---
title: "Tsingtao Beer's E-commerce Strategy: Latest Thoughts on Short Video Livestreaming and In- and Out-of-Platform Seeding and Harvesting"
description: "Both brand owners and technology providers need to know what they want to achieve, whether in public or private domains, and where the growth points lie. E-commerce doesn't guarantee growth; it's about finding the growth points. In February and March, China's e-commerce overall declined by 22%, yet Tsingtao Beer continued to grow. What exactly is e-commerce digitalization? Digitalization is all-encompassing, an E-transformation of the entire process from top to bottom based on corporate strategy. The topic here is e-commerce digital marketing, which involves two aspects: marketing digitalization and e-commerce digitalization."
author: "史永刚"
publisher: "New Distribution"
email: "zhaobo258@gmail.com"
telephone: "+8615854817671"
published: "2020-09-12"
language: "en"
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original_source: "https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/4cEhDbqnFacDOWeMGm8QiQ"
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# Tsingtao Beer's E-commerce Strategy: Latest Thoughts on Short Video Livestreaming and In- and Out-of-Platform Seeding and Harvesting

> Both brand owners and technology providers need to know what they want to achieve, whether in public or private domains, and where the growth points lie. E-commerce doesn't guarantee growth; it's about finding the growth points. In February and March, China's e-commerce overall declined by 22%, yet Tsingtao Beer continued to grow. What exactly is e-commerce digitalization? Digitalization is all-encompassing, an E-transformation of the entire process from top to bottom based on corporate strategy. The topic here is e-commerce digital marketing, which involves two aspects: marketing digitalization and e-commerce digitalization.

Both brand owners and technology providers need to know what they want to achieve, whether in public or private domains, and where the growth points lie. E-commerce doesn't guarantee growth; it's about finding the growth points. In February and March, China's e-commerce overall declined by 22%, yet Tsingtao Beer continued to grow.

What exactly is e-commerce digitalization? Digitalization is all-encompassing, an E-transformation of the entire process from top to bottom based on corporate strategy. The topic here is e-commerce digital marketing, which involves two aspects: **marketing digitalization and e-commerce digitalization.**

Shi Yonggang, E-commerce Director at Tsingtao Beer Innovation Marketing Division HQ

**The marketing digitalization system includes brand digitalization, consumer digitalization, supply chain digitalization, channel digitalization, and product digitalization. E-commerce, as an online business, runs through the business processes of marketing digitalization and has unique advantages in implementation.**

The chart below shows the best-selling categories during JD.com's 618 shopping festival: the top seller was vlog video cameras, followed by esports monitors, 5G phones, and beauty appliances. Why mention this?

The theme of the August China FMCG Conference was "Digitalization · New Infrastructure." The top-selling categories on JD.com clearly indicate the rise of new infrastructure. The rise of these devices is also guiding everyone toward digitalization, and for enterprises, these bring new business opportunities.

**-01-**
**Century-old National Trend Communication**

First, let's talk about consumer digitalization. How does Tsingtao Beer's e-commerce department approach it? **Previously, advertising was just advertising, and offline was just offline. Now, through e-commerce, Tsingtao Beer has achieved the integration of brand and performance.**

For example, the launch event for the 1903 series was held at the century-old Broadway in Shanghai, with both online and offline launches simultaneously. We invited Tmall's marketing team to participate in the live event, and the product was launched online at the same time.

What does the simultaneous online and offline launch bring? Previously, after seeing ads, a live broadcast would be covered by dozens of media outlets, reaching a billion impressions, but it was just an ad. Now with e-commerce, after the offline launch, we can continuously seed within the platform, so consumers who saw ads from dozens of media companies also see in-platform seeding on Taobao and Tmall.

**After in-platform seeding, the next step is harvesting. The fastest way to harvest is through livestreaming, but only for high-value-added products; bestsellers don't need livestreaming.**

**Many companies say livestreaming isn't profitable. Why? Because the average order value is too low, and they're livestreaming bestsellers with transparent prices.**

Not just livestreaming, but other communication methods should also follow. For example, Tsingtao Beer's retro-themed short films with brand ambassadors, such as "The Mummy 3," "Blade Runner," "Midnight Diner," and "The Mission," are highly shareable. Consumers who have been reached by these ads then see in-platform seeding, combined with online ads and celebrity livestreams, to complete the final harvest.

**This is a tightly linked process. Many companies run ads but have no offline distribution and no online seeding or harvesting, making the process ineffective.** Seeding is something everyone can do, but you must also harvest. After waves of harvesting, individual products grow faster.

Tsingtao Beer's 1903 is a great example. From the pre-pandemic launch to now, it has grown to become the store's Top 2 product, not only selling well online but also offline.

If a product can lead in e-commerce for three to five years, you can significantly reduce advertising spending. With 700 million active users on Taobao, over 500 million on JD.com, 800 million on Douyin, and 700 million on Kuaishou, if you can make a product popular on these platforms, you can cut advertising investment substantially.

