How to get users to buy through live streaming?

In just two years, Taobao Live has grown from zero to a scale of hundreds of billions. Live streaming has become a new channel for users and products to reach each other. "Anchors" act as a connection to push products to suitable users, achieving a new way of communication that is faster, more accurate, and more cost-effective for brand promotion.

If you usually watch live broadcasts, you must be familiar with the following two anchors:

After reading these words, I believe many girls can already imagine the scene of "Li Jiaqi" recommending products to you, right?

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It took Li Jiaqi two years to transform from an offline cosmetics salesperson to a live-streaming anchor with an annual income of over 100 million yuan. He has also become a shareholder of his original company, MeiOne, and has the idea of ​​providing better products to users and discovering more domestic brands to offer to users.

In 2016, Wei Ya became associated with Taobao Live and officially became a host of Taobao Live in May of that year. Four months later, the transaction volume she guided reached 100 million yuan. After that, Wei Ya began to engage in public welfare live broadcasts, helping e-commerce companies to get rid of poverty, and cumulatively boosted the sales of agricultural products in poverty-stricken areas by nearly 30 million.

Wei Ya not only helps brand sellers promote products, but also helps users find good products and helps poor areas get out of poverty. She is a responsible anchor who is willing to make her own contribution to the society. In Wei Ya's heart, recommending global good products to fans is her greatest responsibility.

1. Reasons for the popularity of live streaming

When shopping offline, many people will see saleswomen in supermarkets. Sometimes they will put up promotions such as free tasting, buy one get one free, or limited-time offers in front of a certain product, and play these promotional recordings continuously through the loudspeakers.

When some people watch, experience, and rush to buy, more and more people will join in, and unknowingly, they become "impulsive consumers" because of their greed for small profits.

The e-commerce shopping that was popular more than a decade ago was an upgraded version of this model; today's live streaming sales is actually an upgraded version of the e-commerce shopping model.

With the development of the times, e-commerce has become the main channel for people to purchase goods, and short videos have become people’s main entertainment channel. The combination of the two has formed a new way of consumption. Live streaming is an upgraded version of e-commerce shopping. In essence, it is a model that directly faces "users" by introducing products to users through "promoters".

Taobao e-commerce has developed very rapidly this year. The person in charge of Taobao Live once said that live streaming e-commerce is the transformation of consumers' conversations from "dialogues between products and people" to "dialogues between people" when they browse Taobao.

Why does conversation between people bring such great development to the e-commerce industry?

In The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind, it says:

This passage actually talks about how once a person (individual) enters a group, he or she will be influenced by the group and do things that he or she would not do as an individual.

When live streaming sells goods, isn’t it also a way to allow users to integrate from individuals into a group?

The anchor integrates new users into such a field and forms a group through interactions, benefits, discounts and past fans’ swiping of the comment section.

In this group, the anchor is the only key opinion leader who, through introductions and interactions, weakens the user's impression of other similar competing products of the introduced product, and uses the group atmosphere to induce users to buy, thus causing users to form "impulsive consumption."

For many "users", shopping while watching live broadcasts, in addition to the psychological reactions produced when watching, such as "immediacy, impulsiveness, and short decision-making time", is actually "trust, liking, and support" for the anchor, and they have a strong sense of identification with the anchor.

When the number of users reaches a certain scale, a kind of "collective identity" will be formed, and some users will gradually become the "core group" (fans), who will publicize and promote their favorite anchors, and give positive reviews of their works to expand the anchors' fame and reputation. This also makes the anchors' appeal extremely high. For many brand merchants, the advantages and value of live streaming are reflected in this.

Compared with traditional e-commerce, live streaming sales are more in line with people's needs for "emotional consumption". The emotional relationship between people adds a layer of warmth and expectation between cold commodities. This is also an important reason why users will buy in live broadcast rooms and why e-commerce sales are so popular.

2. What roles are involved in live streaming?

1. Supply side

Generally, they are brands, factories, live broadcast platforms, live broadcast organizations, and content platforms (Kuaishou, Douyin, Xiaohongshu, etc.).

In live streaming e-commerce, the brand is the party that provides money and products to the anchor, and the platform helps the anchor connect with users.

The reason why brands choose live streaming to sell goods is actually because the current promotion costs are high and the effect after promotion is not good. E-commerce selling goods is a product that users can buy and use. This helps brands to help new products acquire the first wave of users. At the same time, with the help of the experience of this wave of users, more users can learn about the product and form a group of loyal users.

