Shanghai-based e-commerce company Pinduoduo has launched a live streaming tool called Duoduo Livestreaming for “partners” who can boost the sales of goods on its platform, according to the WeChat account of Pinduoduo’s marketing platform Duoduo Jinbao.
Duoduo Livestreaming has already been integrated in Pinduoduo’s newest app, allowing all its 536.3 million active users to be live streaming partners to promote millions of goods listed on Duoduo Jinbao, KrASIA found out on Friday.
To be a live streamer, a Pinduoduo user needs to undergo face scanning for identity verification, to upload identity card copies, and wait for two days to get the final approval from Pinduoduo.
Those approved are permitted to promote goods in their live streaming sessions and earn commission fees ranging from 1% to 80% of goods’ value.
Actually less than two months ago, Pinduoduo denied that it was incubating a live streaming-related business. When Pinduoduo launched its C2M (Customer-to-Manufactory) initiative in late 2018, the company said that it would build a visual platform to allow factories to live stream the production process to win consumer trust. However, there has been no big progress on this platform until now.
Duoduo Livestreaming now turns out to be Pinduoduo’s answer on how to integrate live streaming into its business after Alibaba’s Taobao has already proven that live steaming is an effective marketing tool.
Alibaba disclosed that goods worth more than RMB 10 billion (USD 1.4 billion) were purchased via Taobao or Tmall by users when watching live streamed presentations in the first nine hours of November 2019, its Double 11 shopping event. Live streaming is now embedded in Taobao’s app so that its users can shop for the items they see immediately without leaving the app, while Alibaba also has a standalone app called Taobao Live Streaming, in which special discounts are available.
Besides Pinduoduo, Suning and JD.com are also making efforts to apply live streaming to boost sales, but both are still in the early stages of their initiatives.
