Analysis report on competitive products of Dewu and Shihuo

This is my first attempt at writing a competitive product analysis report, so the analysis may not be that professional and comprehensive. I hope you will forgive me and give me some suggestions.

Purpose of analysis: To analyze the development status of Dewu and Shihuo as well as the advantages and disadvantages of their functional design, and put forward suggestions for improvement.

1. Product Information

• From the product information of Dewu and Shihuo, we can see that Dewu pays more attention to the development of community content than Shihuo. Its products are mainly sneakers, and it emphasizes product authentication services. After delivery, the platform will first authenticate the products before giving them to users.
• Shihuo focuses on providing users with a cost-effective e-commerce shopping guide platform. Its main products are sneakers, but it has also added a module of life services. The product variety is more diverse, but it does not pay as much attention to community building as Dewu.

2. User Analysis

1. Geographical distribution

The user groups of the two products are roughly the same. The following is the geographical distribution of the user groups:

The users of Dewu and Shihuo are mainly distributed in the coastal areas and the relatively economically developed provinces in the east and south. The per capita income of this user group is relatively high, and they also have high requirements for product quality and authenticity. At the same time, the trendy culture in these provinces is more developed, and users are generally more accepting of trendy culture.

2. User age and gender distribution

(1) Get something

Users aged 30-39 and 20-29 account for the highest proportion, totaling more than 65%. Such age distribution corresponds to Dewu's product positioning - Dewu provides high-quality goods and professional identification processes, so additional fees will be incurred during the transaction process, and product prices are generally more expensive than other e-commerce platforms.

Compared with the user group under 19 years old, people aged 20-39 have more stable and higher income, and are therefore more able to accept the prices of Dewu products. The proportion of male users is about ten percentage points higher than that of female users because boys are more enthusiastic about sneaker culture and are more willing to spend money on trendy equipment than girls.

The gender ratio of Dewu is not as big as that of Shihuo. I personally think the reason is that the community content of Dewu is better developed, and there are quite a few articles posted by female users in the community, which plays a big role in the retention of female users.

(2) Know the goods

Users aged 20-39 also account for the highest proportion, but users under 19 years old account for a slightly higher proportion than Dewu. This is because the high cost-effectiveness brought by Shihuo's multi-channel selection is more favored by users under 19 years old. Most of this group of people are junior and senior high school students with low consumption levels. Shihuo solves their needs for cost-effectiveness.

There is a big gap in the proportion of male and female users of Shihuo, with male users almost twice as many as female users. It can be seen that Shihuo follows the footsteps of Hupu and focuses on the male market.

3. User characteristics

People who live in economically developed cities, are mostly between 20 and 30 years old, like fashion culture, and have a certain pursuit of fashion equipment such as shoes.

4. User needs

(1) Get something

• Authentication after purchasing products on other platforms or this platform
• A channel for purchasing authentic sneakers and other trendy equipment, with high requirements for product quality
• Sell ​​new or second-hand fashion gear
• Get to know more netizens who like trendy culture, browse various trendy product information, and publish posts related to trendy life

(2) Know the goods

• Authentication after purchasing products on other platforms or this platform
• Multiple channels for purchasing authentic sneakers and other trendy equipment, with more emphasis on the cost-effectiveness of the products
• Sell ​​second-hand fashion equipment; ④ There is also a demand for community interaction, but the demand is relatively small

3. Trend Analysis

In terms of ranking, Dewu has always been ranked first among sports apps, and Shihuo ranks third.

The number of downloads of Dewu has shown a slight downward trend in the past year, and the number of downloads of Shihuo has fluctuated slightly but has not changed much overall. The average download volume of Dewu is more than three times that of Shihuo.

In terms of search index, Dewu had a large increase in early 2021, and then maintained a slightly downward trend. The trend of knowing goods has been stable without any big ups and downs. The average search volume for Dewu is about five times that of Shihuo.

Overall, Dewu far exceeds Shihuo in terms of popularity, ranking, number of users, etc.

