From community to e-commerce, how did Xiaohongshu become popular?

Since its establishment in June 2013, Xiaohongshu started out as an overseas shopping guide sharing application and later developed into a vertical community. How did Xiaohongshu develop so rapidly in just two years? An excellent product that has more than 20 million users to date!

With e-commerce booming today, how did Xiaohongshu carve out a niche for itself by combining community with cross-border e-commerce amid the suppression of the three major e-commerce operators , Taobao, JD.com , and Tmall ? So where will we go in the future? Next, I will study the development history of Xiaohongshu products, mainly exploring products and operations.

The picture shows the information architecture of Xiaohongshu

The picture shows the core logic of Xiaohongshu

1. Product Introduction

Xiaohongshu is an APP developed for discovering good things from all over the world. The product is positioned as an information platform for user content sharing (UGC), where users can discover good things from all over the world. It moves offline shopping scenarios online and adds endorsements from real purchasing users. Users upload and share content, and those who shop overseas can get detailed product "strategies" on Xiaohongshu.

Since Xiaohongshu was launched in March 2014, it has been just a simple (UGC) community model. At that time, the usage scenario of Xiaohongshu was: when you don’t know what to buy when shopping overseas, how can users buy overseas products with better reputation. With the improvement of living standards and the rise in consumption levels among young people, more and more people have the demand to buy overseas products and like to share the good things they buy with everyone. Xiaohongshu is developed around this core demand. With its efficient promotion methods and product iterations, it has grown rapidly in just over two years and now has more than 20 million users. The overseas shopping sharing community has become a strong fortress for Xiaohongshu, and it has quietly stood out as a leader among many cross-border e-commerce companies.

1. Target users

Xiaohongshu CEO Mao Wenchao once said: "When I was studying abroad, I witnessed the "madness" of my compatriots' overseas shopping. However, many people do not understand what they are buying during their crazy shopping, nor do they know where to buy it more cost-effectively, and they don't even understand how to get a tax refund, etc." Therefore, at the very beginning, we hoped to serve a group of people who would travel abroad and have shopping needs. We are here to help everyone understand some shopping knowledge.

According to the notes published in the community, most of them are female users who shop overseas. I also checked some announcements released by Baidu and the official website. I think the core users of Xiaohongshu community are mainly young and middle-aged female users who like overseas shopping and pursue high quality. This group of people are those born after 1985 and 1990 in first-tier cities, mostly students and white-collar workers. They are the new generation of consumption force. They represent the consumer population in the upcoming mass market and hope to find some products that can better match their lifestyle and their own understanding of life. However, the product categories in domestic counters are limited, while platforms such as Taobao are filled with a mix of good and bad sellers. Consumers want to buy products from around the world.

So I summarize the needs of Xiaohongshu’s core users:

1. I like traveling abroad, and shopping is a must when traveling, but I don’t know what’s worth buying. I hope others can give me some advice and I want to hear everyone’s thoughts.
2. As my quality of life improves, the goods I buy are not just limited to basic use. I hope they can bring me more spiritual satisfaction and reflect my unique attitude in the eyes of others.
3. I bought a limited edition shoulder bag from overseas yesterday that was both inexpensive and good quality, and I wanted to share it and show it off.
4. I like surfing the Internet. When I see things shared by others and they all say they are very good, I am very tempted so I buy them too.

Xiaohongshu has built a community model based on user-generated content around these pain points. The community is characterized by active users, and its attraction lies in the likes, comments, follows, and collections between users. These can quickly bring in user clicks and increase user stickiness. With traffic , there is naturally no need to worry about doing bad business, and this paves the way for the introduction of the subsequent e-commerce model.

2. Position the market

How big is the market of Xiaohongshu? Where is the entry point?

Figure 1 shows the ranking of Chinese outbound tourism destinations

The number of users of outbound tourism continues to increase - in the early days of launching the community, Xiaohongshu did not create a global shopping sharing community. Instead, based on the 2013 China Tourism Statistical Bulletin, Hong Kong ranked first as the destination for Chinese outbound tourism (picture), and only created a Hong Kong shopping sharing community to ensure that the product was used frequently in the early stages. This was undoubtedly the most appropriate approach.

