Analysis of Xianyu's competitive products

The demand for second-hand goods market is growing, and second-hand e-commerce platforms meet our daily needs. The author takes Xianyu as an example to analyze the differences between its competitor Zhuanzhuan and Xianyu, and puts forward some targeted optimization suggestions.

1. Analysis background and competitive product selection

1. Purpose of Competitive Product Analysis

Investigate the core functions and current status of similar second-hand e-commerce products, analyze the highlights and shortcomings of the products in terms of content, interaction, and function, and propose competitive strategies and plans based on this, serve as a reference for product iteration, and increase product market share.

2. Market trends and industry status

From the perspective of the economic foundation of residents' consumption, my country's current stage of economic foundation, capacity and habits of residents' consumption is a period of rapid growth in total retail sales of consumer goods, accelerated frequency of commodity updates and rapid growth in people's consumption capacity.

The wealth owned by the people has gone from scarce to sufficient, but is still far from excessive. However, judging from consumption capacity and habits, my country is accelerating into an aging society, family economic pressure is increasing, and residents' behavior is returning to rationality.

Moreover, due to the developed economy and consumption culture in first- and second-tier cities, the concept of shared consumption and awareness of resource recycling have become popular. Therefore, the domestic second-hand market as a whole is still in the stage of cultivation and initial growth.

However, the scale of active users in the second-hand e-commerce industry and its penetration rate in mobile shopping have grown rapidly in the past two years. Users' recognition of online second-hand transactions has gradually increased, and online second-hand transactions are becoming an important driving force for the second-hand market.

From electronic products in the beginning to all categories today, the second-hand economy has continued to develop in recent years. With the continuous maturity of the logistics system, second-hand products have been well circulated through e-commerce platforms. Even when the offline business system has been hit hard by the epidemic, second-hand e-commerce has maintained a rapid development trend, spawning a large number of second-hand e-commerce platforms. Not only have many giants been born, but they are also now seeking to go public.

According to the latest news, Aihuishou plans to launch its initial public offering in the United States in early June this year, with a fundraising scale of US$500 million to US$1 billion. However, in terms of user scale, Xianyu and Zhuan Zhuan are still the absolute leaders in the industry.

3. Competitive product selection

Competitive product selection: Zhuanzhuan

Reason: Xianyu is a comprehensive second-hand e-commerce platform covering all categories. In the second-hand e-commerce industry, the only products with tens of millions of monthly active users are Xianyu and 58.com's Zhuan Zhuan, which has a huge gap with other products, forming a duopoly.

The business overlap between Zhuan Zhuan and Xianyu is extremely high, and with the support of Tencent, they also have unique resources.

4. APP version

Xianyu v6.9.80

Zhuanzhuan v8.16.1

5. Baidu Index Comparison

From the search index overview of the past 30 days:

Xianyu’s overall search index is about 3.5 times that of Zhuan Zhuan, and its mobile search index is about 3 times that of Zhuan Zhuan.

In terms of year-on-year and month-on-month trends, Xianyu's overall year-on-year decline was slight and month-on-month growth was high, while Zhuan Zhuan's year-on-year growth trend was obvious.

6. KuChuan iOS ranking comparison

Comparison of KuChuan iOS rankings in the past 30 days:

Xianyu has a clear advantage over Zhuan Zhuan in the overall ranking and is also better than Zhuan Zhuan in the shopping category, second only to Pinduoduo, Taobao, and JD.com; Zhuan Zhuan is also second only to Taote, Diantao, and Alibaba.

As a result of the market trend, second-hand transactions are closely related to comprehensive e-commerce, with users sharing, mutual circulation, and common product categories, forming a competitive ecology. The rankings of Xianyu and Zhuan Zhuan are very close, and the competition between the two products is also intensifying.

2. Strategic analysis - product requirements and user portraits

1. Product positioning

in conclusion:

Xianyu is a second-hand trading community with a wide range of products and a large number of users.
Zhuan Zhuan is a professional second-hand trading platform, especially for second-hand electronics, with its own exclusive professional team and evaluation criteria.

2. User Profile

(1) Physiological characteristics

In terms of user portrait, the age and income of users of Xianyu and Zhuanzhuan are roughly similar; the main users are white-collar workers born after 1990 (44%). The users are getting younger, and those born after 1990 have become the main consumers in the second-hand market. The purpose of young people trading idle items is to experience them. Sharing, renting and sharing idle items has become a daily consumption habit and lifestyle.

In terms of gender distribution, the proportion of males in both is greater than that of females, but the proportion of males in Zhuan Zhuan is higher than that in Xianyu. This is because Zhuan Zhuan mainly sells second-hand mobile phones, second-hand home appliances, etc., and men replace electronic products more frequently, so the proportion of males is higher. The majority of users are men, and the proportion of men among Zhuan Zhuan users is particularly high.

(2) Social characteristics

In terms of geographical distribution, both are concentrated in economically developed regions such as Guangdong, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shanghai, especially Guangdong Province, where the market share is relatively high. These regions have a widespread Internet presence and are more receptive to emerging concepts such as the sharing economy, and are more able to understand and accept second-hand goods transactions.

