The search volume of Xiaohongshu has increased sharply. Is Baidu worried?

"Xiaohongshu search rises, challenges Baidu's position?" In the field of information search, Xiaohongshu's search volume has grown rapidly, attracting widespread attention. How does it attract users and get a share of the pie from Baidu? What does this change mean for brands and businesses?

It is becoming a common practice for many users to flip through Xiaohongshu first when in doubt.

Recently, data reported that the average daily search volume of Xiaohongshu has reached nearly 600 million times, which is more than half of Baidu; and according to Xiaohongshu's previous official data, more than 70% of Xiaohongshu's monthly active users use search, and the average number of searches per user is as high as 6 times a day.

How did Xiaohongshu grab the search cake from Baidu? What benefits has the rapid development of search business brought to brands, merchants and even buyers?

1. Xiaohongshu becomes the new Baidu

When white-collar worker Xiao A wants to know what the experience of using a beauty product is like, or whether a popular skin care brand is worth buying, he will open Xiaohongshu to look for relevant notes and get real user feedback.

"I mainly read the notes posted by users with a small number of fans, and also read the comment section. These are much more authentic than the review notes posted by Internet celebrities, and are more valuable for reference." Xiao A said.

In addition to looking for product feedback, many users have also begun to get used to looking for travel guides and even game guides on Xiaohongshu.

"I've been playing a card game recently, and I often encounter levels that I can't pass, so I'll look up strategies on Xiaohongshu." Game player CC said that she now doesn't even need to search for such detailed keywords as "XX game XX level" or "XX character configuration", she only needs to directly enter "boss" or the character's name, and the search result will be what she wants.

Many users, especially female users, have already used Xiaohongshu as Baidu. This trend is a true reflection of the rapid development of Xiaohongshu search.

Recently, according to information revealed by Zhoutian Finance citing insiders, in the fourth quarter of 2024, Xiaohongshu's average daily search volume (qv) reached nearly 600 million times, while the figure was 300 million times a year ago, which is equivalent to doubling in more than a year.

According to reports, the growth in Xiaohongshu's daily search volume is most likely snatched from Baidu. Baidu's current daily search volume is slightly over 1 billion, while Xiaohongshu's search volume is almost more than half of Baidu's.

The data officially released by Xiaohongshu also confirms the maturity of the search ecosystem.

The "Xiaohongshu Top Ten Search Trends Insights" report for the first half of 2024 shows that more than 70% of Xiaohongshu's monthly active users use search, and the average number of searches per day is as high as 6 times. One-third of users search as the first thing they do when they open Xiaohongshu, and 90% of users say their consumption decisions are affected by search results on Xiaohongshu.

Data also shows that 55% of Xiaohongshu users tend to browse immersively, and 45% of users will actively conduct in-depth searches, and the search content will be sorted based on the comprehensive score, making Xiaohongshu an "encyclopedia of life" for many young people.

Xiaohongshu’s search has grown by leaps and bounds, so has the dividend of search traffic arrived for brands, merchants and even buyers?

2.Has the search bonus arrived?

The maturity of the search business has undoubtedly brought more possibilities for the commercialization of the platform, such as embedding advertising content in search entrances, search keywords, search results, etc. This is a business model that many platforms have already practiced.

Search engines also significantly boost e-commerce business. Data shows that under the closed-loop e-commerce product promotion and marketing goal of Xiaohongshu, search engine traffic accounts for more than 30%; the conversion rate of search engines during the promotion period is 40% higher than that of non-search engines.

In addition, according to the content released by "Little Red Book Business Dynamics", with the increasing number of users in the Little Red Book search field, in order to meet the user search needs, the Little Red Book brand area will be completely upgraded in 2025, and the new product "Brand Space-Note Style" will be launched, which can increase the display rate of brand native notes, enhance user trust, and bring stronger support to brand merchants' business.

Search provides brands and e-commerce with more abundant display portals and exposure channels. How to obtain more public domain traffic through search portals, that is, SEO optimization, has also become a research direction for many practitioners.

As early as 2021, when Douyin focused on search, many e-commerce practitioners began to study how to monetize Douyin search traffic, and even proposed the concept of "Douyin search bonus". Businesses such as SEO optimization and product keyword processing continued to emerge.

