Douyin TikTok : a New Way To Sell Big In China

To remind you, Douyin is a short-video platform that allows users to both produce and watch 50-second videos with numerous effects, music backgrounds, filters, and other tools to be as creative as you want. Douyin has achieved amazing growth numbers in the past years since it was first launched.

Douyin is HUGE in China

As of January 2019, Douyin/TikTok was seeing 250 million unique users each day, and as many as 500 million each month.

As social commerce is becoming a norm in China, most social media platforms here have managed to find a way to provide online shopping functions to their users. Douyin is also taking part in the e-commerce sphere since last year. (full information on Douyin TikTok here)

Read as well: Introduction to Douyin Marketing

+222% growth

In-app spending via Tik Tok surged 222% worldwide in Q1 2019 and indicating that ByteDance is leveraging the popularity of Douyin/Tiktok to become a significant force in the Chinese and beyond eCommerce space.

In May 2018, Douyin opened and set up its own e-commerce store with the objective to complete the loop from awareness to conversion. In 2019, Douyin has become more active in the e-commerce field.

Douyin is different from TikTok

The E-Commerce part is much more developed on Douyin.

Create your Douyin Store to sell your Taobao products

The below picture describes briefly how users would come from watching short videos to shopping on Douyin.

 

Linking to the Taobao store is the most common way Douyin KOLs sells. Lately, Douyin announced that not only Taobao but your JD and Tmall stores can also be linked to your Douyin profiles to sell products on the platform. This is super exciting news for brands since it opens new possibilities to facilitate sales through Douyin.

Currently, anyone with 10 video posts can use this store function.

During the Double 12 2018, Douyin-driven Taobao sales from the top 50 Douyin accounts reached over 100 million RMB. The total number of Douyin-driven transactions of the day is over 1.2 million. The most popular e-commerce categories on Douyin are women’s clothing, men’s clothing, cosmetics, and F&B products.

Opening a store on Douyin is relatively easy:

You have to verify yourself or your company. When that is done, you go to “Share Merch” and apply for the store. You usually get a response within a couple of hours until your application is approved.

Now, link your JD.com, Tmall, or Taobao store

You can link your JD, Tmall, or Taobao store and add your products to your Douyin e-commerce store.

Your products will be visible on your profile. If you want to promote a product through a video, you can add it at the last step of posting a video.

Douyin activated e-commerce mini-programs

QDaily reported that ByteDance now allowed merchants to add mini-programs on Douyin to sell goods directly to its users. This means that by adding mini-programs to their Douyin profiles, online sales can be completed without the need to leave the app and visit the sellers’ online stores elsewhere.

Mini-programs, initially created by Wechat, are lightweight alternatives to apps that run inside existing applications on a user’s mobile phone.

Integration of the mini-program will boost Douyin’s social e-commerce functions by providing users with a better shopping experience and making it become an all-in-one entertainment and shopping platform.

At present, Douyin has partnerships with Xiaomi, NetEase Koala, JD.com, Suning, and others to launch e-commerce mini-apps on its platform.

Douyin mini-programs can also be shared externally with WeChat in the form of QR codes. WeChat users activate a Douyin mini-program by scanning the codes.

There are many ways to access Mini-Programs on Douyin. By far the most popular and important of these is the video link, which drives the most traffic to Mini-Programs on Douyin each month.

Video link

Mini-Programs can be accessed by clicking the link in the bottom left while a video is open.

Video comment area

A link at the top of the comment area can also lead to a Mini-Program.

Search for specific products

 As recently as this May, the app also added support for product searching, enabling users to search for products and then directly open the relevant Mini-Program to purchase the item in the search.

Douyin makes it easy and convenient to search for and buy products within its platform, by letting users search specifically for Products inside the app.

Product listings are sourced from stores that have set up shop in Douyin’s mini-app network. Search results show basic product information, including an image, description, price, and a link that takes users to the retailer’s Douyin mini-app.

Xiaomi’s success on Douyin was made into a case study that is well-circulated among marketers on how to build brands and make sales on Douyin. The company managed to turn its cold start into a big success in a matter of months.

On Douyin, Xiaomi made use of its popular video content. The embedded links into videos direct people to a product store page directly. Avoiding any further redirection or app-switching creates a smoother user experience. Xiaomi also leveraged the social media element by encouraging users to share these videos with the shopping links in it with their friends. This helped them recruit new customers at the least cost. This of course means that the videos must be entertaining or interesting beyond just being an advert for a product. Otherwise, fans won’t want to share them with their friends.

Douyin Full Report (available)

We have a Full report about Douyin available on demand (team@marketingtochina.com)

1. Douyin Ads
2. Douyin KOL
3. Douyin e-Commerce
4. Douyin CPA (CPS)
5. Douyin Affiliate

Who are we? GMA: Dedicated Marketing Solutions for China

1. A full digital Agency
2. Results-oriented
3. Performance partner
4. team of passionate

Do you need to launch a Douyin e-Commerce store, and want to know the price?

If it is reasonable, contact us.