(3) User needs

From the perspective of a second-hand goods trading platform, a demand analysis was conducted on the two main user groups, individual buyers and individual sellers. The main user demands of Xianyu and Zhuan Zhuan are basically overlapping, and both buyers and sellers need a fast trading platform that can guarantee funds and ensure that product prices are consistent with actual conditions.

(4) User portrait

3. Scope layer analysis - core product strategy

1. Functional structure analysis

The above is the business function structure of Xianyu and Zhuanzhuan summarized by the author. By comparison, we can conclude that:

There is a high degree of business overlap.

Xianyu and Zhuan Zhuan are both platforms for second-hand transactions, and their core businesses are transactions of all categories of second-hand goods. While the core business is developing steadily, the two major platforms have been constantly making up for their shortcomings and expanding their business scope, ultimately resulting in a high degree of business overlap.

There are differences in the business attributes of local communities.

Xianyu attaches great importance to the community. It has been planning the community since its very beginning and has been optimizing and iterating it. Currently, it has replaced the previous fish pond model with interest circles and has developed well and stably. Zhuan Zhuan’s community business started late and is less important than other business segments. It is currently mainly composed of local shopping, old clothes recycling and nearby/same-city second-hand shopping, and its functions are relatively simple and weak.

2. Comparison of operating models

3. Comparison of profit models

4. Analysis of structural layer and framework layer

1. Navigation and Architecture

Taking the homepage as an example, analysis and comparison show that the homepages of both apps provide a top search bar, banner image carousel (the banner was cancelled after the summer event of the latest version of Xianyu), icon navigation bar, and bottom menu bar, and the page layout style is similar.

Xianyu places Xianyu Premium Products in the head navigation, which shows that it regards the Xianyu Premium Products business as one of its main businesses that it focuses on developing.

The second navigation bar is for the featured businesses such as worry-free selling, Xianyu premium trendy brands and Xianyu live streaming function; the second row is for the popular C2C product category navigation; the third part is the homepage recommended C2C product module. The hierarchy is clear and well-defined.

Zhuan Zhuan places the main self-operated business categories in the head navigation, using the Metro style to fill in the functional points. Next is the separate Zhuan Zhuan worry-free selling business, which automatically identifies the machine model and estimated selling price to promote transaction desire.

The third navigation bar includes modules nearby the city, identification and valuation, idle items of internet celebrities and other special businesses; the next is the 618 event banner, and the last fifth part is the main product browsing area. The default page on the homepage is Zhuan Zhuan’s carefully selected 3C digital product recommendations.

The bottom menu bars of the two are similar, and both can let users know the most frequently used and important functions and information at the first time, while supporting users to quickly switch between different modules.

Both apps place four functional points and a central product release function in the bottom menu bar. Xianyu highlights and separates the release function by filling in a colored LOGO without any text logo, while Zhuanzhuan emphasizes and highlights the release function by enlarging, filling in colors and using a banner text logo. In this way, the other four functional points are in a parallel relationship, which conforms to the four best rules of human memory.

In addition, from the settings of the main and secondary pages on the homepage, it can also be seen that Xianyu highlights its social attributes. In addition to highlighting the self-operated business in the front navigation bar of the homepage, the "Follow" and "Same City" functions are set up on the secondary page of the homepage to guide users to pay attention to and participate in the social module and enhance user stickiness.

In the follow page, the "Frequently Visited" setting at the top of the page recommends new users to follow, and the topic content can be swiped to browse the updates of the people you follow.

On the same-city page, the first navigation bar adopts the Metro style and is filled with the same-city business function points. Below it is a striking wide banner setting up the same-city door-to-door packaging and recycling business, and finally there is the same-city product classification browsing area. It can be seen that Xianyu has a wide variety of market segments, comprehensive business, and a business development strategy that emphasizes social and local modules.

The homepage of Zhuan Zhuan is relatively simple, with a single page with a King Kong zone, and the main product browsing area at the bottom is subdivided into three sections: Zhuan Zhuan's strictly selected (3C digital products mainly for mobile phones) product recommendations, C2C free market product recommendations, and order sharing area. This is in line with Zhuan Zhuan's overall positioning, which is to take electronic products as the main focus, build a professional second-hand trading platform, and promote transactions through multiple channels and dimensions.

2. Interaction and experience

As a second-hand idle items trading platform, the core is the transaction and the items on the platform, so the interactive experience is analyzed from the perspective of the transaction process and platform content.

It can be seen that the common core of Xianyu and Zhuan Zhuan is the transaction of second-hand idle items, and the key processes are almost the same.

The biggest difference is that the core of Xianyu is to incubate social interaction, and the community model is to establish fish ponds based on geographical location and interests. That is, after attracting users through entertaining content, it continues to guide them into specific small community "fish ponds" to help consumers find users with similar interests, thereby building a relatively stable community and meeting the social needs of like-minded consumers.