However, in terms of ratings, Dewu is slightly lower than Shihuo. From the comments in communities such as App Store, Zhihu, and Weibo, it can be seen that most users have a relatively poor evaluation of Dewu, and they recommend Shihuo more when buying shoes.

The main reasons are:

• Dewu's customer service is poor. Shihuo will guide users to e-commerce platforms such as Taobao. The customer service attitude of large platforms is generally better.
• In the user's perception, it is basically impossible to return products on Dewu. Even if they do, the return procedure is very complicated and users have to pay for postage and other expenses themselves. This is rarely the case on the e-commerce platforms recommended by Shihuo (in fact, some products on Dewu support seven-day unconditional returns, but users still have the impression that "returns are difficult")
• In June 2020, the China Consumers Association named the Douyin platform for counterfeiting and other issues. At the beginning of this year, the Shanghai Municipal Administration for Market Regulation pointed out that the Douyin platform’s sampling failure rate reached 50%, resulting in a decrease in users’ trust in it.
• The prices of products on Dewu are relatively high. Shihuo provides multiple purchasing channels, and users can choose the most cost-effective channel to purchase products.
• Because it has to be sent to the platform for identification first, the logistics is very slow, and the price of lightning direct delivery will be much more expensive. Most users are unwilling to bear this cost

It is possible that such negative reviews may be a deliberate smear campaign against Dewu by “trolls”, so I conducted a small interview with people around me who have experience in buying shoes on Dewu and Shihuo. Through the interviews, I can roughly divide them into three groups:

1. Dewu buyers: This group of people expressed their trust in Dewu’s authenticity authentication and believed that the e-commerce platforms recommended by Shihuo have a vested interest in Shihuo. They believe that they can get Shihuo’s certification if they give benefits to Shihuo. There is no conflict of interest between Dewu’s sellers (such as individual sellers) and Dewu officials, so they will not collude to deceive consumers.
2. Buyers who know the goods: Most buyers who prefer to use Dewu think that the logistics of Dewu is too slow, and that Dewu "sells both real and fake goods", and the return process is complicated or non-returnable. As for products from Shihuo, they believe that there is a certain chance of buying fakes, but Shihuo provides more purchasing channels, and they can choose more reliable merchants to buy from, with better after-sales service guarantees. The price is much cheaper than Dewu, and the logistics is also faster.
3. Buyers who are not biased towards either side: This group of buyers believes that the quality of products on Dewu and Shihuo are similar, and as for whether the products are genuine, it is enough to just identify them. Anyway, there are guarantees such as "three times the compensation if the products are fake." When purchasing, they may consider the price more and buy from the cheapest store.

In terms of numbers, users who choose to buy from Douyin still account for the majority. Combined with the interview content, it can be seen that a considerable number of users who discredit Douyin online may be intentional "water armies". In fact, whether it is Dewu or Shihuo, there will be the problem of selling real and fake ginseng. This phenomenon exists not only on these two platforms, but also on the entire e-commerce platform.

Due to the lack of relevant data, it is impossible to determine whether there are more counterfeits on Dewu or more Shihuo. In any case, Dewu and Shihuo should rectify merchants regarding counterfeits and product quality issues. The profit from selling counterfeits is indeed high, but this is only a short-term gain. If users are lost, long-term interests will be lost.

4. Business Model

1. Dewu’s business model

• Community traffic monetization
• During the transaction, the seller is charged a deposit (5% of the bid), a technical service fee of 5%, a transfer fee of 1%, an inspection fee of 8 yuan, an identification fee of 15 yuan and a packaging service fee of 10 yuan.
• Identification services and sneaker cleaning charges

Dewu’s main income comes from various fees charged to sellers during the transaction process. This is not a small amount, but ultimately these fees are borne by the buyers. Users who purchase goods on Dewu care more about whether the goods are authentic and trust Dewu’s authentication service, so they are willing to accept a higher price.

