In just a few years, short videos and live streaming have experienced explosive growth, and have now developed into two powerful tools for merchants to deeply reach consumers. For brands, the question has shifted from "Should we do live streaming?" to "How exactly should we do live streaming?" Recently, the author interviewed Wang (pseudonym), head of a brand's new retail department that is entering Douyin e-commerce, and Gao Qi, founder of Hangzhou Yiming Media, a brand service provider that ranked TOP1 in GMV for the food industry on Douyin from May to June 2022, to understand their insights and experiences in Douyin operations at this stage, for readers' reference. 01 How to precisely enter the Douyin track? For the question of whether to do live streaming, most brands answer yes. But how? Should they do it themselves or outsource it? If they do it themselves, where to start? To this end, the author chatted with Wang, the e-commerce director of a brand, and summarized three concerns they face when addressing the "how" question. 1. How to find a suitable marketing approach on Douyin? First, people are the most important; wherever users are, brands should be there. As an incremental channel for brand-wide operations, brands need to first figure out how to find target users on Douyin. In terms of audience matching on Douyin, there are mainly two types: "watching short video content" and "entering live rooms to shop." Brands can allocate different operational strategies based on the assessment of future audience assets. Currently, merchants in different categories have different marketing approaches, mainly including brand self-broadcasting, influencer live streaming, Qianchuan traffic investment, and short video带货. Among these, brand self-broadcasting can be operated in ways such as a self-broadcasting matrix with one account per product, brand self-broadcasting plus batch influencer live streaming, Qianchuan traffic investment plus efficient creative materials, and influencer live streaming plus short video带货. Brands can focus on three aspects: product selection (sales packages), traffic investment (creative strategy), and live streaming (operational analysis) to conduct detailed data analysis and find the approach that suits them. 2. How to choose partner operation service providers, MCN agencies, or influencers? What are the requirements for their capabilities? Doing everything in-house is unrealistic for most brands due to excessive capital investment, talent shortages, and limited energy. But if everything is outsourced, brands also have concerns, as it's a game of mutual negotiation, and brands still want to maintain control. Therefore, many brands have established new retail departments internally or set up independent Douyin operation teams within their e-commerce departments. The main role is: things need to be done, but they should take the lead themselves, and they should also find partners like service providers, but this requires time and trial-and-error costs. Regarding what kind of service providers to choose, Wang emphasized one point: most current Douyin service providers lack supply chain capabilities, meaning they do not have the inventory-holding ability of traditional distributors, which puts pressure on many brands. His ideal Douyin service provider should have both supply chain and operational capabilities. For MCN agencies or influencers, the requirements are relatively simple: they just need to match the logic of live streaming's people, goods, and venue. 3. How to balance the ROI between brand promotion and GMV? Wang smiled and said the ultimate goal is definitely GMV. Since you invest in this channel, you ultimately need to see actual results. Brand promotion is also an important driver for sales, and the two do not conflict. While ensuring GMV, you can intersperse brand-side activities such as new product launches and celebrity live streams, which can be done simultaneously. For brands wanting to enter, thinking through the above questions is just the foundation. Once you actually start, the following ideas from Gao, the founder of Douyin service provider Yiming Media, can serve as a reference. 02 How to build a high-quality Douyin live room? Gao Qi, founder of Yiming Media, believes that to ensure the quality of a live room, the first thing to do is standardization, which is the prerequisite for high quality and scale. Standardization of a live room can be done from three dimensions: people, goods, and venue. People are the foundation, goods are the core, and venue is the driver. People: suitable anchors broadcasting suitable products Hangzhou Yiming's proposition is: anchors cannot be cultivated, only selected. People cannot be fully standardized; retaining different anchors' personalities can better leverage individual traits to bring the audience into the scene. But there can be a set of standards for selecting anchors. For example, in a city like Hangzhou, there are many anchors with varying levels of skill. How to find suitable anchors to match different products? At this point, a set of selection criteria can be established. Gao Qi broke down the capability items of this set of standards into four major areas: expressiveness, logic, script, and image, each with standards for passing, good, and excellent. See the figure below for details. In addition, in the people section, there is also standardization of script skeletons and anchor review processes that every merchant can do. Goods: different products correspond to different traffic Throughout the live streaming process, different time points require different products to handle different traffic. Therefore, testing the product mix, such as the main promoted product at the opening, flash sale items, and when to push which product as traffic comes in, all require precise testing by operations and the formulation of standard product entry and exit logic. Venue: standardization of atmosphere The live room needs to present the best visual effect, so this is where money should not be saved. Standardization of atmosphere mainly focuses on clothing, music (music coordination before and after price announcements), anchors (dual anchors can be used), and a 3-5 person atmosphere group on site. Additionally, standardization of holiday atmosphere, such as changing the live room theme at different time points to give a fresh feeling, requires diverse scene combinations to attract and stimulate users to enter and stay. Based on the three dimensions of people, goods, and venue, every detail must be done well. Only through continuous accumulation and improvement can stable live streaming output quality be established, and only then is there a chance to stand out among the vast number of live rooms. Hangzhou Yiming Media was established in 2021 and is currently an officially certified excellent brand service provider by Douyin. In the first half of 2022, it contributed 200 million RMB in GMV, focusing on the food sector, with clients including Kong Ke Yi Mian, Alien Energy Electrolyte Water, and TASOGARE Coffee. I hope Gao Qi's thoughts on building standardized live rooms can bring you some inspiration. 03 Is there still a dividend for brands entering now? Live streaming e-commerce has only been around for 6 years, yet it has become an unstoppable force occupying people's lives. Douyin e-commerce began to sprout in 2018, officially became a strategic-level business within ByteDance in 2020, first proposed the concept of "interest e-commerce" at the first Douyin E-commerce Ecosystem Conference in 2021, and this year upgraded from "interest e-commerce" to "full-scenario interest e-commerce," marking 4 years of development. Douyin E-commerce President Wei Wenwen announced at the conference the upgrade of interest e-commerce to the full-scenario interest e-commerce stage (Image source: Douyin E-commerce official WeChat). Some may ask: Is there still an opportunity to do Douyin today? Can we still enjoy the dividend? I very much agree with a statement by Chen Xin, CEO of Maichun E-commerce: What we can enjoy is only the information gap dividend. What is the information gap dividend? It means that no matter what new things emerge, as long as we can run ahead of others and gain information gaps that others have not yet recognized, that part is the value we can earn. No dividend can exist forever, but the information gap dividend is different; it is not static but constantly changing, requiring individuals or organizations to keep running forward and continuously improve their cognition to continue enjoying the dividend. Maichun E-commerce entered the B2B field a few years ago and became the largest TP merchant on Retail Link. Now it has explored new operational models in community group buying and has also enjoyed the information gap dividend in the new community group buying track. Today's Douyin e-commerce is also in a process of continuous exploration. Platform rules are constantly iterating and updating, and today's experience may be washed up on the beach tomorrow. To be more ahead of others on Douyin, merchants must think clearly before entering, not only about their own conditions and gameplay strategies, but also about whether they have the determination for long-term combat and the courage to constantly challenge their comfort zones. PS: If you are interested in Douyin e-commerce topics, you can scan the QR code to apply to join the New Distribution "Douyin E-commerce Exchange Group." Introduction: Feng Yao, Advertising Manager of New Distribution, mainly researches FMCG brand marketing and channel-related topics; has in-depth research and reporting on brand marketing; has led thousands of outstanding transformation dealers nationwide to inspect new channel models.