But Xiaohongshu did not follow the example of Douyin. In comparison, Xiaohongshu seems to be much more restrained.

In the search bar of Xiaohongshu, there are no sub-entries such as "products" and "live broadcast" except "Guess what you want to search". When users search for content, unless they search for specific products, no words related to products will appear.

Xiaohongshu’s restraint still comes down to protecting the community ecology and maintaining user activity.

Unlike other search engines and other platforms, Xiaohongshu is essentially a content community, and user activity is undoubtedly the top priority.

How to balance content and commercialization, taking into account both user experience and fully monetizing traffic, has always been the first priority that Xiaohongshu needs to consider.

But at a time when Xiaohongshu is focusing on e-commerce, will this "restraint" hinder the pace of merchants?

3. What is the purpose of optimizing algorithms?

Many businesses have told Xinbochang that it is slow to create accounts on Xiaohongshu and increase followers, making it difficult to figure out the so-called hot-selling strategies.

However, this year, as Xiaohongshu has made great efforts in the field of e-commerce, live broadcast rooms and products with goods have begun to receive more traffic. Many users have begun to frequently see content such as live broadcasts with goods and notes on goods with goods on the homepage.

The efforts in the e-commerce field have also brought new breakthroughs to Xiaohongshu's commercialization. During this year's Double 11, Xiaohongshu delivered a very impressive report card.

In mid-November, Xiaohongshu released its Double 11 final battle report: the number of live broadcast rooms for stores with over one million transactions increased by 850% year-on-year, the number of merchants with over ten million transactions increased by 540% year-on-year, and the number of buyers with over ten million transactions in a single session increased by 360% year-on-year.

Many businesses have also felt the impact of Xiaohongshu's e-commerce.

A merchant who joined the Xiaohongshu live streaming business in March this year said that his traffic had been mediocre before, and his fans increased by more than 3,000 in half a year. "There are often only a few dozen people online in the live broadcast room." But the merchant said that his advantage lies in the high stickiness of fans and the large number of old fans.

However, he was surprised that his post recently became popular and gained nearly 4,000 followers in just a few days. "I don't know if it was promoted. It seems that I still need to make good notes and obtain public domain traffic."

Xiaohongshu is a decentralized algorithm strategy, which means that the recommendation is centered on the user's own search. On the one hand, search engines can use the data of the recommendation system to optimize the ranking of search results; on the other hand, personalized recommendations can also use search behavior data to improve the recommendation effect. The two complement each other.

The algorithm determines what kind of content users see and whether they are satisfied with what they see. In other words, everything still depends on the algorithm.

Recently, it was rumored that Xiaohongshu had made adjustments to its algorithm department.

According to Leifeng.com, Xiaohongshu has integrated the algorithm departments of commercialization, community and e-commerce, and established a new application algorithm department, which will be concurrently headed by Xia Hou, head of Xiaohongshu's community technology department, and report to Feng Di, Xiaohongshu's vice president of technology.

The report pointed out that after Xiahou joined Xiaohongshu, he was initially responsible for community algorithms, and later served as the technical director of Xiaohongshu community. During his tenure, Xiahou made great achievements in community algorithms, search integration, and ecological governance, which also became the premise of this appointment.

Adjustments to the commercialization, community and e-commerce algorithm departments can, on the one hand, achieve resource integration, better coordinate the work between departments and improve operational efficiency; on the other hand, it can also better open up the link from content to monetization and accelerate content monetization.

"I don't know whether the establishment of a new algorithm department can optimize Xiaohongshu's 'simple and crude' algorithm. At present, Xiaohongshu's algorithm basically recommends related content based on what the user searches for. It is far less practical than the 'Guess you like' of other platforms." A user said this on the social platform regarding Xiaohongshu's adjustment.

Some industry insiders said that this may also better control the frequency of commercial content appearing on user homepages. On one hand, the search business is advancing by leaps and bounds, and on the other hand, the pace of commercialization is accelerating. For Xiaohongshu, how to balance may ultimately be a difficult problem. However, it can be seen that Xiaohongshu is still seeking change. What impact the new algorithm department will have on the entire community ecology and commercialization remains to be observed in the future.