Nov 12, 2023|
JD.com’s 2023 Singles Day Grand Promotion: Breaking Records in Transactions, Orders, and Customer Engagement
JD.com reported a record-breaking Singles Day Grand Promotion on November 12, 2023, with transaction volume, order volume, and user engagement reaching all-time highs.
JD.com’s “JD Procurement and Sales Manager Livestreaming” initiative went viral among Chinese consumers, captivating more than 380 million visitors. Transaction volume for over 60 brands surpassed RMB 1 billion, and nearly 20,000 brands witnessed a threefold increase in transaction volume compared to the previous year. Notably, new merchants experienced a fivefold surge in order volume compared to the same period last month.
The event marked a historic moment for JD.com, with several innovative initiatives propelling its success.
Innovative Livestreaming Strategy
This year’s Singles Day saw the “JD Procurement and Sales Manager Livestreaming” attracted widespread attention from both industry insiders and consumers alike. The innovative model waived booth and commission fees for brands, focusing instead on delivering unparalleled value to consumers. This approach enabled the offering of a diverse array of popular branded products at discounts as steep as 50%.
Transitioning from strategic behind-the-scenes roles, JD’s procurement and sales managers embraced the limelight. Serving as a bridge between brands and consumers, these managers brought a unique blend of deep consumer insight and extensive product knowledge. Their understanding of evolving industry trends enabled them to adeptly recommend a range of affordable, high-quality products to customers. Through this livestreaming venture, JD.com’s managers leveraged their expertise to guide consumer choices, effectively bridging the gap between brand offerings and consumer needs.
Low-Price Initiatives and Phenomenal Growth
Throughout the year, JD.com has been at the forefront of introducing a series of ambitious low-price initiatives. Key among these have been the “10-billion-yuan Discount” program, the “9.9-yuan Items with Free Shipping” offer, and various dynamic “Flash-sales” channels. These initiatives have not only been well-received but have also experienced a meteoric rise in popularity, particularly during the grand promotion period.
The launch of the “10-billion-yuan Discount Day” on October 31st at 8 P.M. was a landmark moment. In less than four minutes, the campaign had already generated over 100 million RMB in transactions. Additionally, the “9.9-yuan Items with Free Shipping” day, held on November 2nd, marked another significant achievement. The entire day saw a staggering 35-fold increase in order volumes and a 28-fold rise in user engagement compared to the figures from the 618 Grand Promotion.
Enhanced Customer Services and Expanded Trade-In Program
Throughout the promotional period, JD.com offered more 200 customer services, giving customers an even greater peace of mind when making purchases. In the past three years, JD’s “trade-in” service has been expanded to 200 product categories, directly benefiting over 20 million users. Furthermore, JD’s “price-guarantee” service, introduced in 2008, has delivering substantial savings to consumers, amounting to nearly RMB 9 billion to date. During this year’s Singles Day alone, it has saved users RMB 564 million.
Merchant Growth and Support Initiatives
This Singles Day marked a significant milestone for JD.com in terms of merchant growth and support. The platform witnessed a 3.4-fold increase in new shop registrations during this Singles Day, and the number of established merchants participating in the grand promotion increased by 1.5 times compared to last year’s grand promotion. A key driver of this growth was the “Spring Dawn Plan,” an innovative initiative by JD.com that distributed over RMB 100 million in subsidies to newly opened stores during this Singles Day, which attracted a wave of new merchants, thereby expanding product offerings for consumers. JD also launched a “RMB 1-yuan” package for merchants to access JD.com’s operational data open platform. The platform grants merchants comprehensive, real-time insights into store operations, enabling them to make data-driven decisions and optimize their business strategies effectively.
Brand Performance and On-Demand Retail Expansion
Numerous brands achieved explosive sales growth. During the first week of promotion, starting October 23rd, nearly 30 brands reached sales of over RMB 1 billion, and the transaction volume of nearly 15,000 brands increased more than fivefold YoY, with nearly 9,000 brands experiencing over tenfold growth in transaction volume.
Within 10 minutes of the sales period commencing on October 31st, major mobile phone brands like iPhone, Xiaomi, Honor, Huawei, OPPO, and vivo experienced a 100% increase in transaction volume YoY. This trend was not limited to technology; premium luxury brands such as Louis Vuitton, GUCCI, and DIOR also saw their transaction volumes more than triple within the first 30 minutes compared to the previous year.
The surge of on-demand retail, featuring one-hour delivery, continues to gain momentum. This year’s Singles Day saw the integration of more than 400,000 brick-and-mortar stores into JD’s on-demand retail business, JDDJ, doubling the store network from the previous year. Consumers in over 2,200 counties and districts across China enjoyed the convenience of instant shopping, with products delivered to their doorstep within minutes. The ShopNow business saw a 60% YoY increase in the number of users placing orders, underscoring the growing consumer preference for quick and efficient shopping experiences.