Moreover, by leveraging the sense of identity of the same cultural circle based on social interaction, Xianyu can further increase user stickiness, improve user retention, and expand the scope and depth of the sharing economy.

Zhuan Zhuan is a platform that emphasizes professionalism, strengthens its self-operated system, and launches guaranteed transactions. It also provides 58 express service, platform-owned and professional machine inspection services, which effectively address the pain point of users' lack of security regarding second-hand items.

5. Presentation Layer Analysis - Visual Design

1. Theme color

Xianyu’s theme color is yellow, and the main interface is divided into yellow and white to make the navigation part more prominent. Yellow filling and highlighting are also used for important elements of the interface, such as picture marketing and banner bars. The contrast effect is obvious and the visual effect of the interface is relatively consistent.

Zhuanzhuan’s theme color is red, but the main interface only uses red to fill important elements such as the logo and bottom navigation bar icons. The overall interface looks rather messy against the white background because the function icons have different colors and the banner bar does not highlight the red theme.

2. Functional interface effects

Based on the following screenshots of functions, Xianyu uses the theme color yellow to fill key elements in each function, and displays other elements in white. The contrast effect is obvious, which gives users a consistent understanding and forms a clear and impactful visual capture.

However, Zhuanzhuan has almost no key logos and uses a consistent white background and black icons, which dilutes the theme color; the contrast effect is not obvious, making it difficult to grasp the key points, reducing the recognition rate.

Xianyu function page Zhuanzhuan function page

3. Functional path effect

Xianyu adopts the text box format as a whole, and is sorted from top to bottom according to the function priority, in the order of core function-activity function-setting function.

Functions of the same type are placed together to conform to users' common understanding. Relevant functional icons with theme colors are used to supplement the text, making the information form more diverse, with a consistent overall style and unified colors, giving a sense of simplicity and refinement.

Zhuanzhuan also prioritizes and categorizes functions, and displays the function categories in large color blocks to highlight the key points. The overall style is similar to Taobao; it conforms to user perception and is not too difficult to use. However, the colors are not uniform enough, and the colors of the icons in the lower part are not simple enough.

VI. Conclusion

Xianyu and Zhuan Zhuan have different development ideas, which is reflected in the differences in their core businesses. The overlapping point of the core business of Zhuan Zhuan and Xianyu is C2C idle transactions, which is also the business with the widest user base and the largest transaction volume. However, due to the uniqueness of second-hand transactions, there are problems such as non-standardization of goods and low trust between the two parties to the transaction. These problems will greatly affect the efficiency and cost of the transaction.

In response to existing problems, Xianyu focuses on C2C transactions, adopting a "light model" that uses the community to enhance the transaction experience and supplements its business with B2C direct sales and C2B2C platform inspection guarantees, but it may lack competitiveness in high-value categories.

Although Xianyu also has a C2B2C transaction business that provides quality inspection and focuses on high-quality "Xianyu Premium Products", its development strategy is still based on a community-led "light model". The non-standardization of second-hand goods makes Xianyu lack competitiveness in categories with higher quality requirements.

Zhuanzhuan regards the transaction model involving the platform as the core of its business. In the C2B2C model, by building our own quality inspection team and intervening as a platform, we provide quality inspection services to sellers and quality inspection reports and after-sales guarantees to buyers.

In the B2C self-operated model, unified procurement and quality inspection are implemented to improve the standardization of goods and use official credibility as endorsement. This "heavy model" that runs counter to Xianyu eliminates opacity in transactions, solves user pain points, attracts a large number of users in the 3C and book categories, and forms its own core competitiveness. However, this "heavy mode" will bring greater operating costs.

To sum up, Zhuan Zhuan and Xianyu each have their own advantages and disadvantages. Below, the author tries to make improvement suggestions for Xianyu.

1. Search module

The product search box has added the function of taking photos and scanning products, and introduced intelligent voice recognition function to improve the efficiency of buyers' search for target second-hand items.
For example, on Zhuanzhuan, add "view latest transaction price" in the product search results. Buyers can bargain based on the price they have in mind, which increases the transaction rate.

2. Chat Module

In the chat input interface, intelligent associative input is used to facilitate efficient communication between buyers and sellers.
In the chat input interface, add "product" to make it easier for the seller to express the product link in the store.
Chat messages have the function of being withdrawn within 2 minutes to protect the messages sent by both parties.
Support adding notes to contacts to facilitate subsequent identification and communication.
The message interface supports the chat content search function, which is convenient for quickly identifying relevant contacts based on keyword search.

3. Functional modules

In the product details, in addition to "I want", you should also add "Buy Now" to reduce direct purchase operations and improve user experience.
Adding a quick button for the message page on each function page allows you to jump directly to the message page, making it easy to reply to messages in a timely manner. This can shorten the path to a certain extent and increase the transaction rate and conversion rate.
Added a new favorites content management function, which supports clearing expired content with one click.

4. Operation Module

Xianyu’s membership rental business is not strong enough, so it can consider offering users free trials during the promotion period to provide users with real benefits, thereby achieving promotion effects and improving conversions.