Make full use of the community model - As mentioned above, the characteristics of the community are active users, self-propagation by users, and users sharing good things purchased overseas, and the community will bring a lot of traffic.

There are no unicorn competitors yet - before the emergence of Xiaohongshu, there was no mature community shopping sharing product. Xiaohongshu's competitors include Meilishuo , NetEase Kaola, etc. However, Meilishuo's entry point is overseas purchasing, and it focuses on purchasing on behalf of others, while NetEase Kaola operates its own selection of overseas shopping products, seizes the characteristics of users' overseas shopping and provides low-priced, authentic products. What differentiates Xiaohongshu from them is that it started as a community, allowing users to purchase and create their own products, recreating a real overseas shopping scene.

2. Product Development Process (Iteration)

This article will focus on the product's iteration process and appreciate the growth trajectory of an excellent product, mainly analyzing from the perspective of product design and operation. Note: Download volume source: KuChuan Android version release record source: App Store

The picture shows the download ranking

1. Exploration stage 2013/9~2014/1 (shopping guide to community) - the main purpose of this stage is to establish the early form of the product. First, we focus on overseas shopping guides, and then move to overseas shopping sharing communities. Through MVP products, we verify the product positioning of users' core needs for overseas shopping community sharing.

2. Accumulation and polishing stage 2014/2~2014/8 (community maturity and development) - the main purpose of this stage is to accumulate user behavior data and determine the product form (community development maturity). I understand this stage as Xiaohongshu's in-depth development of the product and expansion of demand after verifying user needs.

3. Successful transformation stage 2014/9~2015/3 (introduction and development of e-commerce) - During this stage, the community developed and matured, and at the same time, the "welfare club" e-commerce platform was introduced. The number of users saw a rapid growth, and Xiaohongshu successfully transformed again. From community cross-border e-commerce, we can achieve double growth in users and profits.

4. Stable development stage 2015/4 ~ present (perfect development of community and e-commerce) - During this stage, Xiaohongshu's experience was further improved, with operations as the core leading product strategy, and comprehensive pursuit of data growth in transaction volume.

Phase 1: Exploration

2013/9~2014/1 (Shopping guide to the community)

1.MVP product form

From v1.0 to v1.3, Xiaohongshu first entered the field of overseas shopping guides, starting with the exploration of overseas travel shopping guides, and then moved on to overseas shopping sharing communities, initially determining the Hong Kong shopping sharing community as its core function (the reason why it only focused on the Hong Kong sharing community may be because the 2013 China Tourism Statistical Bulletin showed that Hong Kong ranked first as the destination for Chinese outbound travel, which is very correct)

The picture shows a screenshot of version v1.0

The picture shows a screenshot of version v1.3

As people's living standards continue to improve and they pursue a higher quality of life, the number of people from the mainland traveling to Hong Kong is growing, and they go to Hong Kong for shopping most frequently, which gives the product a higher traffic usage in the early stage. Therefore, the subsequent products are all based on one core demand, mainly enabling users to share their shopping experience in Hong Kong. The form of the community has basically been established since then. It does not have too many functions, but can basically meet the needs of the community. This stage is mainly to verify the product form.

2. Product Operation

Since this stage is mainly about verifying and exploring product goals and directions, and due to the small number of users, operations are mainly focused on the dynamics and content quality of the user UGC model community. Because a UGC community is generated by user-generated content, the content and atmosphere of the community are the focus of operations. Because these users are the core seeds of Xiaohongshu's future products, they will continuously produce high-quality and excellent content for Xiaohongshu, keeping the community highly active.

It can be concluded from Baidu search that Xiaohongshu's operations at this stage are mainly centered around influencers. Influencers produce high-quality content to increase the daily activity of the community, so it is very important to find and maintain a group of high-quality core users who share overseas shopping. Operations dominate product strategy at this stage.

3. Phase Overview

During this stage, Xiaohongshu mainly explores and verifies users' overseas shopping sharing and community atmosphere. The product does not have too many functions. At the beginning, users will not come for the product's many functions, but precisely because they want to solve their problems.

The focus is mainly on exploring and polishing the sharing community based on the user UGC model, aiming at the core demand of overseas shopping sharing, and quickly completing the exploration of product form. For this reason, Xiaohongshu released several versions in succession. Through rapid iteration, it found the core needs and clarified the product direction. At the same time, it also found the first batch of seed users , which strengthened the confidence for the future development of Xiaohongshu.

