Oriental Selection “enters Taobao”, further loosening its ties with Douyin?

This article begins with a media report that Dongfang Zhenxuan is preparing for Taobao live broadcast, then talks about Dongfang Zhenxuan's upcoming entry into Taobao, and then talks about Dongfang Zhenxuan's previous live broadcasts, and finally talks about Dongfang Zhenxuan's live broadcasts that have attracted much attention. This article is suitable for friends who sell goods through live broadcasts.

On August 21, media reported that Dongfang Zhenxuan was preparing for a Taobao live broadcast, which was expected to start at the end of the month. On the 22nd, Taobao’s official account launched a related guessing contest on Weibo, indirectly announcing the matter.

In fact, there have been rumors about Dongfang Zhenxuan and Taobao Live for a long time. As early as September 2022, Dongfang Zhenxuan was rumored to be planning Taobao Live, and was also rumored to participate in Taobao's Double Eleven live broadcast event, but both were denied.

But whether it is the precedent of peers such as Jiao Ge Pengyou and Yao Wang entering Taobao, or setting up their own studio and broadcasting on their own apps, Oriental Selection has never wanted to and cannot be limited to Douyin.

This is also the choice that live streaming e-commerce organizations have made after the platforms and the leading companies have gradually loosened their constraints.

1. Oriental Selection will soon be available on Taobao

After rumors had been circulating for almost a year, Dongfang Zhenxuan finally chose to join Taobao.

On August 21, according to media reports, Oriental Selection is setting up a Taobao live broadcast-related team and has initially found product suppliers. It will start broadcasting as early as the end of this month.

It is understood that there are many Taobao Live-related positions in the current recruitment information of Dongfang Zhenxuan, such as Taobao Live's business manager, visual designer, product selection manager, etc. At the same time, Dongfang Zhenxuan has also begun to invite some brand merchants to cooperate on Taobao Live.

Although Dongfang Zhenxuan responded to the media and said it would not comment, at about 10 a.m. on August 22, Taobao’s official Weibo account posted a message: “A friend from the East is coming to our live studio, guess who is coming!”

Based on the accompanying pictures and text, netizens left messages saying that Oriental Selection is going to come to Taobao Live.

Among them, @Gp Geng Peng, whose Weibo account is certified as "General Manager of Huaqing Shichuang", reposted this Weibo post and tagged Dongfang Zhenxuan and several anchors including Dong Yuhui, claiming "See you in the Taobao live broadcast room."

In addition, according to Jiemian News, the product selection team of Oriental Selection has been negotiating with Unilever on Taobao Live's product list and related mechanisms since August 9. The two parties have confirmed the cooperation, and Unilever will participate in Oriental Selection's first Taobao Live show, and the cooperation model is pure commission without slot fees.

Oriental Selection’s first Taobao live broadcast will add a larger proportion of daily chemicals, beauty and skin care, home appliances, and 3C digital products to the categories previously dominated by agricultural products, food, and personal care and household cleaning products.

Xinbochang discovered that currently, Oriental Selection has two accounts on the Diantao App, namely "Oriental Selection" and "Oriental Selection Flagship Store".

The former has posted 985 videos, the earliest of which was posted in June 2022. It has not only gained 385,000 followers, but also carries the certification information of "Master in the Source Food Field". The other account does not post any content, but has 126,000 store fans.

However, these two accounts have no live broadcast records and have not released any live broadcast previews.

2. From traffic limit disputes to being blocked for violations

In mid-June 2022, the Douyin live broadcast room of Oriental Selection quickly became popular because of its "bilingual sales", and Dong Yuhui, who transformed from a New Oriental teacher to a sales anchor, also quickly became popular. With the popularity of content and high-quality product positioning, Oriental Selection has become the top live broadcast sales IP on Douyin.

But soon thereafter, it was reported that the live broadcast room of Oriental Selection was restricted by Douyin.

Although both Douyin and Oriental Selection have responded to the issue of traffic restrictions, not only are some fans not satisfied with the responses, but many industry insiders have also analyzed the situation from all sides and said that even if Douyin did not restrict the traffic of Oriental Selection, it would limit its growth into a top live broadcast room on the platform.

It was also during this period that Yu Minhong, who saved New Oriental from the education and training crisis with the help of live streaming, began to further expand in live streaming by relying on the continued popularity of the topic and traffic dividends. He successively opened the Oriental Selection video account, Taobao and Tmall stores, and launched an independent app of the same name as Oriental Selection.

