On social media, between following, sharing, and interacting, transactions can be completed in a dialog box. A new retail model is taking shape. It is virally infectious and one of the most eye-catching changes in new retail on the Internet. .
Specifically, social e-commerce is aimed at e-commerce players who have left traditional platforms and emerged with the help of social behaviors. By using e-commerce tools of third-party platforms, using social relationships and personal influence, consumers can generate purchase behaviors. Pull other users to participate through social networking, so as to achieve the behavior of splitting into countless shopping guide subdivision entrances.
When the traffic dividend is not there, e-commerce is ushering in the second half, and the emergence of social e-commerce is not to compete with traditional e-commerce such as Ali and JD. Markets in third- and fourth-tier cities that have not been fully reached.
The above reasons have prompted the rise of social e-commerce platforms such as Pinduoduo, Yunji, and Aiku, but the deeper meaning is that social e-commerce is a "spoiler" for traditional e-commerce.
The rise of social e-commerce
In the past ten years, the development of the e-commerce industry in China has been in the first half. This is due to the increase in the number of netizens. On the other hand, consumers have shifted from offline to online consumption needs. , find the outlet through e-commerce and get better satisfaction.
Liaison Yi believes that traditional e-commerce also has thinking in social e-commerce. Among them, the most typical is the commercial realization of social red people. A large number of fans are gathered on the Ali platform, especially consumers of online celebrity women's clothing stores. They fully interact on the platform, resulting in an explosive sales peak in the new launch.
In addition to the traffic bonus, the perfection of WeChat payment and the maturity of mini programs have enabled social e-commerce to flourish. At the same time, a large number of mature e-commerce players have already perfected the supply chain, warehouse distribution and logistics, which has also become the reason for the rapid rise of social e-commerce.
With the development of new retail, social e-commerce is generally favored by the market and investment institutions. In April of this year, Pinduoduo was once again rumored to raise $3 billion; in January, Aiku, a brand inventory distribution platform, announced the completion of 100 million yuan in Series A financing; in February, Global Catcher announced a strategic investment with a valuation of 2 billion; in April On the 23rd, Yunji Weidian, a social e-commerce platform, announced that it had completed its Series B financing of US$120 million.
What the capital side sees is that social e-commerce can realize diversified marketing channels, so that products can be more quickly known to consumers, and at the same time provide consumers with faster and more convenient consumption methods.
In fact, Pinduoduo is not an early adopter of social e-commerce. The first batch of social e-commerce players who do not need to rely on the platform for traffic distribution and sell their products by building their own traffic centers include Xiaohongshu, WeChat, Wechat, etc. Of course, It also includes the facial mask cosmetics micro-business in the circle of friends.
Alibaba and Tencent have their own distinctive social e-commerce characteristics. Based on differences in genes, they present different comprehensive market reflections. The diversified development models also allow Chinese retailers to have a variety of attempts and choices.
After social e-commerce has experienced a period of brutal growth, market dividends are gradually consumed with the increase of traffic costs. Under the trend of consumption upgrade, users' demand for personalized and accurate recommendation is increasing, which makes social e-commerce begin to return to its essence.
Then through the "social e-commerce" system layout, you can spy on the traffic that basically matches your bottom, waist, and top, and fight against traditional e-commerce from all aspects. 
First of all, in terms of bottom traffic, Pinduoduo provides factory goods and micro group purchases to allow consumers to buy a certain product, thereby converting Tencent’s bottom traffic.
Before the emergence of Pinduoduo, social e-commerce was more focused on KOLs, or the Internet celebrity economy, which resulted in asymmetric consumers. Under the Pinduoduo model, anyone can initiate group purchases, which can then be combined with mobile social networking, so that the discounts stimulate users’ sense of participation, so that social traffic turns into sales.
Most of the merchants on the Pinduoduo platform are from Taobao shop owners, and most of them have their own factories or supply chain capabilities. However, under such a model, the disadvantage that has to be considered is that when facing the tide of consumption upgrade, Pinduoduo's "cheap" idea does have a certain consumer group, but what will happen in the future, I believe that many parties are in it Closely.