Industrial Belt Collaborations
JD Super, the supermarket business under JD Retail, collaborated with over 2,000 industrial belts nationwide, showcasing hundreds of thousands of high-quality agricultural products that resulted in sales peaks. Fujian province’s dried yellow croaker and Yunnan province’s corn experienced YoY growth of 300% and 237%, respectively. The impact of the initiatives was further amplified through the “9.9-yuan Items with Free Shipping” program.
Additionally, sectors such as apparel, home appliances and furniture, and fittings and hardware within these industrial belts witnessed substantial growth. The number of merchants in these sectors expanded dramatically, with increases of 248%, 141%, and 150% respectively. JD’s private label brands, JZao and Huixun, were instrumental in enhancing this dynamic ecosystem, forging partnerships with over 70% of key industrial belts.
Logistics Supply Chain and Technology Excellence and International Expansion
On the logistics front, a Bosideng down jacket dispatched from JD Logistics’ flagship Qingdao industrial park on October 23rd marked China’s 100 billionth express delivery parcel in 2023. JD Logistics’ industry-leading logistics infrastructure ensures that 95% of JD’s retail orders can be delivered within 24 hours, with over 10 million products eligible for same-day delivery.
JD Cloud, the cornerstone of JD’s technology, saw peak user visits per second increase by 170% compared with the same period last year, and its intelligent customer service handled more than 1.4 billion inquires.
Additionally, JD’s omnichannel retail brand in Europe, ochama, marked another milestone this Singles Day by extending its doorstep delivery service to 24 European countries. In the Netherlands, Germany, and Belgium, selected pick-up points extended their operating hours until 22:00, providing consumers with a wide range of quality products at low prices and flexible fulfillment and delivery services.
At the core of these advancements is JD.com’s commitment to leveraging cutting-edge technology and its deep expertise in streamlining supply chain operations. This strategic focus has significantly enhanced the efficiency of JD.com’s supply chain, enabling the company to offer substantial price reductions on its products. JD’s approach not only delivers cost benefits to a wide consumer base but also fosters robust, sustainable growth for businesses and partners throughout the supply chain.
Apr 22, 2024|
JD.com Debuts AI Digital Representative of Founder Richard Liu During Livestream, Drawing 20 Million Views in Under One Hour
During a livestream on April 16th, JD.com introduced an AI digital representative of its founder, Richard Liu (Qiangdong Liu), nicknamed “procurement and sales manager Brother Dong (采销东哥).” Liu appeared in both JD Home Appliances and JD Supermarket’s livestreaming rooms, attracting over 20 million views within the first hour and generating RMB 50 million in sales throughout the entire livestream.
The digital representative almost perfectly replicates Liu’s facial expressions, body language, gestures, and voice, capturing even the subtlest movements of his fingers. Behind this technology is JD Cloud’s ChatRhino, an advanced large language model (LLM) that brings the avatar to life.
Behind the Technology
The LLM precisely mirrors Liu’s distinctive expressions and movements, naturally weaving in his occasional finger twiddles while he speaks, accentuating points with hand gestures, and adding nods at just the right moments for emphasis, creating a natural and authentic representation. Perfecting the voice proved to be a greater challenge. Those who have heard Liu speak are well-acquainted with the distinct inflections of his Suqian accent—a characteristic touch from his small-town roots in Jiangsu province. Observers will note the brisk pace of his speech, lighter enunciation, and his tendency to meld words in a seamless flow. His “sh” sounds carry a nasal quality, and he often addresses people as “brothers” to boost morale.
While programming the standard Mandarin dialect is relatively straightforward, teaching the AI to adopt the nuances of the Suqian dialect and Liu’s unique vocal patterns required a precise level of customization from the ChatRhino LLM. For example, the LLM had to provide accurate judgments on when to introduce the nasal tonality or the specific moments to merge words, ensuring the AI’s linguistic output mirrored Liu’s signature speaking style authentically.
Beyond replicating vocal characteristics, the AI’s voice must also be suitable for the casual, dynamic atmosphere of e-commerce livestreaming, such as adopting colloquialisms like “xiong di men” — a phrase comparable to “folks” or “guys” in English — to create a friendly rapport with the audience. JD Cloud’s ChatRhino team fine-tuned the model to focus on sociable nuances. The initial dataset for the LLM consisted predominantly of Liu’s formal speeches—spirited and compelling, yet too ceremonious for the interactive world of livestreaming. To cultivate a more congenial and approachable persona, the team utilized Liu’s recent casual conversations as the primary source material, rich with personal anecdotes and travel tales. This approach shaped the AI’s voice into one that is that is not only natural and approachable but also genuinely engaging for the end user.
