---
title: "After Three Months as a Group Leader, Sales Dropped 20%—What Am I Getting Out of This?"
description: "As the sense of presence and commission rates decline, both platforms and participants are losing enthusiasm for the group leader role. Retail and E-commerce Observer interviewed several group leaders about their development and experiences during this period."
author: "祝宇晨"
publisher: "New Distribution"
email: "zhaobo258@gmail.com"
telephone: "+8615854817671"
published: "2021-03-16"
language: "en"
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# After Three Months as a Group Leader, Sales Dropped 20%—What Am I Getting Out of This?

> As the sense of presence and commission rates decline, both platforms and participants are losing enthusiasm for the group leader role. Retail and E-commerce Observer interviewed several group leaders about their development and experiences during this period.

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As the sense of presence and commission rates continue to decline, both platforms and participants are gradually losing enthusiasm for the group leader role.

Retail and E-commerce Observer interviewed some group leaders to ask about their development and their experiences as "group leaders" during this period.

**-01- More Than Just Commission**

The pickup point is located at the intersection of three residential communities, covering 30,000 to 40,000 people. Currently a group leader for Orange Heart优选 (Chenxin Youxuan), he has a physical store.

Mr. Wang from Qingdao was initially a group leader for Duoduo Maicai, Shihui Tuan, and Orange Heart优选. However, due to the poor quality of Duoduo Maicai products, he deregistered as a group leader. Recently, Shihui Tuan had an operational incident that led to the deduction of bonuses, so he also deregistered from Shihui Tuan and now focuses solely on Orange Heart优选.

"Orange Heart优选 has monthly sales of 30,000 yuan," the group leader told Retail and E-commerce Observer. "The later operations of Orange Heart优选 are quite user-friendly, so I'm willing to promote it in several WeChat groups."

According to Retail and E-commerce Observer, in community group buying, if a customer orders more than three items, to encourage repeat purchases, you must provide bags—this is an unwritten rule.

The market price for a thicker bag is 0.2 yuan each. Although not expensive, the volume adds up.

"Shihui Tuan, which appeared on the Spring Festival Gala, didn't bring me much profit. All that came were groups of bargain hunters. I don't know how many bags I give away every day," Mr. Wang said with a helpless tone. "They're from the surrounding communities, so you can't refuse, but even if you give them, it's hard to generate repeat purchases."

For these headaches, Orange Heart优选's operations have been more satisfactory for group leaders. "Whether you need bags or promotional materials, just ask, and they'll provide them. When there are shortages or missing items and refunds are given to customers, they also arrange low-threshold discount coupons as compensation," the group leader said.

According to Retail and E-commerce Observer, the commission rate for Orange Heart优选 products is about 10% for items priced below 50 yuan, and 5% for items priced above 50 yuan. This is significantly higher than Duoduo Maicai's comprehensive commission rate of 3% to 4%.

Thoughtful service and decent commissions are what attract group leaders. Thinking from the group leader's perspective throughout the entire process leads to methods that are more likely to be accepted. Whether it's materials or compensation for customers, both can encourage customers to make a second purchase.

When asked why he deregistered from Shihui Tuan, he described the incident to Retail and E-commerce Observer.

"When I logged in, I found my account balance had turned negative, and I wasn't the only one. In the internal group for Shihui Tuan group leaders, when the first leader posted a screenshot of the problem, others couldn't hold back and started frantically @-ing the group admins. The response was that an error occurred during the Spring Festival, causing group leaders to receive duplicate activity bonuses, and now they were being recovered." However, many observant group leaders reported that during the activity period, their transaction details did not show receiving the bonus. As of the time of writing, the Shihui Tuan Qingdao branch had not given group leaders a satisfactory answer.

**-02- High-End Community, Four Platforms, Monthly Income 500 Yuan**

The pickup point is located in a high-end community with 7,000 residents. He is a group leader for four platforms: Orange Heart, Meituan, Duoduo, and Xingsheng, with no physical store.

Mr. Zhou signed up as a group leader out of interest.

"Except for Xingsheng, the other platforms approved me quickly. Xingsheng was the most troublesome; they required offline training. But I heard that after the giants entered, they gradually relaxed the requirements."

"As for delivery times, Duoduo Maicai is the most 'punctual.' Although the driver always tells me the speed will improve, as the last stop in this area, it always arrives exactly at 14:00," Mr. Zhou said. The other platforms besides Duoduo Maicai have less consistent speed and stability. Constantly changing drivers and unstable arrival times are a headache for Mr. Zhou, who has a full-time job.