2. Know the business model

• Community traffic monetization
• Drain traffic to various e-commerce platforms and stores, and collect a certain share
• Identification service charges

Shihuo charges a lower commission than other e-commerce platforms, so the price will be lower than Dewu, meeting users' requirements for cost-effectiveness.

5. Product Architecture

1. Product structure diagram of Dewu

2. Product structure diagram

Based on the product architecture, it can be intuitively seen that compared with Shihuo, Dewu gives a higher weight to the authentication service, which is in line with Dewu’s product goal - focusing on authenticity and authentication. Compared with Dewu, Shihuo has one more module - life service, which recommends various discount recharges in life. It can be seen that Shihuo wants to do more than just sneaker-related business.

Personally, I speculate that Shihuo wants to be a one-stop platform that covers various services in users' lives and meets users' needs in different fields.

The launch of this module by Shihuo may affect the image of its brand in the minds of users. The slogan of Shihuo is "good products and good prices for sports trends", but the life module is not closely related to sports trends. The extra functions may make users feel that Shihuo is not so professional in "sneakers" and "trends".

On the contrary, Dewu has always focused on areas related to fashion culture, and appears to be more professional compared to Shihuo. So when users want to buy trendy equipment, they are more likely to think of Dewu rather than Shihuo first.

But Shihuo's attempt may not be a bad thing. Perhaps it is because in the fields of "trends" and "sneakers", Dewu's brand image has become difficult to shake in the industry, and it is very difficult for Shihuo to surpass Dewu in this regard. Therefore, it develops other functions to find a way out.

How to evaluate Shihuo’s life module depends on how Shihuo will operate the content of this module in the future. At present, it seems that most users do not pay too much attention to this module, and the substantial role of this function cannot be seen.

Dewu attaches much more importance to community than to identifying goods. Dewu's product positioning is a trendy online shopping community, with special emphasis on the community attribute. It can be seen from the page settings of the entire APP that the weight of the community module in the Dewu APP is very high, which is reflected in the following points:

• The community page is the homepage of Dewu and is the page that is directly displayed when the APP is opened, while the homepage of Shihuo is the purchase page. It can be seen that Dewu is more inclined to guide users to browse community content, while Shihuo is more inclined to guide users to shop.
• In the community, Dewu's "Publish" button is located in the upper right corner of the page. The button occupies a small space on the page and will not affect the user's browsing experience. Shihuo's publish button is suspended in the lower right corner of the page. The button layer is also above other content on the page, which is more conspicuous than Dewu's publish button.
• The publishing function of Dewu is very rich in content, with four options: "Live Broadcast", "Album", "Photography", and "Template". It provides various special effects and shooting templates to help users produce high-quality content. The publishing function of Shihuo is like that of an ordinary camera, without any special functions. Dewu’s rich publishing functions are designed to facilitate users to produce high-quality content and promote the development of UGC.
• Dewu divides the content of the community into "Follow" and "Recommendation", and gives the "Follow" content an exclusive column, allowing users to more conveniently browse the content they are most interested in. The community content of Shihuo is not divided into "Follow" and "Recommendation", only the push of various posts.
• On the "My" page, Shihuo only displays the number of followers and fans, in the same column as the user's avatar and name, while Dewu displays community-related data such as likes and favorites, fans, following, and number of updates in another row.
• On the "My" page, Dewu also sets up the "Creation Center" as a separate column, which displays some data of the published dynamics, fan portraits, and various recent popular activities to provide users with creative inspiration. The income from creation and the order-sharing function allow users to quickly publish content. Shihuo also has a creator center module, but the entrance is placed in the function center, which is not very conspicuous, and there is only an overview of popular weekly events. The functions are not as rich as those of Dewu. Dewu’s Creation Center provides users with dynamic relevant data to help them operate their own community accounts. Fan portraits let users know what kind of content their followers like, which is also to help users operate. Creative income encourages users to make money by posting updates, promotes the development of UGC, and is also a part of the revenue of Douyin.

