Taobao Live can no longer sit still as it becomes an MCN

In recent years, live streaming has become very popular. Taobao, as one of the leading e-commerce platforms, recently announced that it will set up a live streaming e-commerce company to provide "nanny-style" full-hosting operation services for new anchors, celebrities, KOLs, and MCN organizations who are interested in starting live streaming on Taobao. Let's take a look at what's going on!

Recently, Taobao officially established a live streaming e-commerce company to provide "nanny-style" fully managed operation services to new anchors, celebrities, KOLs, and MCN agencies who are interested in starting broadcasts on Taobao.

The company is run by the Taotian Live Operation Team, and adopts a flexible cooperation model of guaranteed minimum or profit-sharing with the anchors to help them achieve account cold start, full-cycle planning, business docking, official inventory, marketing planning, and even in-depth full-hosting services such as financial management and venue support.

Taobao said that the main purpose of establishing the company is to provide six-month services to the anchors who have just joined Taobao. After the "newbie training period", the anchors and agencies can adapt to the platform rules and gameplay, and they can form their own teams or sign contracts with other MCN agencies.

What is the main purpose of Taobao's involvement in MCN? What is the current development status of Taobao Live? Can Taobao Live return to its peak again?

1. Behind the live e-commerce companies is the anxiety of Taobao live broadcasters

Taobao established a live streaming e-commerce company, which attracted much attention in the industry.

Tianyancha information shows that Zhejiang Taobao Live E-Commerce Co., Ltd. was established in January 2023. The legal representative is Ye Zhencan, with a registered capital of 10 million yuan. Its business scope includes Internet sales, food sales, personal Internet live broadcast services, organizing cultural and artistic exchange activities, and corporate management. It is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Beijing Baina Yuedong Technology Co., Ltd. Cheng Daofang, head of Taobao Live and Content Division, serves as executive director of Beijing Baina Yuedong Technology Co., Ltd.

As a platform, Taobao's move will undoubtedly trigger speculation from all sides. Some industry insiders believe that Taobao's official live streaming e-commerce company may pose a threat to other MCNs, and that Taobao's live streaming anchors will also be divided into "legitimate" and "illegitimate" types.

In this regard, the company's head Yuan Ge said, "The project will not compete with other institutions. We also welcome institutions to put the new anchors they want to sign into the hosting model, and the platform will help bear the early incubation risks. The entire project is not aimed at making a profit, but will invest in budget support, with the goal of prospering the ecosystem."

Image source network

The full hosting model can be understood as a mechanism for the platform to incubate new anchors. Based on the popularity and fame of celebrities and KOLs, Taobao takes on a series of anchor training-related tasks to help celebrities and influencers complete their identity transformation. In addition, Taobao will also provide operational support to help celebrities and influencers quickly get started in the live broadcast room in terms of traffic, product selection, marketing, venues, and other aspects.

It is understood that there are now a group of talents and organizations who want to try out live streaming on Taobao, but the gameplay varies between different platforms. When it comes to the training of new anchors, the official is obviously more familiar with the platform than third-party MCN organizations, and has more advantages in obtaining platform resources. The fully managed service will help them get started quickly.

From the perspective of the platform, personally becoming an MCN agency for new anchors can allow the anchors to have native attributes, thereby achieving a deep binding between Taobao Live and the anchors and enhancing the stability of the platform anchors.

In fact, since 2022, Taobao has launched a number of incentive policies for anchors, but unlike the self-incubation model of full-hosting services, it is directly introduced from other platforms to continuously enrich the ecology of Taobao Live.

On the eve of Double 11 in 2022, Taobao poached Luo Yonghao from Douyin in a high-profile manner. Subsequently, Douyin bloggers such as Yili Xiaoshazi and Zhu Yici also joined Taobao Live; last year, celebrities such as Dazui Mei and Xiang Zuo started broadcasting on Taobao Live. The MCN agency behind Zhang Baizhi and Jia Nailiang, Yaowang Technology, the MCN agency behind Liu Genghong and ViVi, and Yu Minhong and Dongfang Zhenxuan have also settled in Taobao Live.