The second stage: accumulation and polishing stage

2014/2~2014/8 (maturity and development of the community)

1. Product status

During this stage, the product form is basically determined, the number of users is also increasing, and it has officially entered the iterative rhythm of small steps and fast progress. This stage mainly explores more possibilities on the original basic product form and promotes further growth by covering more user needs. In terms of product design, the features introduced in version 1.9 from APP Annie include :

• Optimize the picture editing page and add picture tags, so that you can mark the brand, price, and purchase location information on the picture
• Added new picture watermark, multiple watermark effects to choose from
• Optimize the publishing page to make the process more convenient
• Added brand introduction, users can subscribe to brand dynamic updates
• Home page optimization, support for subscription to "My Brand" and "Daily Selections"

2. Operational status

I previously checked Baidu and learned that Xiaohongshu at this stage was extremely dependent on the content produced by influencers, so influencers played a key role in the development of the community and determined the survival of Xiaohongshu. Therefore, the operating strategy focused on Xiaohongshu influencers. Its operating methods included signing contracts with a small number of influencers, supporting influencers, and even creating stars in the community. Because of this, it is easy for the community to become centralized, and experts become the weight of the community, with heavy emphasis on them and light emphasis on them.

From the download ranking and comment level of APP Annie, it can be clearly seen that from March to July 2014, Xiaohongshu's historical ranking and comment trend showed a V-shaped trend. Xiaohongshu should be a fast-growing and stable community at this time, but why did this happen? Moreover, the functions of the product itself have not changed much in the version iterations from v1.7 to v1.9, so why do such unimpressive data appear?

The picture shows the historical rating changes of Xiaohongshu on APP Annie

The picture shows the download ranking of Xiaohongshu in APP Annie's history

After analyzing the data and checking the historical comments of users, I concluded that there was an incident of melody expert stealing pictures on Xiaohongshu during this period. During this period, Xiaohongshu promoted influencers who plagiarized other people's high-quality pictures and published them in the community, in order to bring a lively atmosphere to the community and attract users. In the end, it was pointed out by users and the account was blocked, which caused a very bad impact. Xiaohongshu, which had been developing with a good reputation, suddenly fell into the dark abyss (Xiaohongshu, you have lost your moral integrity).

The picture shows the user's historical evaluation

Since Xiaohongshu promotes influencers too much, it seems inevitable that Xiaohongshu will be affected by the image theft incident. When checking the information, Xiaohongshu founder Mao Wenchao also said in an interview with the media: "The Xiaohongshu community focuses on content, not the people who share content, and does not reuse users and influencers." From this, it seems that after more than three months of fermentation and dullness of the incident, Xiaohongshu made a major adjustment to its product strategy in version v1.9, becoming "focused on content, not influencers." After this storm, Xiaohongshu's comment level and download ranking have recovered well, and the number of users is also slowly increasing, and it has begun to grow steadily again.

3. Stage Overview

Due to unreasonable operations, the Xiaohongshu community, which has always been known for its good reputation, has been affected to a certain extent. The download rankings, user review levels, and download volumes have all declined. But Xiaohongshu is able to quickly adjust its product strategy. After the incident was settled, multiple versions were iterated and optimized continuously, and the operation focused on the three key points of "focusing on content sharing experience, focusing on content browsing experience, and focusing on active community interaction" to help Xiaohongshu improve its data.

At this stage, the community has basically matured, and the community has brought self-growth to the development of the product itself. At this time, Xiaohongshu's high-quality content and user stickiness have laid a solid foundation for further product development. During this period, Xiaohongshu also completed a multi-million dollar Series A financing , which confirmed and strengthened its product direction, and also prepared for the cross-border e-commerce transformation of the "Welfare Club" to be introduced in the next v2.0 version.

Stage 3: Successful transformation

2014/9~2015/3 (Introduction and development of e-commerce)

After the second phase of community development, Xiaohongshu’s direction was determined. This phase will focus on expanding in the community, looking for more possibilities, and seeking a larger market share.

1. Product status

Xiaohongshu has gone through the development of a community, and the mature community has also become a self-growth point for the development of Xiaohongshu itself, so the product design will continue to optimize the experience and introduce new features to satisfy the freshness of old users.

