By adjusting the low-price rules and launching a price comparison channel, is Douyin's e-commerce heading towards Pinduoduo?

As Douyin enters the lower-tier markets and starts a price war, will Douyin become the next Pinduoduo?

Tech Planet has exclusively learned that Douyin e-commerce will once again revise the "Douyin Mall Low-Price Flash Sale Channel Investment Rules", with the core changes being: the "Hot-selling Flash Sale" and "Daily Flash Sale" entrances will be merged, and the price requirements for quotations (usually refers to the lowest price promise provided by merchants to consumers in promotional activities or price competition) will be changed: from ≤150 yuan to ≤100 yuan; the discount requirement of ≤90% will be deleted; the minimum price traceability period will be extended from the past 1 day to the past 14 days.

In addition, Tech Planet also exclusively discovered that the Douyin Mall APP has launched a price comparison channel "Find a Good Price", which allows users to find the lowest price for the same product in the mall through price comparison. Its entrance is on par with a number of core e-commerce businesses such as "Hourly Delivery".

In February this year, according to Latepost, Douyin e-commerce set "price power" as the highest priority task in 2024. So far, from Pinduoduo at the beginning to JD.com, Taobao, and Douyin, mainstream e-commerce has promoted "low price" to the core strategy of the platform.

Coincidentally, according to 36Kr, Taotian Group has weakened its absolute low-price strategy and no longer pushes the "five-star price power". However, weakening the distribution of traffic by price does not mean not to offer low prices, but it needs to be more targeted. JD.com's main cost-effective brand "Jingxi" was renamed "Jingxi Self-operated", providing lower-priced products in a fully managed model.

A new battle between platforms has begun.

1. Douyin e-commerce "opens the book" at low prices

Douyin Mall has increased the weight of low prices, and a large amount of display has been given to low-price related entrances or sections.

Caption: Screenshot of Douyin Mall.

For example, in the "Super Value Purchase" area, which focuses on official subsidies and allows consumers to enjoy super low prices, you can see the lowest prices given by big brands. Not only that, users can also participate in the 10,000-person group event from 8 pm every Friday to midnight on weekends, with double subsidies and a minimum price of 50% off. According to the official data of the platform, the number of reservations this week has exceeded 100,000.

In Super Value Shopping, there is also a "Big Brand Outlet", which is similar to an offline outlet, selling some discounted, off-season clearance and brand-name products with coupons.

Caption: Screenshot of the super value and low price flash sale areas.

In addition, the Douyin Mall homepage also has a "Low Price Flash Sale" section that focuses on low price flash sale gameplay. According to a Douyin Mall merchant, low price flash sale is a limited-time and limited-quantity marketing product launched by Douyin Mall. It will regularly hold corresponding low price flash sale channels to create a high-traffic, high-conversion store daily sales position through low-priced popular products.

Tech Planet found that the area sells a relatively complete range of low-priced goods, including fresh food, paper products, mother and baby toys, sports and outdoor activities, etc., and the lowest price offered by the merchant is 1 yuan.

In order to help consumers find lower-priced goods, Douyin Mall has also launched a new "Find a Good Price" channel that allows consumers to compare prices and find the lowest price in the mall. It is worth noting that the entrance to this channel is listed alongside a number of important Douyin e-commerce businesses such as "Hourly Delivery" and "Global Shopping".

After entering this channel, you can see the lowest-priced products recommended by various platforms. These products are subsidized by merchants on a large scale and at high amounts to strengthen users' minds with low prices. Consumers can also click "Compare Prices" to check the lowest price for the same product in the mall.

Caption: Screenshot of the Find Good Price channel and Price Comparison function.

In addition to the above functional changes, the platform recommendation strategy and investment requirements are also changing dynamically. It can be found that in the product recommendation interface below the mall, products with "low price flash sale" and "super value purchase" labels are displayed to users first.

Caption: The product recommendation interface at the bottom of the Douyin Mall.

Douyin e-commerce has increased its low-price strategy, and there are signs that it can be traced. On the one hand, the investment rules are frequently adjusted. In May this year, the "Douyin Mall Low-Price Flash Sale Channel Investment Rules" adjusted the price requirements for goods in the investment standards. In addition, in June, the 95% discount requirement for "Daily Flash Sale" was adjusted to be open to all categories. In addition, the "Hot Sale Flash Sale" and "Daily Flash Sale" entrances were merged in July, and the price quotation was further lowered.

2. Will low prices become the new growth curve for Douyin e-commerce?

Against the backdrop of saturated e-commerce competition, Pinduoduo has made a comeback with its "low-price strategy".

Pinduoduo has risen to prominence by relying on its low-price strategy. Pinduoduo's low-price strategy has attracted many other platforms to follow suit, including Douyin e-commerce.

In February this year, LatePost reported that Douyin e-commerce insiders revealed that until early 2023, Douyin e-commerce will still compare itself with Alibaba, but now "internal benchmarking is more focused on Pinduoduo." In 2024, Douyin e-commerce's low-price strategy will be extended to the content field. Among them, the mall and short videos will vigorously recommend low-priced goods, while the live broadcast room will continue to carry high-priced goods mainly from brands.