In addition to introducing top anchors and institutions, Taobao is also focusing on small and medium-sized anchors. Before last year's Double Eleven, Taobao hosted a "China New Anchor" challenge competition to expand the scale of small and medium-sized anchors, and Taobao Live will also expand to all categories.

Cheng Daofang, head of Taobao Live, also said at the closing night that "the platform is more willing to support unknown anchors to become famous anchors, which is more valuable. How to make an ordinary person become the next Li Jiaqi may be our goal."

2. Taobao Live needs more “Li Jiaqi”

As the originator of live streaming e-commerce, Taobao also had a prosperous past. In 2018, Taobao live streaming platform brought in more than 100 billion yuan of goods, a year-on-year growth rate of nearly 400%. At that time, Taobao live streaming had become a mainstream e-commerce model and a standard for merchants. For consumers, the online shopping behavior of "shopping" while watching live streaming has gradually developed, and live streaming has become a well-deserved "trump card" of Taobao.

In 2019, live streaming became the new mainstream of business, and all walks of life regarded live streaming as one of the core engines of business development. For three consecutive years, Taobao Live has driven transaction growth of more than 150%. At the same time, Li Jiaqi, Wei Ya, and Xue Li gradually became top anchors, supporting half of Taobao Live.

By 2020, the epidemic has accelerated the outbreak of live streaming e-commerce. While Taobao Live maintains its leading position, the content ecology has also undergone corresponding changes: on the one hand, live streaming covers a wider range of industries. In addition to categories such as clothing and beauty, many industries with a relatively large offline operation have also moved online. The penetration rate of live streaming in categories such as home appliances and home furnishings has increased significantly. Traditional industries affected by the epidemic have been rejuvenated by the live streaming economy.

On the other hand, emerging brands such as Perfect Diary and Zhong Xue Gao have achieved impressive results in live streaming and have grown rapidly. Classic brands such as La Mer and Li Ning have also achieved new growth through live streaming.

2021 is a turning point for Taobao Live . Top anchors Viya and Xue Li have successively "failed". In 2022, Li Jiaqi stopped broadcasting for more than three months. Taobao Live was once in a dilemma where all top anchors were absent. At that time, a large amount of public opinion that "merchants have suffered from anchors for a long time" began to appear in the market. The potential of brand store broadcasts continued to be optimistic, and Taobao Live also began to focus on store broadcasts.

During last year’s Double 11, Taobao store live streaming exploded and performed particularly well. According to data released by Tmall, during the Double 11 period, 38 brands’ live streaming rooms had transaction volumes exceeding 100 million yuan, and 451 stores’ live streaming rooms had transaction volumes exceeding 10 million yuan. Strong categories such as apparel, beauty products, and home furnishings grew rapidly.

Among them, the live broadcast room of FILA's Tmall official flagship store achieved sales of over 100 million yuan in the first four hours of the Double 11 pre-sale, breaking the industry record. Red Star Macalline, which only entered Taobao live broadcasting on June 18 last year, achieved sales of over 100 million yuan in the first hour of store broadcasting, a year-on-year increase of 170%. The auto industry store broadcasting has emerged as a new force. Within four hours of the sale, the sales of auto industry brand store broadcasting exceeded the entire day of the first day of the sale last year.

It can be seen that the potential of Dianbo has been verified and has become the backbone of live broadcast e-commerce. However, Dianbo and Dabo are different in function. Dabo focuses on early marketing and seeding, while Dianbo focuses on subsequent operations and weeding. The two complement each other and are indispensable.

Looking back at the development of the industry in 2023, it has been proven that big anchors are still important and are still the protagonists of live e-commerce. Douyin continues to grab user attention with top anchors such as Dongfang Zhenxuan, Crazy Xiao Yangge, and Make Friends; the intellectual live broadcast style of celebrities such as Zhang Xiaohui and Dong Jie has made Xiaohongshu a successful buyer e-commerce; JD's transformation into live e-commerce needs to rely on "Luo Yonghao" to take the lead...