At that time, Oriental Selection had no intention of just being the “number one influencer” on Douyin.

Not only that, Yu Minhong also publicly stated that as a listed company, Oriental Selection will not rely on a specific platform.

Being highly dependent on a single platform not only has traffic restrictions, but also regulatory restrictions.

Earlier, when Dong Yuhui was introducing a type of milk in a live broadcast, he used the term "white and fat", which was deemed as a violation by the platform, and his live broadcast room was removed from the rankings. In the live broadcast the next day, Dong Yuhui mocked himself and said: I dare not speak casually anymore.

But not long after, Dong Yuhui used the term "magic potion" when introducing a product, and was again found to be in violation by the platform...

On July 26, Oriental Selection suddenly issued an announcement stating that due to regulatory restrictions, Oriental Selection’s self-operated product store and live broadcast room on a leading platform have suspended operations.

It is reported that when the anchor of Oriental Selection was explaining the ingredient list of a certain product, Douyin judged it as diversion because of the QR code on the packaging. Subsequently, the Oriental Selection's private product store was punished by closing for three days.

At this time, independent apps become an important rescue tool.

After Douyin’s self-operated store was closed, Dongfang Zhenxuan switched to its own independent App and used a three-day promotion to attract traffic and calm users. Unexpectedly, it turned out to be a “blessing in disguise”.

According to relevant data, on July 28, Dongfang Zhenxuan surpassed Pinduoduo to top the free list of Apple Store shopping apps, with more than 330,000 users downloading the Dongfang Zhenxuan app. From July 26 to 29, the total transaction volume of Dongfang Zhenxuan's live streaming on the app for four days was 110 million yuan, and many popular products were sold out.

Starting broadcast on its own app is also the most obvious signal that Oriental Selection is "escaping" from Douyin.

3. The much-watched “escape”

In fact, the discussion about Oriental Selection’s entry into Taobao has been going on for a long time.

On September 6, 2022, some self-media reported that Dongfang Zhenxuan is currently preparing for Taobao Live. In a chat screenshot circulated online, a customer service representative with the ID "Dongfang Zhenxuan Flagship Store: Dongdong" said: "Dongfang Zhenxuan's Taobao Live is being prepared."

Soon after, Luo Yonghao announced that he would join Taobao Live and participate in the platform's Double 11 promotion. In addition, during this period, many top Douyin influencers such as Liu Genghong announced that they would join Taobao, and Dongfang Zhenxuan was also rumored to participate in Taobao's Double 11 live broadcast, but Yu Minhong denied it.

After that, there were many rumors that Oriental Selection might enter Taobao Live and "escape" from Douyin.

However, the so-called "escape" does not mean completely leaving Douyin, but copying or moving the live broadcast room to more platforms to get rid of the relevant restrictions imposed by the Douyin platform.

Therefore, it is not surprising that Dongfang Zhenxuan has finally joined hands with Taobao Live now that the dust has settled. On the contrary, in the eyes of many industry insiders, it seems a bit late to join Taobao at this time.

After all, Dongfang Zhenxuan’s peers, such as Jiaogepengyou, Yaowang Network, and Wuyou Media, have long been involved in Taobao Live. It has long been a trend for leading institutions to deploy on multiple platforms.

As the ties between platforms and the top companies are further loosened, multi-platform layout is the natural choice for the top live e-commerce companies. In particular, Douyin's continued efforts in shelf e-commerce have made it look like a "big shopping mall" to many anchors, merchants and institutions.

Then, the roles of head institutions and anchors will also become brand merchants. After choosing to settle in this shopping mall, they can still choose to settle in more shopping malls.

Back to Dongfangxuan itself, Yu Minhong was aiming for an e-commerce mall from the beginning, and an e-commerce live broadcast room would not be his final destination, so Dongfangxuan would also reach more users and more supply chains through "escape". In this live broadcast of goods on Taobao, the rich categories of goods brought by Dongfangxuan are also a reflection of its rich supply chain resources.

With the entry of Oriental Selection into Taobao Live, the "escape" initiative has made new progress again. The outside world is also looking forward to how strong the explosive power and vitality of this leading live e-commerce IP will be.

Author: Aligu WeChat public account: New Broadcasting Field