Dewu is now committed to developing the community module in order to create a trendy cultural community, so that users of Dewu can find their favorite content in the community, and satisfy their social needs, respect needs and self-realization needs by publishing content, while also gaining income through the community and ultimately gaining a sense of belonging in Dewu. All of this is for user retention and to increase brand influence.

Shihuo does not put too much energy into developing community content because Shihuo is positioned as an e-commerce shopping guide platform, focusing on guiding users to shop and achieving user retention by giving users a good shopping experience. However, it cannot be ruled out that Shihuo will increase its efforts to develop community content in the future. After all, social networking and content-seeking can promote user consumption to a certain extent.

VI. Core Business Analysis

1. The process of purchasing sneakers

In the purchasing process, since Shihuo still requires jumping to other platforms to purchase, the steps are slightly more cumbersome than Dewu, but it also gives users more choices. The following is an analysis of the various pages in the purchase process of Dewu and Shihuo:

When searching for products based on keywords, Shihuo displays far more products on one page than Dewu. The products most relevant to the keywords only occupy one row on Shihuo's page, and you can slide to the right to see other sneakers of the same brand and similar in style to the target sneakers.

The entire page of Dewu is used to display the sneakers most relevant to the search term. The information box of each product is larger, and the number of collectors of each pair of sneakers is also displayed, allowing users to clearly understand the popularity of the sneakers.

Shihuo displays a large number of products on the search page, but too much information can make it difficult for users to choose. Dewu only displays information of 6 items on one page. Larger pictures and texts can give users a better browsing experience, and they will not be confused about where to start because of too much information.

In terms of providing product information to users, Dewu has the "Ask Everyone", "Size Feeling" and "Evaluation" columns, while Shihuo has the "Shihuo Discussion" for users to consult and discuss product-related information, and the number of discussions is far more than Dewu, providing users with more reference information.

Both Dewu and Shihuo have fashion collection columns. Dewu has a larger number of users and publishes more fashion collections than Shihuo. However, Shihuo integrates reviews from all over the Internet, and many users post photos of their outfits. The number of reviews is far more than that of Dewu’s fashion collection column, which can provide users with more references when purchasing.

In the outfit selection column, Dewu has a "Publish" button in the upper right corner, which allows you to jump directly to the shooting page.

Shihuo attracts and encourages users to post photos of their outfits by allowing them to “post their outfit notes to win cash”, but there is no direct posting button on the page. Users have to click “View All” before they can see the “Show Your Outfit” posting button on the outfit selection page. Shihuo can set the publish button in the outfit column of the product details page, so that users can publish their own outfit photos without having to enter to view all outfit selections, reducing the publishing steps and promoting users to publish content.

On the product details page, Dewu will display the users who recently purchased the sneakers, providing the size, price and purchase time, so that users can intuitively understand the price trend of the shoes and help users determine the best time to purchase.

• When users finish browsing the product information and are ready to place an order, Dewu’s “Buy Now” button is very conspicuous and uses a different color from other elements on the page. In fact, it is also guiding users to the next step of purchase.
• After clicking the buy button, you need to select the size. The corresponding price is marked under each size. After selecting the size, choose the shipping method. Different shipping methods correspond to different prices, and the approximate logistics time is also marked.
• After selecting the shipping method, you will come to the order confirmation page. On this page, after selecting the delivery address and confirming that the product information is correct, you can place the order. The total price (product plus shipping fee) and the "Submit Order" button are displayed at the bottom of the page. Similarly, the "Submit Order" button and the "Buy Now" button use a different green color from other elements on the page, which further guides users.
• The total price of the product on this page is the price of the product plus shipping costs, which is higher than the price when selecting size and logistics in the previous step. The reason why the total price is not displayed when selecting the shipping method may be to lower the user's psychological defenses when purchasing and try to guide the user to the next page.

The purchase process design of Dewu follows the principles of simplicity and speed. The amount of information on each page is controlled just right. Users only need to choose the size and delivery method for sneakers, and will not have difficulty making a decision due to too much information, which greatly facilitates users to complete the purchase process.