Secondly, brands can raise the store's rating through live streaming, using the loss of some products in exchange for raising the store's overall rating. Not only can they hire anchors, but Taobao platform now also supports store self-broadcasting (store owners sell goods themselves). Although the effect is not as good as hiring anchors, the effect is also good.

2. Linking party: anchor

In live streaming e-commerce, the anchor acts as a bridge between a brand and users. By leveraging users’ trust in him/her and the number of users, the anchor can bargain with the brand for lower discounts, so that users can purchase high-quality goods at lower prices.

3. Demand side: users

By watching the host's videos and reading his articles, you can get to know what kind of person the host is, and decide that he is interesting. When you are bored, you can watch his live broadcasts. While watching the live broadcasts, you can buy products based on the host's introduction and your own needs.

These roles constitute the industry chain of live streaming e-commerce. In this industry chain, the anchor serves as a new link channel. Compared with the original e-commerce platform link channel, this channel has a lower shopping purpose for users and is more like entertainment.

For many users, watching live streaming sales is actually a process of exploration: because I may not know the brand before buying, or I don’t know that the brand has launched a new product. Originally, I might not buy this type of thing - because I may not know whether it is good or not. Under the host’s introduction and super low discount, I placed an order and then used it.

Since the anchor has a good product selection process, the quality of the product will be good. Users who use the product and think the product is effective will remember the brand and the anchor, and even share it with their friends to watch together. The brand will have a group of users who have used the product, and this group of users may conduct "secondary dissemination" (write reviews on Xiaohongshu and introduce it to friends).

This is a great promotional tool for a new product and has a very good effect. The anchor will gain new users’ views here and have the opportunity to convert them into “fans” and purchasing users, thus forming a virtuous industrial chain.

3. How to sell goods through live streaming

1. Get users

Expand the user base through short videos, articles, sweepstakes, user-initiated promotions, etc., find the characteristics of the target user group, target their characteristics and their own uniqueness, and then produce content that attracts users for different platforms based on the tone of the platform (Xiaohongshu, Kuaishou, Douyin, Weibo, etc.), and then import it to the live broadcast platform for conversion.

Users are very important to anchors. Only a large number of users can convert them into "fans" and make them buy goods. The more users there are, the more reliable the anchor is to them. This involves a herd mentality (there must be no problem if so many people watch and buy).

Of course, this will also turn live streaming into an oligopolistic business (the more popular the anchor, the more people will watch and the higher the sales volume. The more viewers and the higher the sales volume, the lower the price can be negotiated with brands, giving users lower discounts. Brands have also seen the effects that popular anchors can bring, so they are willing to give profits to the anchors. Anchors with few viewers will not have that many people watching them, so they cannot sell at the same sales volume as big anchors, and they cannot attract more users). Therefore, it is very important to acquire users and make them interested in watching.

2. Choose the right products

If a live streaming business wants to sustain for a long time, the first thing to do is to consider the users. From the user's perspective, where to buy the product is not the most important thing. The most important thing is that the product can solve the problems he encounters and address the needs he has in a certain scenario.

If the product's packaging, usage effects, etc. give users an experience beyond their expectations, or even spiritual satisfaction, then the user will remember the product and will also remember you as the person who recommended the product to him.

Product selection is to verify the effects of certain products from various brands after experiencing them, and then judge the effects and quality of this product based on your own experience and industry data, and then find the right product to discuss cooperation with the brand (bargaining, quantification). Only by constantly finding high-quality products and making users feel that your products are of good quality and the price is lower than the market price, will they continue to pay attention to and support you.

3. Build trust

In live streaming, the anchor acts as a bridge between the brand and the user. If the user does not trust the anchor’s reliability, they will not dare to buy even if the price is very favorable. The anchor must bargain with the brand on the spot during the live broadcast (if the anchor is a big one, he can directly negotiate with the brand based on the cost price (product production price + postage + deduction point));

There are also live broadcasts and videos on tracing the origin (visiting the brand’s factory and counter to see how their products are made, what the production process is like, what the offline selling price is, and letting users experience the product);

Another way is to introduce products together with the celebrities who endorse them, as well as the co-branded products between you and the brand. Through these methods, you can build trust with users and let users know what you do behind the live broadcast and how a product is produced.

4. Create a live broadcast atmosphere

Users need to feel the host's enthusiasm and shopping atmosphere when watching live broadcasts. The host needs to maintain enthusiasm during the live broadcast. When introducing a product, it is not enough to just read out the product's functions, effects, and applicable groups, but it is also necessary to repeat it constantly, using exaggerated tones, rhetoric, and a loud and clear voice to convey the product's value.