Therefore, a major revision was made in version v2.0 (version content source: App Store):

1. A new daily topic is pinned to the top of the homepage, so you can view the latest highlights as soon as you open the screen.
2. The first tab on the [Discover] page introduces the "Welfare Store", which is clear and transparent. You no longer have to ask Captain Potato where you can buy things. It is clear at a glance.
3. Special topics, topics, and expert editions have all been included in the "Plaza" column, and the exclusive "Destination" tab has been retained, so that you can easily check the latest and most popular lists in various countries.
4. Added mobile phone login function, eliminating the need to jump back and forth between WeChat and Weibo, and realized one-click login on mobile phone to quickly enter Xiaohongshu (experience optimization)
5. The "logistics tracking" system for my orders has been fully upgraded, so I can keep track of the package's movements at any time. Also fixed some known bugs.

The picture shows a screenshot of version 2.0

2. Product Operation

Under the guidance of the second phase's product strategy of "focusing on content, not on influencers", the user activity of the community has been greatly improved. The operation of this phase mainly relies on the promotion of the community's transfer to cross-border e-commerce, a process of transformation from community overseas shopping sharing to community e-commerce. Users have been hanging out in the community for a long time and have collected a lot of good stuff, but they don’t know where to buy them. So Xiaohongshu solves user needs and naturally launches e-commerce functions.

Xiaohongshu's e-commerce function did not initially offer too many products, but instead promoted the further development of e-commerce through the form of flash sales of single products, and achieved satisfactory results, which also verified the strong market behind this demand.

3. Stage Overview

Due to the maturity of the community, introducing the "welfare club" to explore the e-commerce market at this stage is undoubtedly the most reasonable and clear-cut decision. This proves that there is a huge market for Xiaohongshu community + cross-border e-commerce. The community has the characteristics of self-growth, and e-commerce brings a profitable market. The two are perfectly combined. Under the two major trends, users continue to grow rapidly and soon develop to a user base of millions.

During the verification phase of introducing e-commerce, Xiaohongshu did not expand its product categories. In several iterative versions, the "Welfare Club" has always been a single-product flash sale event, which not only stimulated users but also laid the foundation for accumulating word-of-mouth for Xiaohongshu products themselves. The community + e-commerce model in this stage tends to develop stably and mature, and at the same time indicates that Xiaohongshu will have greater motivation and direction in the future to attack various possibilities.

During this period, Xiaohongshu completed its Series B financing led by GGV Capital. GGV Managing Partner Hans Tung joined the Xiaohongshu board of directors after this round of financing.

The fourth stage: stable development stage

2015/4~Present (Perfect development of community and e-commerce)

We didn’t find a profit model in the early days, but after word of mouth got good and the user base grew rapidly, the profit model naturally opened up. During this stage, I will comprehensively analyze a mature MVP product from the perspectives of UI, interaction, product, and operation.

1. Product status

During this stage, Xiaohongshu is committed to sharing and displaying massive amounts of notes in the community and improving the functional experience related to cross-border shopping. The top priority is to connect the two modules of community and e-commerce to achieve perfect integration. Because it is a rather awkward problem to persuade users who browse the community to go to the "welfare store" to shop. After all, there is no obvious connection between the community and e-commerce, so the product must be able to guide users very well.

Therefore, in the future, Xiaohongshu’s main focus will be on how to perfectly combine community and e-commerce, and achieving seamless transition is the strategic goal of achieving the product.

So new features added in version v3.4:

1. Filter notes and products by category, brand, and purpose to achieve a perfect integration of community notes and "welfare club" products.
2. The category list, brand list and purpose list are placed on the search homepage.
3. A one-click note publishing function has been added to the tag details page to meet the needs of publishing ideas in a timely manner and optimize the user experience.
4. The items on the message page are clearer, and Captain Potato’s thoughtful reminders are no longer given, which increases user stickiness.

The addition of these functions will promote the integration between product communities and e-commerce, step by step.

Product status (UI)

The main experience version is Xiaohongshu v4.10, and the experience tool is iPhone6 ​​iOS 8 version 9.3.5

The picture shows a screenshot of version v4.10

The UI color is mainly red, which is suitable for the new generation of young women and echoes the little "red" book. The overall interface is clean and concise, and the key design points are cute, fresh and flat.