When users buy sneakers on Shihuo, they first select the size below the photo of the sneakers. The corresponding price is indicated below the size, allowing users to immediately understand the price of the selected size and the price difference between different sizes.

After clicking the "Buy Now" button, you will be redirected to the page for purchasing channel selection. This page provides users with purchasing channels on multiple platforms, with different prices and different ratings. Compared with the purchase page of Dewu, the amount of information is much larger. Users often consider: Will I buy fakes in low-priced stores, or will the workmanship of the sneakers be poor? With so many channels, how should I choose? Although this allows users to choose the most cost-effective purchasing plan that suits them, it also creates difficulties in choosing for some users.

Regarding the large amount of information on the purchase page, Shihuo has also made corresponding countermeasures.

• First, you can set the option to switch the size of the sneakers on the page, and the corresponding price will be attached when switching the size;
• Secondly, after clicking on the filter, you can filter suitable stores by multiple conditions, such as membership of a certain platform, delivery speed, return service and source of goods. After selecting the delivery address, the shipping fee can also be calculated for the user;
• Finally, there are two sorting methods to sort the channels - by shipping speed or price from low to high. For price sorting, we only set it from low to high, and do not set high to low or custom options. This is because most users who buy sneakers on Shihuo are looking for cost-effectiveness. Compared with high to low, the price sorting option from low to high will be the sorting option that most users will choose. Therefore, there is no need to provide users with other price sorting methods.

All in all, the purchasing process of Shihuo is much more complicated than that of Dewu, because Shihuo is an e-commerce shopping guide platform that provides users with more choices than Dewu, with more information and is more cost-effective. What Shihuo can do is to provide users with more help in screening, making it easier for users to make decisions.

2. The sales process of Dewu

The following is a detailed page of the sales process:

The entrance to the product for sale is located on the product details page, adjacent to the purchase button, and is easily noticed by users.

The entire sales process is very simple. You just need to select the delivery method and size, fill in the selling price and pay the deposit to complete the sales process (excluding the subsequent shipment of sneakers and after-sales service).

What may make it difficult for users to decide in this process is the selling price. Dewu provides users with the minimum selling price and the maximum purchase price. Sellers can refer to these two prices to set the selling price. After setting the selling price, the estimated maximum income will be immediately displayed below, and users can adjust the selling price based on actual income.

In response to users' different sales needs, Dewu also provides two sales modes: "immediate cash out" and "lightning direct delivery", which respectively solve the needs of users who are in a hurry to sell for cash and those who don't want sneakers to take up space or don't want to store and manage sneakers themselves.

3. Identification service process

The identification service processes of the two apps are roughly the same. Next, I will analyze the differences between the two apps in identification services from the perspective of the entry point of the identification service, the type of identification service, and comparison of the same type.

Both apps have designed multiple entrances to the authentication service. The authentication entrance of Dewu is located in the "Service" page in the bottom navigation and the personal center page. The design of the "Online Authentication" button in the "Service" page is the most prominent, allowing users to find the entrance to this function at first glance.

In the identification of goods, the entrance to the authentication service is not so obvious. There are two entrances on the homepage. The first is the entrance to the explanation page for product authenticity guarantee. There is an entrance to the identification service at the bottom of the page. The other is located in a navigation bar in the middle of the page. The third identification entrance is located in the function center of the "My" page. Click "Professional Identification" to enter the identification service page.

In this page, the "Online Identification" button uses a more prominent red color than the "Physical Identification" button, and the button is larger, which shows that users use "Online Identification" more.

Judging from the design of the entrance, the importance of identification service in Dewu is higher than that in Shihuo. Dewu has set up a bottom navigation bar specifically for identification, cleaning and care, and second-hand transactions, which is at the same level as the community and purchase. It can be seen that Dewu attaches great importance to identification services.

Although Shihuo has set up two entrances to the identification service on its homepage (strictly speaking, the first one mentioned above is not an entrance to the identification service), the button design is not prominent and users cannot quickly locate the location of the identification service.

