Tech Planet exclusively learned that Pinduoduo has launched a "Local Life" entrance within its app, located deep in the "Recharge Center" on the homepage, currently mainly selling discounted food coupons and proxy ordering services provided by merchants. Note: The local life business entrance in Pinduoduo's app. On July 5, Pinduoduo's recruitment website posted a job for a virtual product manager, with responsibilities including recharge center, virtual, travel, and local life services, possibly related to this new entrance. In fact, Pinduoduo's moves in local life are not limited to this. Earlier this year, Pinduoduo's community group-buying platform Kuaituantuan began quietly advancing local life services, recruiting merchants in catering, entertainment, beauty, and accommodation. In May, group-buying coupons were launched, allowing group leaders to promote products, and users could redeem them in-store after purchase. In the first half of this year, local life became a hot track for major internet companies. According to LatePost, Zhang Lidong, chairman of Douyin Group and head of commercialization, began to pay more attention to local life business. Meanwhile, Douyin upgraded its hotel and travel business to a first-level department, parallel to its in-store business (including in-store dining and comprehensive in-store services). Meituan, on the other hand, launched short video and live streaming features to create multi-channel sales scenarios for local life merchants. Even players like Xiaohongshu and Video Account began testing local life services. With new and old players continuously entering and expanding, the local life services market is bound to become more lively. Pinduoduo's Main App Initially Ventures into Local Life The launch of the local life entrance expands Pinduoduo's new business scenarios. After testing, Tech Planet found that Pinduoduo's local life services currently mainly include selling food coupons and proxy ordering for in-store pickup. The products are mainly from chain restaurants such as Walmart, KFC, McDonald's, Starbucks, Luckin Coffee, Burger King, Pizza Hut, DQ, Heytea, and Häagen-Dazs. Note: Food discounts in Pinduoduo's local life section. The purchase method is the same as buying other e-commerce products on Pinduoduo: you can buy individually or join a group. For example, to buy a Burger King electronic voucher, after group purchase and payment, you can view the card voucher in all orders and then redeem it in-store. Note: The purchase and redemption process for electronic vouchers in Pinduoduo's app. In addition to buying in-store group-buying coupons, consumers can also purchase proxy ordering products in the local life section, where merchants place orders on behalf of consumers. Currently, only KFC and McDonald's meal sets support proxy ordering. After successful proxy ordering, the merchant will notify the consumer to pick up at the nearest store, or KFC and McDonald's will provide delivery. The entire service process is provided by the merchant. Overall, the products in Pinduoduo's local life services are still relatively limited, currently only food group-buying products. Whether it will further expand into other segments such as beauty and accommodation remains to be seen. In addition to launching local life services in the main app, Pinduoduo had already attempted local life services through its Kuaituantuan platform earlier this year, with progress accelerating. In March, it recruited service providers, and in May, local life products were listed on the Kuaituantuan mini-program. Group leaders can sell group-buying products, and consumers can redeem them in-store after purchase. The variety of local life products in Kuaituantuan is richer than those in the main app. It is reported that over 40 are food and beverage categories, while others are entertainment, accommodation, leisure, beauty, and lifestyle services. This trial is also seen as another signal of Pinduoduo's increased focus on local life. Local life services are a completely new field for Pinduoduo. Currently, whether in the main app or on Kuaituantuan, its efforts are still relatively conservative compared to other players. However, if this service scenario proves successful, Pinduoduo may increase its investment in local life in the future, potentially creating a new growth point beyond e-commerce. Testing the Waters or Doubling Down? Horizontally comparing, besides Pinduoduo, other new players in local life services are currently facing challenges to varying degrees. After three years in the field, Douyin has not yet found a suitable direction for its local life services. Tech Planet exclusively discovered that Douyin Life Services has a new entrance located in the Douyin Mall on the homepage of the Douyin app, meaning that life service products can also be purchased in Douyin's e-commerce. However, this also indicates that Douyin's life services, developed for years, still need to be supported by other businesses within Douyin and are far from being truly independent. It shows that local life services are not going smoothly. Note: The life services entrance in Douyin Mall. Similarly, Pinduoduo faces many problems to solve if it wants to do well in local life services. Although Pinduoduo's e-commerce business is strong, in the current competitive landscape and environment of the internet industry, starting a new business requires significant human, financial, and resource investment. Pinduoduo's core business is e-commerce. Deep involvement in local life services might confuse consumers about its positioning. Just