As a fully self-developed technology product of JD Cloud, the ChatRhino Digital Representative solution has already served over 4,000 brand merchants, contributing to a 30% increase in order conversion rate during idle hours and helping merchants reduce livestreaming costs, enhance operational efficiency, and optimize user experience. Equipped with 50,000 hours of voice data, this technology enables digital representatives to intelligently adapt to various livestreaming styles dynamically.
The AI is also adept at managing 70% of routine live chat inquiries autonomously without any manual intervention, while also optimizing its responses with a self-improving algorithm. For instance, digital representatives can autonomously fields questions using product details and scripts, and post-livestream, and assimilate new information. Mirroring the acumen of seasoned sales professionals, it boasts a 90% accuracy rate in offering tailored product recommendations when solicited by customers.
The recent introduction of a cutting-edge livestream control console serves as the “brain” for the digital representative solution. It diligently monitors real-time inventory, adjusting the showcased products in the livestream and tailoring the script to ensure relevance—sidestepping items that are out of stock and spotlighting those in high demand. It also gauges and fine-tunes the frequency and style of interactions based on live audience engagement. With this advanced platform, businesses managing multiple livestreams can effortlessly operate thousands of sessions concurrently via cloud services, bypassing the need for intricate local setups. This innovation yields a substantial cost reduction of 30%.
Human-Machine Synergy
The intention behind digital avatars is not to outshine or compete with human talent but to harness the potential of technology to work in concert with livestreamers, maximizing overall growth. Essentially, the digital representative solution serves as a tool for brands and merchants to leverage long-tail traffic once real livestreamers conclude their broadcasts. JD’s analytics indicate this strategy can boost order conversion rates by 30% during off-peak hours, such as late into the night.
Digital representatives also excel in specific product categories that require detailed explanations, such as health products like nursing beds, electric wheelchairs, and oxygen concentrators. The solution can provide constant, round-the-clock guidance, adding substantial value to livestreams when traffic is typically lower.
Last week, JD.com announced an investment of one billion yuan into video content creation. This investment underscores JD’s commitment to leveraging the power of short videos and livestreams to transform the online shopping experience for its users and create new growth avenues for brand merchants.
Apr 20, 2024|
JD.com Unveils Ambitious Plans for 618 Grand Promotion: Aiming to More Than Double High-Performing Merchants
JD.com is gearing up for this year’s 618 Grand Promotion with an ambitious goal: to more than double the number of merchants achieving sales over one million yuan on its platform. At the recent Conference of Merchants and Ecosystem Partners on April 18, JD.com introduced a range of supportive initiatives aimed at achieving this ambitious target.
Sandy Xu, CEO of JD.com, noted at the conference that the company will dedicate significant resources to bolster traffic support, incorporate advanced AI technology, and enhance service capabilities. These efforts are particularly focused on empowering third-party merchants, including small and medium-sized enterprises in its marketplace.
Key initiatives include optimizing the platform’s traffic distribution ecosystem to prioritize highly-rated stores and products and competitively priced products through enhanced search and recommendation mechanisms. Additionally, JD.com will continue to offer merchants free access to high-traffic channels, which include significant incentives such as the popular 10-billion-yuan discount and free shipping programs.
To engage more content creators, JD.com recently announced that it will allocate over one billion yuan in cash incentives and traffic resources. This investment aims to cultivate a vibrant ecosystem that supports merchants’ traffic, business growth, and innovation.
At the core of JD.com’s strategy is technological innovation, which involves integrating AI-driven solutions into merchant operations. This includes the deployment of JD’s proprietary large language model, ChatRhino, and an AI-empowered merchant operation platform that offers are variety of free AI applications, and more. These technologies streamline various operations scenarios, enhance efficiency, and reduce costs for merchants.
For instance, On April 16th, JD.com unveiled an AI digital avatar of its founder, Richard Liu, as a sales host on its livestreaming platform. This event attracted 20 million viewers in just one hour and generated sales exceeding RMB 50 million ($6.9 million). This AI-driven virtual host technology, developed by JD Technology, is now supporting over 4,000 brands on the platform. Additionally, merchants such as a sashimi knife seller can utilize JD.com’s AIGC content generation tool to quickly produce high-quality demonstration images, bypassing traditional costs associated with product photography.
JD.com also continues to enhance its service capabilities, particularly for small and medium-sized merchants. This includes personalized business guidance, comprehensive training programs, and upgraded after-sales services, ensuring a seamless shopping experience for customers.
As of March 2024, JD.com has seen a significant increase in active third-party merchants on its platform, surpassing one million. This growth is a testament to the platform’s effectiveness and its appeal to both new and established merchants.
JD.com Enhances Authenticity Verification Services for Imported Merchandise