The above are the types of identification available for Dewu and Shihuo.

Dewu has given the identification function social attributes and launched free identification. Users can post identifications to the discussion area and wait for identification by forum experts. For users who do not want to spend money on identification, the identification function in the discussion area is very practical and the identifications posted have a high response rate. Users can also express their opinions on product issues with other experts in the discussion area, get to know more professional appraisers, and meet their social needs.

The physical identification of Shihuo is something that Dewu does not have. Although this identification method is highly accurate, it is time-consuming and costly due to logistics reasons. Not many users use physical identification, so in the page design, Shihuo also gives more weight to online identification, weakening the proportion of physical identification in the user's field of vision.

Another special identification method of Shihuo is to find the store. Shihuo will give a score to the store based on the inspection of the store, the store service and other aspects, and give the results of the identification of the store's products, so that buyers can judge whether the store's products are reliable.

Shihuo launched this feature because Shihuo is an e-commerce shopping guide platform. Users need to choose the purchasing channels provided by Shihuo when purchasing. If they find it difficult to make a decision, they can make a judgment by searching for stores.

Dewu’s paid identification and Shihuo’s online identification are the same functional services, both of which require uploading photos of the physical object for appraisers to identify, but Dewu’s paid identification function is more complete than Shihuo’s.

Both apps provide guidance to novice users on the issue of photographing real objects, allowing users to quickly get started and publish identifications. The guidance process is roughly the same.

What Dewu does better than Shihuo is that Dewu provides a one-click function to post identification information to the discussion area. After posting to the discussion area, if the user's sneakers are authentic, they will gain recognition from more people, satisfying the user's social needs and respect needs. It also shows that Dewu attaches great importance to and efforts to develop the discussion area.

Secondly, Dewu also supports users to change appraisers, giving users more choices. However, the appraisal service of identifying goods is assigned by the system according to the number of people in the queue. Users cannot change it by themselves, which may affect the service experience.

4. Community Release Process

Dewu attaches great importance to the development of community UGC and has put a lot of effort into the process of users publishing content, and the publishing function is relatively complete.

The publish button of Dewu is located in the upper right corner of the community page. The camera icon vividly represents the entrance to the publishing function. However, the button is small and cannot be noticed by users at first glance. This design may be to give users a better browsing experience.

If users want to take photos or videos to post, Dewu will provide many special effects, photo-taking instructions and posting templates for users to refer to. Most of the photo-taking instructions are about posing with sneakers, and the templates are also up to date with the trends.

If users choose to upload photos or videos to post, Dewu provides multiple creation templates that can add special effects to videos and photos at the same time. Users can also add product tags to photos. After posting, clicking on the tag will jump directly to the product purchase page.

Finally, when posting, there is a “Secondly Become a Trendy Thing” button in the upper right corner of the page to provide users with posting guidelines, give suggestions on text content creation in the text box to guide users in writing, and use the slogan “Publish original content to get more respect” to encourage users to be original. Users can also attract traffic by associating topics and locations.

Regardless of the publishing method, Dewu provides users with sufficient help and guidance. Even users who publish content for the first time can easily create high-quality content, which further meets users' needs for respect and self-realization, and also forms a virtuous circle for the development of UGC.

The publishing function of Shihuo is relatively simpler than that of Dewu, and its functions are single. The publish button is located at the bottom right of the page and is quite conspicuous, but the shooting function has no special effects or templates, and there are only a few filters for users to choose from when publishing photos, which provides little assistance for users to produce high-quality photos.

On the publishing page, Shihuo also provides users with posting guidelines and excellent note examples. Users can also attract more traffic by associating topics, and can directly associate products and add jump tags to the product purchase page in the post.

The “labels” of Dewu make it difficult for users to immediately associate the functions of its related products, while the related product buttons of Shihuo are very direct and clear. It can be seen that the community function of Shihuo is more inclined to promote transactions.

