"I earned 200000 yuan in two months through the task reward of Taobao shopping." "In my spare time at work, I worked as an influencer to introduce new Chinese fashion, earning about four to five thousand yuan per month." On the afternoon of March 12th, at the Zunhui Clothing and Apparel Industry Park in Panyu, Guangzhou, the reporter met multiple sales influencers shuttling through a dazzling array of clothing and shoes to choose goods. During the interview conversation, these influencers inadvertently revealed their "wealth creation experience", which showed that the competition for short video seeding and live streaming sales on e-commerce platforms has become increasingly fierce, and the excellent platform incentives are bringing rich income to sales influencers.
At the same time, behind the prosperity of the number of influencers in the clothing and apparel industry, many small and medium-sized businesses located in Guangdong, Hangzhou, and other areas have gained a wider range of channels for the circulation and sales of goods.
Seize traffic with the "toughest motivation"
Half a month ago, Taobao announced the establishment of a live streaming e-commerce company, providing "nanny style" full custody operation services for celebrities, KOLs, and MCN institutions interested in joining Taobao for broadcasting, and naming it as a "novice player" service for newcomers to Taobao.
On March 12th, in the Guangzhou Panyu Diamond Hui · Clothing and Apparel Industry Park, a "Taobao Clothing Spring and Summer Double Selection Conference" attracted more than 200 source merchants, as well as top Taobao anchor teams such as Lie'er Baby, Make Friends, and Huhoo, as well as many "stroll" influencers. Amidst the crowds, Taobao staff announced on site that they will enjoy an incentive policy of "million traffic support+680000 yuan cash reward+20000 yuan official investment red envelope rain" by the end of March for live streaming sales on Taobao.
The waiter stated that according to different reward tiers, "Assuming a sales revenue of 3 million yuan, Taobao will give a cash rebate reward of 180000 yuan. If you achieve 8 million yuan, you can receive a reward of 640000 yuan, with a maximum reward of 700000 yuan. This policy is unprecedented." Undoubtedly, this has greatly impressed the merchants and influencers on site. In the "T1000 Anchor Support Program" launched by Taobao Clothing, merchants can receive up to 3.8 million traffic exposure per account. Not only that, the meeting also released four major measures to help Taobao clothing launch new products in spring and summer. In addition to the live streaming support policies mentioned above, there are also new product promotions such as Quick Burst, Spring Festival free gameplay, and clothing coupon promotions. Taobao Clothing will collaborate with Guangdong origin shippers to launch new products, helping origin merchants expand their online channels. Moreover, the Taobao Clothing Spring Fashion Promotion also saw a comprehensive upgrade in March, such as adding exclusive venue tags at the top of the homepage.
From the various actions of promoting clothing in spring, Taobao's intention to "lower costs" and "poach" from other platforms is obvious. Traditional e-commerce platforms such as Taobao have begun to break through this year with a last-minute approach. Cash incentives, aimed at competing for merchants and traffic; For example, the "Spring Summer Double Election of Taobao Clothing" shows that Taobao is frequently reducing costs by going deep into the factories in the industrial belt and reducing the circulation links of merchants, hoping to win the battle against Tiktok, Pinduoduo, JD and other e-commerce platforms in the "lowest price" battle this year.
It is estimated that the annual GMV (total transaction volume) of China's e-commerce with e-commerce products in 2023 is about 4 trillion yuan, accounting for more than 1/4 of the national online retail sales. The substitution effect of e-commerce with e-commerce products on traditional e-commerce is very obvious.
Continuous growth of merchants and daily active users entering Taobao
Clothing has always been the long board of Taobao e-commerce, but in recent years, under the impact of platforms such as Tiktok live broadcast and Pinduoduo short video, Taobao has undoubtedly been under the pressure of share loss. Since last year, Taobao has continuously adjusted its strategy and launched a "counterattack", bringing confidence to small and medium-sized clothing businesses to "go back to Taobao".
"Other platforms are basically 'small profits but quick sales', with not high profits. Relatively speaking, the commission system on Taobao is now more friendly to our merchants." At the "Taobao Clothing Spring and Summer Double Selection Conference", the owner of Aliti Clothing, who has been doing women's clothing e-commerce for ten years, "Pang Ge", told reporters that in recent years, he has mostly worked on mainstream e-commerce platforms. This year, his focus is mainly on Taobao, and "other platforms are now mainly focused on supply.". ”
Su Lai, the owner of DecodeDiva, a clothing store specializing in European and American styles, is also interested in the high rewards offered by Taobao today. She has been doing overseas clothing business on cross-border e-commerce platforms such as SHEIN and Temu. After entering the domestic market at the end of November last year, she observed the GMV of her store for three months and chose to stay on Taobao. "Some platforms do explosive clothing business, but Taobao has stable traffic and a wider audience. Of course, for merchants now, profits are also relatively high." She said, currently positioning herself as selling on other platforms, while Taobao focuses on branding.
The influx and selection of merchants show that Taobao Clothing is still the main battlefield for many Chinese clothing merchants. According to Quest Mobile data, the number of daily active users on Taobao has increased for five consecutive months since March this year, making it the only e-commerce platform with a DAU exceeding 400 million. According to Taobao data, the sales scale of Taobao Clothing increased by over 22% year-on-year in the first three quarters, and the number of merchants entering the Taobao Clothing industry continued to expand, with a 25% increase in the number of unsold products.
Short video and live streaming sales have achieved initial results
Nowadays, entering the "stroll" channel is completely different from the "cold and desolate" of the same period last year. Tens of thousands of merchants and influencers are here to release short video works, start live broadcasts, and compete for the generous rewards given by Taobao. Data shows that only the Taobao clothing short video channel saw a year-on-year increase of 200% in the number of short videos, and the video completion rate increased by over 90%. The short video channel has also been effective in attracting traffic, with a year-on-year increase of over 81% in the total number of people introduced. In this year's key live streaming channels, Taobao's traffic and transaction contribution have increased in both directions. The number of viewers in the clothing category of live streaming has increased by over 51% year-on-year, and the total viewing time in user live streaming rooms has increased by over 28% year-on-year, guiding transaction amounts to increase by over 70% year-on-year.
The achievements of Taobao in attracting industry driven merchants to settle in have emerged, and many successful cases of merchant transformation have emerged. Taoma Youxuan's factory store has been returning to Taobao for live streaming for 3 months, creating an atmosphere of "buy and ship from the origin factory" with the factory and warehouse as the background. At the same time, based on official support and commercial investment, stable growth in natural traffic has been rapidly achieved, with the highest number of online users in the live broadcast room steadily exceeding 1000 and monthly transactions exceeding 100000.
Undoubtedly, despite the initial results, Taobao still faces enormous challenges in the e-commerce field of product promotion. IResearch Consulting predicts that the compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of the Chinese live streaming e-commerce market from 2024 to 2026 will be 18%, and the industry will show a stable growth trend and enter a stage of refined development in the future. At the same time, in the traffic competition that Taotian Group is trying to lead, platforms such as Doupin Jingwei have strong ambitions for this year's GMV competition, and have not given Taobao series platforms any chance to breathe a sigh of relief.