as WeChat has huge potential with 1 billion daily active users but remains restrained in commercialization, finding a balance between e-commerce and local life is undoubtedly a challenge. From Pinduoduo's past actions, local life is a tough nut to crack. Pinduoduo's local life services can be traced back to 2020 when it launched services like flight tickets and travel, seen as competing with Fliggy and Meituan's accommodation, but these services have not made significant progress. On one hand, Pinduoduo's focus was on community group-buying "Duoduo Maicai"; on the other hand, the company did not allocate substantial resources and attention to this business. A person close to Pinduoduo told Tech Planet that Pinduoduo's current business focus is its overseas cross-border e-commerce business TEMU. Local life should still be exploratory, not necessarily meaning Pinduoduo will treat it as a major business. Just like the earlier incubation of Duoduo Travel within Pinduoduo, if progress is not smooth, it will stop exploring the business in time. Moreover, while exploring new businesses, it is not easy to defend its home turf, as the main e-commerce track is highly competitive. The person also said that the launch of the local life section this time is to better integrate merchants selling local life products on Pinduoduo, provide them with new entrances, and create order opportunities. From Pinduoduo's perspective, it is an attempt to enrich its service system. Competing for the Trillion-Yuan Market In the first half of this year, many new players entered local life services. Compared to Pinduoduo's low-key trial, new players like WeChat Video Account, Douyin, and Xiaohongshu have been more high-profile. Since the beginning of this year, in addition to in-store group-buying, Douyin has also launched food delivery services and an independent delivery mall. Moreover, Douyin has been continuously enriching its merchant system and service capabilities. Recently, Douyin Life Services announced the launch of "search data" capabilities to help merchants increase search traffic exposure and conversion, thereby improving business results. The enhancement of merchant-side tools is not limited to this. Tech Planet's statistics show that Douyin Life Services has launched four tools to strengthen merchant backend: Douyin Linke, Douyin Xiaobang, Douyin Laike, and Douyin Jixing, with much greater investment in merchant backend construction than other players. WeChat Video Account also has new moves. Following Douyin's short video group-buying model, Video Account launched local life product promotion this year, with official incentives for merchants, actual rates below 1% or even free, accelerating the penetration of local life services in Video Account. Tech Planet learned from a service provider in Wuhan that they and their peers have begun establishing local life teams for Video Account alongside their existing Douyin and Kuaishou businesses, using official accounts and Video Account to expand their business. Another new player, Xiaohongshu, also recently announced its entry into local life. Tech Planet learned from a Xiaohongshu employee that the feasibility of local life business has been discussed internally several times. With various companies launching local life services this year, Xiaohongshu entered the market based on its advantages in traffic and content seeding, as well as the need to create new growth points. A few days ago, Xiaohongshu announced the launch of its "official store visit cooperation center," with initial cities for internal testing being Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen. Merchants can initiate store visit cooperation plans on the platform, and bloggers can apply to participate, visit the store, and publish notes with relevant store or product tags. Users browsing the notes can directly place orders through the purchase entrance. A new round of "thousand-group war" in the local life services market is imminent, and Meituan, a leading player, is also making frequent moves. In the first half of this year, Meituan launched major features like short video and live streaming to provide new sales scenarios for merchants. A Meituan employee told Tech Planet that starting from the merchant side, in some regions, they will reduce merchant commission rates and provide support in marketing and traffic. Facing the new industry landscape, Alibaba, which has been deeply involved in local life services, also has new strategies. In March, Amap announced the official merger with Koubei, Alibaba's in-store business under local life, meaning Alibaba's local life in-store business will be integrated into the Amap entrance. Leveraging users' map navigation habits, it guides search behavior to extend to life services. Tech Planet observed that in the Amap app, the "Nearby" tab in the bottom navigation bar has become the aggregated entrance for Alibaba's local life, including Ele.me and Koubei. The local life services market still has vast growth space, attracting new and old players. According to iResearch data, by 2025, China's local life services market will grow to 35.3 trillion yuan. According to QuestMobile, in April 2023, considering the overall internet penetration rate, even the comprehensive services (mainly group-buying) as an important support segment had a penetration rate of less than 40%, and food delivery services only 15.6%. This provides imagination space for new entrants like Pinduoduo, Video Account, Douyin, and Xiaohongshu. The new battle in the local life services field will continue.