"Every day I have to guess when the driver will arrive; it takes too much energy," Mr. Zhou said. The worst part is when drivers click 'delivered' before 14:00 to avoid fines for being late, but the mini-program automatically notifies customers to pick up their orders. When customers arrive at the store and find the goods haven't arrived, I become the innocent victim.

"Because of the living environment, people around here have certain requirements for food quality, so there are few repeat customers," Mr. Zhou said. "Often the vegetables have a lot of mud, or the frozen meat isn't frozen well." As temperatures rise, the requirements for cold-chain delivery are also increasing.

Mr. Zhou said, "If I had to choose one of the four platforms, I'd choose Xingsheng as the most satisfactory. Their training for group leaders seems quite serious, but the downside is that their response is a bit slow."

According to Retail and E-commerce Observer, Xingsheng优选 irregularly organizes offline training for group leaders, offers online courses in WeChat groups, and has a group leader academy on their official account. However, the most criticized aspect is after-sales service, which takes 3-5 days to resolve each time. Group leaders with high order volumes find this very troublesome.

"Four platforms, one month, 500 yuan profit—not much money," the group leader told Retail and E-commerce Observer. "I'm just experiencing another profession; I don't care about making money. The biggest meaning of being a group leader these past few months might be getting to know my neighbors."

**-03- Meituan Fastest, Xingsheng Slowest**

In Maotai Town, Zunyi, Guizhou, covering 12,000-16,000 people, he is a group leader for four platforms: Orange Heart, Meituan, Duoduo, and Xingsheng, with no physical store.

Mr. Wang, with the help of his family, operates four platforms, the longest for nearly half a year. Based on his experience, he rates Meituan优选 higher than the others.

"Because I do group buying at home and live in a high-rise, there's no suitable place to receive and distribute goods, so receiving goods is a headache every time," Mr. Wang said. "Meituan优选 delivers to the door every time. Although it doesn't take much time for us to go downstairs and bring it up, it's still touching."

After-sales is the function Mr. Wang uses most frequently besides promotion.

"I have four WeChat groups with about 1,500 people in total, and the monthly profit is over 1,000 yuan. Although it's not much, when converted to order volume, the numbers are scary—there are after-sales issues almost every day. Meituan is the fastest, Xingsheng is the slowest," Mr. Wang said. "With Meituan, as long as there's photo evidence, the refund is processed in seconds; with Xingsheng, it goes through multiple reviews, and by the time it's approved, you've forgotten about it."

The group leader said he will continue with Meituan优选 and Duoduo Maicai in the future. Meituan优选 has high commissions and good service, while Duoduo Maicai has more traffic. He also hopes platforms will improve communication with group leaders regarding product needs.

**-04- After Three Months as a Group Leader, Sales Dropped 20%**

In a community on Nanhu Avenue, Wuhan, covering 15,000-20,000 people, he is a group leader for four platforms: Orange Heart, Meituan, Duoduo, and Xingsheng, with a physical store.

Mr. Wang runs a department store and started community group buying in December last year. He moved to this community less than two years ago, and shortly after arriving, the pandemic hit, followed by community group buying. In his words, "Since I moved here, life hasn't been peaceful."

One day in December, a person in a yellow vest approached Mr. Wang. That was the first time he heard about community group buying. Due to the pandemic, his supermarket business was poor, and combined with the BD's "easy daily pickup and delivery + if you don't do it, others will" approach, he couldn't refuse. After that day, he became a group leader for Meituan优选.

A month later, he was a group leader for four platforms. At that time, the number of pickup points in the community was, as he expected, no fewer than 20. Facing fierce competition, he didn't think about expanding his focus on community group buying because he realized the impact it was having on his supermarket.

"Before community group buying came, my monthly sales were 100,000 yuan; now they're only 70,000-80,000, a 20% drop," Mr. Wang told Retail and E-commerce Observer. "Fewer and fewer customers are coming to the store. The pandemic plus community group buying has had a huge impact on the retail industry."

The beautiful scene the BD once described—"You'll get traffic you never had before, and this traffic will boost your supermarket's performance"—turned out to be just a dream. "The products on the platform are too cheap; it's only price-sensitive customers who buy there. When such people see the supermarket prices, they immediately know it's more expensive, so it's hard to attract traffic," Mr. Wang said.

Because his business has been greatly affected, he never proactively promotes these platforms to customers. He relies on organic traffic to maintain his group leader status and earn some extra money. Mr. Wang has also thought about uniting the community to resist group buying, but it's unrealistic to control others. "If we resist community group buying, customers' purchasing needs are suppressed. The stakes are huge, and there are too many people; it's hard to prevent everyone from touching this pie."

Mr. Wang is like a microcosm of thousands of supermarket owners. When a supermarket encounters community group buying, all the possible problems have happened to him.


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