Secondly, Tencent’s waist traffic gathers players such as Yunji and Aistock. Different from the low-price strategy at the bottom, Yunji and Aistock provide high-quality products while paying attention to cost performance. The comparison is Ali’s “Tmall Supermarket” and “Ali Big Distribution System” ".
Yunji Micro Store adopts the S2b2C model, the core of which is the cooperation between SaaS service providers and individual store owners to jointly serve consumers. When an individual store owner obtains the qualification to open a store on the platform, he can select the products in the commodity library and put them on the shelves to generate a small store. After placing an order through the shared link, the store owner will receive relevant commission income.
At the same time, in terms of logistics, Yunji Weidian also cooperates with strategic partners such as Amazon, SF Express, and EMS to bring consumers a better user experience. However, most of the merchants and users of Yunji Microstore are from ordinary consumers, and most of the products are purchased by Yunji. In this way, the threshold for the idea of "explosive models" for a single product is not high, and it is easy to be copied, and it is easier to fall into the quagmire of "capital" wars.
Another player in the waist flow of Ai Inventory is similar to the model of Yunji Weidian. The S2b2C model is also adopted. The upstream cooperates with the brand to help the brand clear its inventory in the form of limited-time specials, and the downstream connects with professional purchasing agents or micro-businesses as a characteristic sales channel.
Throughout the traditional micro-business purchasing agent, there are two main confusions: a large number of stockpiles and a single product. Wechat business sales are based on trust, so the repurchase rate is often very high. As long as the products are abundant, the needs of the audience can be tapped and satisfied repeatedly. However, it is difficult for individual micro-businesses to stock up on multiple commodities at the same time. Ai Inventory is the solution to this problem.
From the hoarding mode to the buying mode, for professional purchasing agents, what they want is not to save money, but a platform to make money. Ai Inventory lowers the sales threshold by setting up one-click forwarding, helping them solve how to work simply and efficiently, and find genuine low-cost sources. In addition, the idea of Ai Inventory not only improves the sales model of micro-business, but also finds a key channel for brands that can not only quickly solve the inventory of goods, but also protect the brand price system.
There are different ways of playing in the field of social e-commerce, and there will be multiple strategic choices for different business models, such as positioning and helping professional purchasing and making money with small b and small c love inventory, etc. What will happen in the future, I believe it can be verified in the short term.
In recent years, although the model of social commerce has been changing, it has developed at an astonishing rate.
According to the published data, Pinduoduo’s single-day turnover exceeded 10 million and the number of users exceeded 200 million in just four months after its official launch. Another social e-commerce platform, "Yunji", also achieved 400% growth in 2017, exceeding 10 billion yuan in transaction volume. The monthly sales of Ai Inventory has exceeded 50 million in half a year since its launch, and the growth rate is rapid! 
At present, the social e-commerce circle does not seem to be fully formed, and many players are also seizing market share in different ways, although there are still differences in gameplay. Traditional e-commerce can rely on continuous bidding to obtain traffic, but social e-commerce cannot. Traditional e-commerce is a way of playing traffic, but social e-commerce is actually a way of branding from the very beginning.
Whether it is traditional e-commerce or social e-commerce, product quality and consumer experience will always be the most critical part of retention and transformation. Who can do more in the field of social e-commerce in warehousing, logistics, quality control, and consumer value-added services Businesses will have a better chance of winning.
Regarding the relationship between social e-commerce and traditional e-commerce, as the co-founder of the social e-commerce platform "Yunji" said, "We are players who dig a river beyond the Yangtze River and the Yellow River." Business social traffic is expected to bring retail incremental market, but the development trajectory still has to follow the essence of retail, the gameplay is different, and it is still impossible to escape the sincerity of consumers. The development of e-commerce is also a process of dirty work and hard work. , In terms of traffic conversion, platform exploration, and ecological construction, every detail is worth doing again.
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