sustained release of online consumer demand, providing strong support for the continued expansion of domestic demand, consolidation and enhancement of the positive momentum of economic recovery.
Simple ordering, win-win cooperation
E-commerce platforms are returning to their original intentions one after another
It is worth mentioning that after 16 years of celebration, this year's "Double Eleven" has once again returned to the original intention of serving consumers with a rational halo.
The "Double Eleven" shopping festival, which began in 2009, originated from the online promotion activity launched by Taobao Mall on November 11 of that year. On that day's event, sales significantly exceeded expectations, and subsequently, this year's marketing event became a landmark date for Taobao to regularly hold large-scale promotions.
In 2015, the first "Cat Night" invited director Feng Xiaogang, TFboys, Adam Lambert, and the then popular Korean boy band. That night, big screen data showed that Taobao's sales revenue was 91.217 billion yuan. In 2016, the sales revenue exceeded 100 billion yuan for the first time, reaching 120.7 billion yuan.
In 2018, Taobao's sales exceeded 200 billion yuan and reached 213.5 billion yuan. This is also the last time Jack Ma appeared on "Cat Night". That night, he competed with 26 year old Li Jiaqi in a live stream to sell lipstick. Li Jiaqi rose to fame and became one of the top live streamers with the most sales power on Taobao.
In 2019, Taylor Swift, who had been invited since the first "Cat Night", was finally invited to perform three songs from her new album at the Mercedes Benz Arena. In the same year, Pinduoduo's momentum began to emerge, with a subsidy of billions seen as its flagship account for surpassing Taobao and JD.com. That year, Pinduoduo doubled its growth and exceeded one trillion yuan.
In 2021, Tmall last announced the total transaction volume of "Double Eleven", reaching 540.3 billion yuan, with a year-on-year growth rate of less than 10% to 8.5%. Since then, no specific sales information has been provided for the Double Eleven shopping festival. Maowan no longer has a large screen scrolling real-time transaction volume, and e-commerce platforms have coincidentally used various segmented data to avoid the decline of the overall market.
In fact, up to now, there have always been new players in the e-commerce industry. Whether Pinduoduo or Tiktok Kwai, they represent a new market and new traffic channels. If you want to survive in the increasingly competitive market, whether it is traditional e-commerce or a rising star, the industry strategy must be changed. So in the past two years, many e-commerce platforms have started to simplify and return to a direct low price strategy, no longer just pursuing growth in scale.
This year's Singles' Day, Tmall officially announced a major change in the form of a poster, focusing on "more and bigger coupons" while "easier ordering" is also the keyword of this year's Singles' Day.
The essence of why discounts can become the key to attracting consumers to purchase is that price has always been the top factor in ultimately driving consumer purchases. In previous major promotions, many consumers have found that some merchants often label product prices differently from the final payment price, and even label three or four prices on a single product, leaving people at a loss.
In order to improve the accuracy of displaying the post coupon and post discount prices, Taobao and Tmall have specially integrated and upgraded the original "Taobao Platform Price Release Specification" and "Tmall Product Price Management Rules" before "Double Eleven". The post coupon and post discount prices will include user personal assets such as gold coins and red packages in the discount calculation, and will be displayed in the product detail page in a system automatically calculated and real-time updated manner. The price given by the system is the price at which the consumer bought the product.
Looking at the marketing strategies of major e-commerce platforms during this year's Singles' Day, keywords such as "no tricks, just lower" and "lowest price across the entire network" are still rampant. However, when it comes to shopping itself, the prerequisite for consumers to recognize the platform's "good price" and "good service" is to buy a "good product" that they truly need.
At the same time, a historic change in this year's "Double Eleven" promotion also includes the dismantling of barriers by e-commerce giants who once competed with each other: this year's "Double Eleven" JD Logistics fully integrated into the Taobao Tmall platform, and consumers can also use WeChat Pay when shopping on Taobao. Now, users can not only use WeChat Pay to purchase goods within the Taobao app, but also directly click on the Taobao link within the WeChat app, activate the Taobao H5 interface on the WeChat end, and complete the order and payment process.
More than a decade has passed, and the historical mission of "Double Eleven" as a super shopping festival may eventually come to an end. However, no matter how the form and form of this consumer promotion will change in the future, the e-commerce competition promotion and the consumer enthusiasm it inspires have quietly integrated into everyone's daily life.