At present, Li Jiaqi is the only top anchor left on Taobao. Last year, Li Jiaqi was involved in constant turmoil, and there were even rumors that Li Jiaqi would retreat behind the scenes. Now Taobao Live is in urgent need of creating more "Li Jiaqis."

3. As multiple platforms increase their investment in live streaming e-commerce, where will Taobao Live go?

Nowadays, in the context of stock competition, live e-commerce is one of the few industries that is still growing. According to Star Chart data, during the "Double 11" promotion in 2023, the total sales of comprehensive e-commerce platforms represented by Tmall, JD.com, and Pinduoduo reached 923.5 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of about 1.1%; while the sales of live e-commerce represented by Douyin, Kuaishou, and Diantao (Taobao Live's official platform) reached 215.1 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of about 18.6%. Therefore, live e-commerce has become the focus of various companies, and Taobao Live's situation has begun to become passive.

Among the many players, Douyin e-commerce has posed a great threat to Taobao Live. In 2023, Douyin e-commerce GMV exceeded 2.2 trillion, of which shelf e-commerce GMV accounted for more than 35%, and live e-commerce accounted for more than 60%, and the gap with traditional e-commerce platforms such as Taobao, JD.com, and Pinduoduo is constantly narrowing. Recently, Douyin e-commerce has set a goal of breaking 3 trillion in GMV in 2024, and the pressure on Taobao Live can be imagined.

After JD Live began to develop last year, it directly targeted Taobao Live. Last year, the dispute between JD’s purchasing and sales staff and Li Jiaqi’s live broadcast room over the price of a certain “Haish” oven attracted a lot of attention. After the “price control” incident, eye-catching red slogans directly targeting Li Jiaqi’s live broadcast room appeared in JD Home Appliances, JD Supermarket, JD Real Low Price and other live broadcast rooms.

Image source: JD Live Screenshot

During the Double 11 shopping festival in 2023, JD Live also invited anchors from platforms such as Douyin and Kuaishou to help out, including @罗永浩, @瑜大公子, @金星, @黄圣依 and other 10 major industry top anchors and celebrity anchors, who will broadcast live non-stop throughout the entire Double 11 shopping festival. Recently, JD is urgently formulating an anchor recruitment plan, and does not assess GMV or gross profit for recruited anchors. It is obvious that it also hopes to speed up the improvement of content layout in the live broadcast field. Even recently, many anchors in JD's official live broadcast rooms have called Dong Yuhui online and invited Dong Yuhui to cooperate.

Last year, Xiaohongshu launched the "buyer e-commerce" through several top bloggers such as @张小卉, @董洁, and @伊能静. @张小卉's first live broadcast had a popularity of over 600 million and a live broadcast sales of over 50 million. @董洁's third live broadcast had a GMV of over 60 million, and @伊能静's first live broadcast had a GMV of up to 70 million. These achievements are very impressive for Xiaohongshu's "buyer e-commerce".

According to Xiaohongshu's official data, from 2022 to August 2023, the number of Xiaohongshu e-commerce "buyers" and managers increased by 27 times, the number of active merchants increased by 10 times, and the number of purchasing users increased by 12 times. Although Xiaohongshu's buyer e-commerce is currently small in size, it is in a period of rapid growth, and Taobao Live has finally gained another competitor.

Livestreaming sales on Bilibili has also started to get on track. Last year, @鳥牡梨, @Mr迷角, @大物是也 and many other UP hosts successfully led the livestreaming sales, proving the commercial potential of Bilibili. Recently, many UP hosts on Bilibili have been recruiting home improvement, clothing and beauty brands. UP hosts with millions of fans and even hundreds of thousands of fans have started to invest in livestreaming sales on Bilibili. It is foreseeable that livestreaming sales will become a normalized commercial monetization method for Bilibili, which is not good news for Taobao Live.

From being the "king" in the field of live e-commerce to gradually losing its power today, Taobao Live has to face the fierce pursuit of latecomers on the one hand, and constantly make up for the regret of the lack of top anchors on the other. Whether the introduction of the "full hosting" model can reverse the passive situation of Taobao Live remains to be seen.

Author: Aries

Source: WeChat public account "TopKlout (ID: TopKlout)"