**-02-**
**Building a Livestreaming Sales Matrix**

How to do seeding? It's not as simple as shooting a few short videos. It must be original; videos uploaded by consumers themselves have the best effect. However, platforms like Xiaohongshu, Douyin, and Tmall have resolution and size requirements, making it difficult for consumers to upload, so you still need professional companies to edit.

Previously, we seeded with images and text; now we seed with short videos. By laying out content channels and building up a reservoir, you can definitely harvest during Double 11. Tmall's short videos can now be vertical, and vertical short videos are better than horizontal ones—this is a difference in digitalization.

**Seeding should not be limited to in-platform; you should also seed out-of-platform. Tsingtao Beer also seeds on Xiaohongshu, Douyin, etc. Out-of-platform seeding serves to build communication bridges and convey brand value, but it's also for harvesting.**

Currently, Douyin and Kuaishou are not convenient for transaction harvesting, and Xiaohongshu can't harvest at all. So how to ultimately harvest? You still need to return to in-platform harvesting. **The most effective way to achieve brand and performance integration is to seed and then return to Tmall for harvesting. In short, you can't only seed in-platform and not out-of-platform, nor only out-of-platform and not in-platform.**

When talking about seeding, we must discuss internet celebrities. What can they actually do for enterprises? Some might ask, aren't Li Jiaqi and Viya selling tens of thousands of boxes in a minute or two a form of sales?

Top influencers can indeed drive sales growth, but you can't rely on them for long-term performance. For high-value-added products, seeding might sell ten or twenty thousand boxes, but tens of millions of viewers receive product education and promotion.

Therefore, you still need to find vertical domain experts. Apart from Li Jiaqi and Viya, Tsingtao Beer's subsequent livestreams have all been with vertical experts, who are better at seeding. Moreover, compared to traditional advertising, vertical experts' seeding costs are lower and effects are better. These vertical experts explain products more clearly than a 15-second ad, even better than professionals like me.

**Different livestreamers have different audience profiles. Different categories have different profiles. You can't use one livestreamer's audience profile to represent the entire company, nor can you use online profiles to represent the entire brand's profile.** E-commerce sales only account for 1% of Tsingtao Beer's total, and many audience profiles aren't reflected online, such as people drinking beer at night markets.

This profile only represents Li Jiaqi's follower purchase profile: 84% female, mostly from first- and second-tier cities, and most buy Tsingtao Beer only once. We do our own livestreaming for seeding, maybe over 20 sessions a month, but with big influencers, it's once a month, and it must be for high-value-added products, not bestsellers—bestsellers won't work.

Wang Han's profile is half male; Li Jiaqi and Viya are more concentrated in first-tier cities, while Wang Han is mainly in second-tier. Because online sales account for a small proportion, these profiles cannot guide the company's product development.

Many companies tell me they livestream with top influencers three or four times a month. Why? They say to chase same-period sales. That's like drinking poison to quench thirst.

Brand owners must not bet all their sales on external livestreaming. They can do self-broadcasting, with over 20 sessions a month. Whether to use social influencers or their own, we have over 20 store managers who can do livestreaming; they know operations, product knowledge, and can host.

Currently, according to Tmall and JD.com requirements, the duration isn't enough. During promotions, the requirement is eight hours, but my team can only cover four hours; the remaining four hours are outsourced at about 400-600 yuan per hour.

**-03-**
**Advancing Membership Operations**

What's the use of memberships? Some say memberships are expensive, and the cost of acquiring a member is very high. Actually, it depends on how you do it. **If you use a referral-based approach, it's better; if you rely on free trials and giveaways, the cost is high.** There are many ways to play with memberships. First, give members basic store benefits and treatment, such as offline meetups for top members.

We roughly calculated that our membership cost isn't that high because we use referrals. We do give away gifts—two cans of tasting beer costing 10 yuan, plus 7 yuan for shipping—but only if the member refers two friends to register. This way, the customer acquisition cost is actually not high. The cost is basically controlled at around 5 yuan, but once a member joins, the value they bring far exceeds 5 yuan.

Research data shows that Double 11 sales depend on the number of buyers from August to October multiplied by 70%. If you slack off in August-October, you won't have a consumer base for Double 11. Tsingtao Beer's 618 member recruitment increased by 133% compared to last year's Double 11, member GMV grew by 350%, and member transaction share grew by 184%. So membership operations are very important.

Members contributed 27% of orders during last year's Double 11. After Double 11, we worked hard on memberships, and the member base grew several hundred times. This year's 618, we were the No.1 across all platforms, with members contributing 59%. Members can contribute traffic and GMV, so you must pay attention to membership operations and build a solid membership management system.

_Note: Hello! From August 24-26, 2020, New Distribution held the (3rd) China FMCG Conference. Although it has ended, to further improve the quality of conference content and themes, we now invite you to participate in a survey on FMCG conference topics. The survey data will be kept strictly confidential and not used for other purposes. After completing the questionnaire truthfully and passing review, you will receive the "2020 Distributor Transformation E-book" sent via email. New Distribution sincerely thanks you for your cooperation!_


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