Xiaohongshu tab homepage:

1. Search (the search is more intelligent, and you can search for notes, products, and users with one click) is what you see is what you get, guiding users to search for better things.
2. The camera in the upper right corner is for posting notes (adding content to the community) and sharing your notes to let the world know that you are a person who knows how to live better.
3. Since Xiaohongshu focuses on community sharing, the first screen is naturally the user's UGC original content. It adopts a two-column design, and there is no specified size for cutting pictures. This mode is a community "show self" mode, allowing users to enter immersive reading ( Kuaishou 's homepage design also adopts this mode)
4. The diary displays a picture, the main title /content, the poster's avatar and username, and likes. (Community form)
5. The pictures you click to view the notes do not have a fixed size (sometimes large, sometimes small, eye-catching and interesting), the color of the collection and follow buttons is red to highlight their importance, and the text in the comment box is attractive, guiding you to participate in the comments and improve the community atmosphere.

Disadvantages: The community content is too much, messy and complicated! Today is an era of information explosion. I don’t pay attention to this type of content, and there is no button to cancel the recommendation of this type of diary. No more precise recommendation was made.

Tab2 found:

1. The banner below the search box did not attract me to click. It was just a simple picture with text. What? They also put useless information like the Little Red Book icon (well, it’s your turf, you decide)

2. The following hot topics, quality of life, etc. are displayed in a flat information format. Only one-fourth of the fourth picture is shown, which is actually to guide you to swipe left to see more content and display more information on the limited mobile phone screen.

Tab3 Purchase

1. The shopping homepage should still place a limited-time sale product. This design has been around since version v2.0 and has achieved a good purchase conversion rate . Good design should be maintained.
2. The style of the product classification is fresh and visually clean, and the icons are linear, highlighting the beauty of women, which is a plus for female users.
3. The pictures under the banner in the fashion column are a bit messy. The first two are cut-out versions, the third is a corner board, and the fourth is a cut-out version again... You are going to drive people with obsessive-compulsive disorder to death!
4. Click on the product to enter, and a reminder of recent order users will pop up in the upper left corner of the picture to restore authenticity. A jumping red "Add to Cart" button will also stimulate users to buy. The difference between this and the UI design of e-commerce platforms such as Taobao and Tmall is that there is no direct purchase button. I think this may be because Xiaohongshu is a community shopping scene, and users generally browse content, then add items to the shopping cart, and finally "buy" them.

Tab5 I

1. Xiaohongshu’s main model is the community model. The essence of the community is for users to express themselves. However, the background image in the “I” homepage is fixed and cannot be changed. Moreover, the background image is filled with “I” behavior data. These are not in line with the characteristics of the community. Xiaohongshu should optimize them in the future.

2. Xiaohongshu started with user UGC original content, which of course includes the notes I published and some content shared by others that I collected, so under my personal profile are notes + albums. It is "my notes + other people's notes" that supports the Xiaohongshu community. Xiaohongshu encourages users to post notes, so the "Post Notes" entrance is particularly prominent (I see, you just want me to post notes too!!!)

3. Click on Post Note and select the photo, and I was shocked by what I saw. The design of Xiaohongshu is very thoughtful. It reminds me of Meitu XiuXiu's powerful filter function, which can basically satisfy users who love beauty. I will not analyze the success of Meitu XiuXiu here, it is simply a hit on the users' appetite. The text of the filter uses the names of some famous tourist areas, which are very beautiful and full of temperament. These are the characteristics of people who love beauty and know how to live. You must know that "beauty is the primary productive force", and "beauty" reflects Maslow's five levels of needs (psychological, respect, safety, community, self-realization). This is a rigid need!

Product situation (interaction design)

1. The success of Xiaohongshu is nothing more than a comprehensive and in-depth understanding of this core user group of women born after 1985 and 1990. The degree of understanding of core users directly affects the development of products. Therefore, the first step in interaction is to study the user group and find the first batch of seed users to identify their pain points and needs.

2. Use tab navigation. I will not analyze the advantages of tab navigation. Xiaohongshu is a community-based content immersive product, and this type of navigation is most suitable. It is easy to jump back and forth between tabs, and it helps to integrate the levels between the community and e-commerce.