And give a reasonable reason for the price reduction, and finally use the order reminder mechanism (only XX orders are left, buy now and get XX for free, we have never sold at this price, 10.9.8...3.2.1, if you don’t buy it, you will miss the next product) to encourage users to purchase, and through raffles and welfare distribution, make users willing to continue watching and interact, to achieve a mutually beneficial and win-win situation in a live broadcast.

In 2020, as the cost of acquisition continues to rise, brands have begun to seek new communication and sales channels, and "product and effect integration" has become an effect that brands want to pursue. Live streaming may be the most effective way to achieve such an effect and a good channel to help brands promote a hit product.

Taobao Live is now very saturated, but there are not many people doing live streaming sales on Kuaishou, a content platform with a large number of low-end users, and there is no particularly strong head live streaming. Its number of users is extremely large and has yet to be tapped. Kuaishou Live may also become a market as big as Taobao Live.

4. Challenges and opportunities of live streaming sales

Live streaming has been popular for some time. During this process, there have been successes and failures, and the market fluctuations have become faster and faster. In such an environment, challenges and opportunities coexist. We need to enter the industrial chain and understand users in order to survive better in it.

Challenge 1: Fierce competition

With the explosive popularity of platforms such as Tik Tok and Kuaishou, the industry has begun to see an influx of professional MCN organizations for creating influencers. The number of influencers is also increasing, and users are watching more and more videos and following more and more influencers. There are greater expectations for the quality of content, and the quality of influencer video content needs to be constantly improved. This is a big challenge for them. The weekly topic selection, copywriting, and publication all require a steady output of creativity to be satisfied.

Challenge 2: Stricter policies and higher threshold for live streaming

Last November, the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television issued a notice on "Strengthening online audio-visual e-commerce live broadcast programs and advertising programs during Double Eleven", and put forward five requirements.

This includes requiring all online audio-visual program service agencies to adhere to the bottom line and red line. The programs must not contain vulgar, banal, or kitsch plots or shots, and those with scandals and bad records are strictly prohibited from speaking abroad.

In online audio-visual programs, the language used in live broadcasts and advertising programs must be civilized and standardized, and must not be exaggerated, defraud or mislead consumers.

With the rapid development of the live broadcast industry, policies have been continuously introduced since 2017 to refine the qualifications and content of live broadcasts. This has also led to higher thresholds for live broadcasts and greater difficulty in live broadcasts.

Challenge 3: Cross-platform challenge

Li Jiaqi and Wei Ya rely on Taobao, Sanda Ge and Simba rely on Kuaishou, and the live broadcasts of various anchors on other platforms are not popular.

Although there is overlap in users on many live streaming platforms, the platforms have different tones and community cultures. Kuaishou's users are more dispersed and lower-tier, while Douyin's users are mostly from first- and second-tier cities. This leads to different product needs and prices for these users. It is impossible for a host to sell goods of all prices, which will prevent users from forming an impression of the host.

This also makes live streaming influencers increasingly dependent on a single platform, and the difficulty of cross-platform continues to increase.

Challenge 4: Supply and after-sales issues

Although the anchor has done a good job of selecting products in the early stages and negotiates prices with the brand through himself and his team, due to his role as a distributor and promoter, he cannot intervene in the brand's operation and management of the goods, nor can he guarantee the quality and after-sales service of the cooperating brand products. He can only choose big brands and visit factories to solve this problem.

This efficiency is actually not high, and once there is a problem with the cooperative brand, it will seriously affect the host's reputation.

Opportunity 1: 5G is coming

With the construction and popularization of 5G mobile phones, 5G infrastructure, and the development of AR/VR technology, new consumption patterns will emerge. Short videos and live broadcasts are a model that can both reach out to brands and be close to users.

This actually enables practitioners in this industry to have a deep understanding of the industrial chain before entering new consumption scenarios and have great advantages after entering new consumption scenarios, because no matter how the future changes, products will still satisfy people's needs, and someone will still be needed to provide products.

Opportunity 2: Platform

Currently, only the top anchors of Kuaishou, Douyin, and Taobao Live are relatively famous, while other platforms with a large number of users also provide development opportunities for live streaming sales. When they start the live streaming function, it may be the beginning of this opportunity. The goods sold in this live streaming may not only be Taobao products, but also music festival tickets, scenic spot tickets, hotel coupons, etc.

Author: Yimao

Source: Yimao