Livestreaming, the dominant emerging Internet format, injects vitality into sales of electric home appliances amid the continued COVID-19 crisis.
A furniture showroom is being live-streamed to the audience. Image credit: Kushagra Kevat/Unsplash
► Grees CEO accomplished over CNY 300 million sales in a three-hour livestreaming.
► Livestreaming is an unstoppable trend, transforming B2C businesses.
How much revenue can a salesperson contribute in a day?
The CEO of Gree Electric, Ms. Dong Mingzhu, made an astonishing sales record on May 10 – CNY 300 million in a three-hour livestreaming broadcast on Kuaishou, with sold goods from air conditioner priced at CNY 9,000 to juicers at CNY 155.
In contrast with her first livestreaming online sales on Douyin, her second try on Kuaishou is a tremendous success. On April 24, the CEO had only sold fewer than 100 units of products, at a GMV (Gross Merchandise Value) of CNY 36.2 thousand. The sales performance on Kuaishou gave over 10 thousand times of growth in GMV.
Ms. Dong Mingzhu, a savvy salesperson, has seen the enormous potential value embedded by livestreaming. She plans to establish a livestreaming channel of her own and normalize this format throughout Gree’s distribution network.
“There are over 30 thousand off-line distributors and dealers for Gree,” says Ms. Dong, “I hope they can combine online and offline business. I am just starting this new style, paving the path for them.”
Indeed, the integration of livestreaming and e-commerce is not such a radical innovation in the B2C world anymore. Thanks to the widespread lockdown in China amid the pandemic, this fusion has come the new normal for B-players to sell products and for consumers to reach authentic information.
Gree is not the first business to participate in this fashion. Make-up, apparel companies and others in the consumer goods area have been the pioneers in dispatching their head bosses, founders and CEOs to the front lines since the peak time of the outbreak in February.
The CEO of Lin Qing Xuan, or Forest Cabin Cosmetics – a Shanghai-based skincare brand –generated a GMV of four off-line stores’ monthly sales in total, within one day. The board head of Ctrip, the tier-one travel management company, gave a livestreaming show crammed with 220 thousand audience members within four hours.
As has been often said, in the new consumption era of China, he or she is a bad CEO who doesn’t know how to sell well. As the market competition gets fiercer, the line between a professional manager and an entertaining KOL (Key Opinion Leader) is blurred more and more.
So, what can be observed is an unprecedented trend in the Chinese retail market. The craze for livestreaming from the consumer end has altered the battlefield of the consumer goods industry.
This undoubtedly leaves quite a lot of uncertainties for businesses: when is the proper time to adjust and how far shall they go? When faced with unknowns, in a context of growth and opportunity, then the optimal way out is often to be practical and take action – if there are no clear roadmaps.