However, the super shopping festival in this year didn’t create may buzz on internet as it used to do. The previous carnival atmosphere no longer exists. And there are much less promotions information on the internet. Personally, I didn’t receive as much promotion SMS messages in this year than in the last years.

Reasons for the cool down

According to our analysis, there are 3 reasons for this phenomenon:

1. Chinese government has strengthened the regulation of e-commerce.

Although the rapid growth of e-commerce industry over the past years solved employment problem in some extend and helped to sell the agriculture products from rural area, there are still many problems under the shadow of prosperity, including monopoly, unfair competition, click farming, personal data leakage and etc. Chinese government is trying to manage the problems through many measures. For example, in 2021 the Personal Information Protection Law of the People’s Republic of China has come into power since Nov. 1st 2021. Therefore, the platforms deiced to keep a low profile.

2. Time scope is too lang and the rules are too complex.

Double 11’s time line is stretched too long and the atmosphere as intense as before. In the beginning, Double 11 shopping festival is only limited to the day of Nov.11th. Since 2019, the Double starts the pre-sale from 20th October. These is even an Encore of Double 11 after the day of Nov. 11th. Stretching out the timeline of the Double 11 event is indeed a way to keep the transaction volume growing at a more robust rate, which is beneficial to the platform. But for consumers, there is no feeling of anticipation for that day of November 11. Therefore, Chinese people are less enthusiastic about Double 11. Besides, in the last several Double 11 events, people already began to discussed the complex rules of the platforms and shops. Without a certain mathematical basis, it is difficult to figure out how to convert the various coupons. Even if someone understand the rules, in the end will find that there is actually not much discount as normal business days.

3. Live-streaming e-commerce is now under the spotlight.

In the first half of 2021, the national live-streaming e-commerce transactions exceeded one trillion yuan. The advantage of live-streaming e-commerce is that the display of goods is more intuitive and the price can be very low, which attracts a lot of people to snatch up. Live streaming from top KOLs and some brands, in normal business day, can also guarantee the consumers the same price as in Double 11. Compared with Live-streaming e-commerce, the rules of double 11 are too complicated and the prices is not very attractive.

Conclusion

Normalize the market and rational consuming. This is what the government has been advocating. The State Administration of Market Regulation also issued a document during the Double 11 saying that platforms should regulate marketing and consumers should shop rationally. Double 11 is still the most important shopping festival, people are also still buying, just not so crazy. If you have any questions related to e-commerce and marketing in China, we are glad to help you.