3. After the waterfall information appears on the purchase page, a top button appears and when you click it, you can return to the top. The icon interferes with the content.

4. The labels added to the pictures in the notes have flashing circle animations that attract people's attention and make them want to click on them, thus guiding users to click and achieve conversions. When I click on interactive buttons such as favorites, a prompt will pop up at the bottom. What you see is what you get, and I get quick feedback on my actions.

5. The login page is designed with three login methods: third-party login, mobile phone number login and registered account login. 1. Xiaohongshu has optimized WeChat, QQ, and Weibo for quick login, and the level is relatively shallow. After logging in, there is a subscription guidance page, which is mainly used to collect user data and provide accurate recommendations for users. 2. Log in with mobile phone number. The next step will be displayed only after the 11-digit mobile phone number is entered, which improves user awareness. 3. Logging in with a password is more hidden. In my opinion, it is mainly because Xiaohongshu encourages users to log in with the first two methods, so as to better collect various data of users and better recommend content to users.

The picture shows the login page

6. The categories in each navigation can be switched by clicking or sliding left and right, and the interaction methods are simple and diverse. However, the “Collapse” icon of the category is too small. According to Fitts’ Law, the smaller the icon, the greater the cost (effort) of clicking it.

2. Product Operation

We have analyzed products, UI, and interactions before. Now we will analyze operations to see where operations are focusing their efforts. I understand this stage as products serving operations, and operations leading product strategies. This stage is mainly about how to increase profits and how to sell things.

Based on the information I have read on Xiaohongshu’s official Weibo account for several days, I have concluded that the reason for the sudden increase in the number of users during this period is that on June 6, 2015, Xiaohongshu created a successful marketing campaign (Xiaohongshu used young handsome men to deliver goods to your door if you placed an order between June 1 and 5). On the first day of Xiaohongshu’s anniversary celebration, photos of muscular men delivering goods to your door were circulated among girls’ friends , and the girls’ hearts were filled with excitement. Coupled with the media’s promotion, Xiaohongshu’s exposure rate increased significantly, allowing more people to know about Xiaohongshu! ! (I also want to see muscular men, so I’m going to download Xiaohongshu to shop and place an order right away).

This marketing campaign was undoubtedly the most successful, bringing huge dissemination and influence in the industry. According to the official Weibo account that posted multiple apologies on the same day, the server crashed and orders could not be placed due to the excessive number of users on the day of the event! (You guys are not shopping, you are robbing a bank!!)

The picture shows Xiaohongshu explaining that the server crashed due to too many users

After the previous marketing activities, Xiaohongshu re-launched its brand slogan "Find good things from all over the world" as it entered its third year. The brand hopes to convey inspiration and satisfaction to everyone who lives life with heart, and to inspire and help consumers to start their endless imagination of a better life. So they invited Hu Ge as the celebrity spokesperson and recorded a video advertisement about Hu Ge's disappearance for three days and three nights to spread the message.

The picture shows Hu Ge's first Weibo post as the spokesperson

In order to expand its brand, Xiaohongshu invited Hu Ge to be its spokesperson. Let’s not talk about what effect it will bring first, let’s take a look at why Hu Ge was chosen as the image spokesperson for Xiaohongshu?

Thanks to "The Disguiser" and "Nirvana in Fire" in 2015, the 30-year-old Hu Ge successfully distanced himself from a group of young actors, and also became a "hot item" that various brands were vying for endorsements. In the commercial, Hu Ge transforms into an "ordinary user" of Xiaohongshu, presenting the real scenes and the real Hu Ge to the users. Fans really have no defense against the real life side of their idols.

You need to know the qualities that Hu Ge possesses: 1. Inspiring 2. Quality and style 3. Interesting and fun 4. Real. These characteristics of Hu Ge are exactly the brand slogan that Xiaohongshu wants to spread, and most of Hu Ge’s fans are girls born after 1985 and 1990 (which is exactly the core user group of Xiaohongshu), and they are full of girlish hearts! ah! ! ah! ! ! (Look at my nonsense, I am suffocating~)

The picture shows a screenshot of Weibo comments

With Hu Ge as the spokesperson for this operation, users are more certain that Xiaohongshu has become a lifestyle for them and believe that they are also people who know how to live. The Xiaohongshu brand has also become more popular, pushing the development and operation of Xiaohongshu to a new level.