Personally, I feel that the publishing function of Dewu is already quite complete, but there is still a lot of room for improvement in Shihuo, especially the shooting and picture editing functions. It needs to provide users with more special effects and templates. In this regard, we can learn from apps with better UGC development such as Dewu, Xiaohongshu, and Douyin.

Although Shihuo is positioned as an e-commerce shopping guide platform and may develop more deeply in the direction of e-commerce in the future, a good publishing experience can effectively promote the development of UGC, and social attributes can also improve user retention and bring more revenue. Therefore, Shihuo needs to improve community functions and strengthen the operation of this module.

VII. Conclusion

1. About Dewu

As the leader in the field of sneakers (trends), Dewu's position is difficult to shake by apps such as Shihuo and Nice, and it has considerable advantages in competition with its peers.

Dewu has a good ordering and shopping experience, professional authentication services, or free discussion forum authentication, plus its brand image in the fashion field, so people always associate Dewu with labels such as fashion, sneakers, and authentication. All of these have won Dewu a large number of users.

Developing good community content plays a vital role in user retention. Dewu attaches great importance to the development of community content. Whether it is the classification of content or creating a high-quality publishing experience for users, Dewu does much better than Shihuo. With the development of UGC, users' social needs, respect needs and self-realization needs are met, and the retention rate is improved. This also enables Dewu to retain female users, and not suffer from the serious polarization like Shihuo.

However, the future of Dewu is not all good. From its trend, we can see that the fluctuations in the number of users are still relatively large. In addition, the criticism from the Municipal Supervision Bureau and the China Consumers Association has had a certain impact on its reputation. A large number of remarks discrediting Dewu have also appeared on the Internet.

Because of the C2B2C business model, Dewu's logistics is slow and its product prices are high, which has caused it to lose some users. In addition, its customer service is poor, there are many problems with after-sales service, and its image among users that it is difficult to return or exchange products has not improved.

2. For those who know the goods

As an e-commerce shopping guide platform, Shihuo provides users with multiple purchasing channels and can check its certified stores, which gives users peace of mind while also ensuring a high cost-effectiveness.

Although its number of users is not as large as that of Dewu, its reputation in the industry is comparable to that of Dewu. In terms of user experience, when purchasing goods, due to its shopping guide nature, it provides users with too much product information, which increases the difficulty for users to make decisions.

Compared with Dewu, the authentication service of Shihuo also has certain disadvantages, such as the lack of free authentication methods. Dewu has a discussion area where users can get authentication without paying. Shihuo has problems with user retention. Most users only care about the price-performance ratio of Shihuo. If the price of a certain product on Dewu is not much different from that on Shihuo or is lower, more users may tend to choose Dewu.

The most important thing for Dewu now is to rebuild its image of representing authenticity and high quality in the minds of users. Only by strengthening the supervision of product quality can it attract more users. At the same time, it is also necessary to train customer service and improve their service quality.

In terms of community, Dewu needs to continue to develop its UGC content, which is the key to improving its user retention. The problems of slow logistics and high prices of Dewu are related to its C2B2C business model, so I can’t think of any better solutions for the time being.

What Shihuo needs to do is to attract more users and improve user retention rate. The life module launched by Shihuo may be its attempt to attract more new users. However, in order to transform its image in the minds of users from a "shoe shopping platform" to a "one-stop life platform", Shihuo must not act too hastily and needs to slowly establish a "practical" image of the life module in the minds of users.

In terms of attracting users and improving user retention rate, Dewu has many aspects that are worth learning from for today's knowledgeable people.

To identify the goods, you can refer to the identification mode of Dewu’s discussion area, which provides users with a free identification mode. As for its community function, it should first separate the content that users care about from the recommended content, improve the user's publishing experience, provide appropriate assistance for shooting techniques, and provide users with photo templates, etc., to encourage users to publish high-quality content.

In any case, for these two platforms, ensuring product quality is the most important thing. In addition, they must also do a good job in image promotion. Whoever can win the trust of users will be able to go further in the field of trendy e-commerce.

Author: Bezy

Source: Bezy