Then, Douyin e-commerce targeted the richness of goods brought by small and medium-sized merchants. In July, Douyin announced a reduction in commissions for some categories of goods, including household and personal cleaning tools, home accessories, household daily necessities, storage and organization, etc., reducing the commission deduction from the original 5% to 2%. It also provides small and medium-sized merchants with policies such as one license to open multiple stores and a reduction in deposits, aiming to reduce the operating costs of merchants and attract more merchants to join the platform.

This commission reduction policy means that the costs borne by merchants in each transaction will be significantly reduced, which will allow them to have greater flexibility in pricing strategies, improve the market competitiveness of their products, and promote sales growth.

At this year's Douyin Mall 618 Good Products Festival Investment Conference, relevant persons in charge introduced that the Douyin Mall 618 Good Products Festival will officially start on May 24. The platform will invest tens of billions of traffic and launch multiple low-price marketing methods.

Continuously increasing the low-price strategy has also brought certain results to Douyin e-commerce.

According to official data, during the 618 period, the transaction volume of Douyin Mall increased by 85% year-on-year, the order volume increased by 94% year-on-year, and the number of active products in the mall increased by 93% year-on-year. Among them, the "Super Value Purchase" channel, as part of the low-price strategy, was very popular. The number of users placing orders on this channel increased by 175% year-on-year, the transaction volume increased by 150% year-on-year, and the order volume of this channel increased by 175% year-on-year.

Some industry insiders also pointed out that for merchants, low prices may compress profit margins and affect their long-term profitability. At the same time, low prices may make it difficult to ensure the quality of some goods or services, affecting user experience.

Although the "low price" strategy has certain challenges, based on market demand, platform advantages and effective operating strategies, "low price" has a great chance of becoming the new growth curve of Douyin e-commerce.

3. Low-price war, all parties attack

Starting this year, low prices have become an unavoidable topic in the e-commerce industry, and various platforms have stepped up their efforts to compete for low-price strategic advantages. Not only Douyin e-commerce, but also Alibaba, JD.com, Kuaishou and other platforms have frequently made moves on low-price strategies.

According to 36Kr, Taobao Group held a closed-door meeting for merchants after the 618 shopping festival, with first-line business executives present. At the meeting, several changes were made, which will be officially implemented in the second half of the year. The core change is that Taobao has weakened its absolute low-price strategy. Since last year, the search weight distribution system based on the "five-star price power" has been weakened and changed back to distribution based on GMV, and the low-price strategy is more targeted. The five-star price power indicator is still retained for branded products. At the same time, for such branded products, the Taobao platform has also increased its 10 billion yuan subsidy.

JD.com has made adjustments both online and offline. On July 16, JD.com Retail will integrate all its resources to launch a low-price continuous project, "JD.com Super 18". Starting from July, the event will be held on a monthly basis from 8pm on the 17th to the 18th of each month. Each issue will launch some high-value products at a fixed price of 18 yuan.

Also in July, JD Jingxi changed its name to "Jingxi Self-operated", focusing on the full-management model. Currently, most of the products sold are priced below 10 yuan, and it claims to be "strictly selected, factory direct supply, free shipping for one piece, and official service."

Offline, this month, JD.com's first full-category discount supermarket, Huaguan Discount Supermarket (Changyang Store), was launched in Fangshan, Beijing. Mainly relying on JD.com's supply chain system, the goods are directly purchased by purchasing and marketing personnel from factories, and the main selling point is "everyday low prices".

Huatai Securities predicts that user growth will remain one of JD.com's key goals in 2024, and the expansion of "low-priced" and "rich" product supply will be one of its core measures. As new users' consumption habits on the JD.com platform gradually develop and mature, it is expected to further help JD.com's retail GMV and revenue growth.

Starting from 2023, Kuaishou will make "low-priced good products" its annual strategy. At the 2024 Kuaishou E-commerce Gravity Conference, Wang Jianwei, senior vice president of Kuaishou and head of the e-commerce division and commercialization division, said that the platform will work with merchants to further optimize the consumer shopping experience; at the same time, through the coordinated growth of global traffic, the supply of low-priced good products will be enriched. At the conference, Kuaishou announced that it would provide traffic subsidies and billion-level commodity subsidies, and at various major promotion nodes and marketing IP activities, it would provide new products, hot products and other low-priced good products, combined with interest-based content, to bring surprise experiences to users together with merchants and influencers.

Based on multiple factors including consumer demand, market competition, technological support and market expansion, e-commerce low prices will continue and may be presented in more diversified and innovative forms.

Author: Chen Qiaohui

Source: WeChat public account "Tech Planet"

This article is authorized by @Tech Planet to be published on Operation Party. Any reproduction without permission is prohibited.

The title image is from Unsplash, based on the CC0 agreement