Although Xiaohongshu has accumulated a large number of users, it has the advantages of user base and user stickiness, high user retention and long retention time. However, from the order conversion rate, we can see that the attributes of the community are always stronger than the characteristics of e-commerce, and people's awareness of purchasing on Xiaohongshu has not been well guided. Therefore, the next operation will focus on exploring the shopping needs of core users.

The picture shows the daily activity of Xiaohongshu

The picture shows the monthly active users of Xiaohongshu

3. Stage Overview

This stage is characterized by a revenue-driven product strategy and user activity as an operational goal.

It is the dual growth stage of community and e-commerce models. Xiaohongshu continues to optimize the user experience in terms of products. After the "Welfare Society" has identified a large market, it continues to expand its efforts, and the functions of its products are constantly increasing and being optimized. In terms of operations, the types and categories of goods are also increasing to meet the needs of users. The UI and interactions are also constantly optimized to enhance the user experience, allowing Xiaohongshu to display its beautiful side in terms of image and temperament, and to spread its good reputation.

According to historical data, several promotional activities that played a crucial role in the development of Xiaohongshu are reviewed:

• On June 6, 2015, Xiaohongshu's marketing event, which used the home delivery of fresh meat, became popular in the circle of friends. With the help of the media, Xiaohongshu was known to more users in an instant. In terms of revenue, on the first day of Xiaohongshu’s anniversary event, sales within 24 hours exceeded the sales for the entire month of May and continued to rise.
• On September 24, 2015, Premier Li Keqiang visited Xiaohongshu’s Henan Bonded Logistics Center and affirmed Xiaohongshu’s achievements. He said, “Today’s achievements are 30% due to innovation and 70% due to hard work.” This was another wave that pushed Xiaohongshu to a climax. Even the Premier gave Xiaohongshu such a high evaluation. What reason do I have not to believe in Xiaohongshu?
• On April 8, 2016, Hu Ge was invited to be the celebrity spokesperson. At that time, Hu Ge was very popular all over the country, and his fans just reflected the core user group of Xiaohongshu, which was full of girlish hearts! (Who do I love? I can’t tell the difference between Xiaohongshu and Hu Ge!!!)

Xiaohongshu focuses more on the conversion rate of content and the activity of users, and gradually builds itself into a brand that means "discovering good things from all over the world" and becomes popular among the people.

Summarize

1. Iteration summary

Looking at the entire process of Xiaohongshu's product iteration, from the initial overseas shopping guide, to exploring the needs of community sharing, and then to the later entry of e-commerce to explore more possibilities, Xiaohongshu has always been exploring and polishing products around a new lifestyle of community sharing. After finding the first batch of seed users, products and operations went all out to achieve today's results.

If we consider why Xiaohongshu is successful without considering the intrinsic factors of the product, I would rather believe that Xiaohongshu has hit the huge market of travel shopping. As living standards improve, people's lifestyles also change. People like to pursue a high quality of life and like to travel everywhere, not just live for the sake of living! Also, grasp the charm of the community. People tend to like to join in the fun, and where there are many people, there is business.

2. More Possibilities

The development of Xiaohongshu to date is based on a comprehensive and in-depth understanding of its core user group, namely women born after 1985 and 1990. The degree of understanding of core users directly affects the development of the product. Now that we have both user volume and activity, the product strategy is mainly to solve the problem of e-commerce monetization and achieve greater profits, so the product strategy at this time should be:

• Insights into the consumption patterns of Xiaohongshu’s core target group can help incubate more consumption characteristics targeting this group of people, while also being of great appeal to merchants.
• Optimize the supply chain, enhance channel capabilities, and provide more possibilities for sending and receiving goods from the user's perspective.
• Make the push notifications more in line with user psychology, and stimulate users' desire to buy quickly, accurately and strongly.
• Continue to maintain the high quality of community content and create an active, healthy and harmonious community environment.
• Maintaining a good reputation, Xiaohongshu is a lifestyle that leads users to discover good things around the world.

Finally, I would like to end with the Prime Minister’s words: “Today’s achievements are 30% due to innovation and 70% due to hard work”. Why shouldn’t Xiaohongshu be successful?

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