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Many major cities in Asia are under COVID lockdown this year, how should you prepare for one of the biggest sales seasons – Double 11 this year? In this article, we studied previous trends in Taiwan and China and summarize 4 must-know key points as your reference. Let’s rock this year’s Double 11 together!

Over-complicated promotion mechanisms and short campaign periods are the typical issues of Double 11. Since last year (2020), we have seen some changes in the overall shopping experience such as multistage campaign period and simplified mechanisms, only to provide customers with a better experience.

So, what are the changes that you should take note of?

1. Extend sales period and organize preorder as warm-up

Ever since Tmall’s Double 11 pre order campaign was introduced in 2015, Tmall has been using the tactic of “preorder” to attract customers to pay deposit first, and pay the rest on 11 Nov in order to secure a lower price. Last year (2020), Tmall extended their preorder period, when customers finished paying deposit on pre-sale day, they had the flexibility to choose whether to pay the rest earlier on 1-3 Nov, in order to receive their products earlier. On the other hand, JD also kicked off their Double 11 campaign period earlier on 21 Oct.

COVID is the reason why major eCommerce companies were adjusting their strategies. JiaLo, VP of Alibaba, suggested that COVID has affected many merchants’ overseas supply chains, to avoid the potential inventory crisis on the day of Double 11, merchants tended to offer a longer sales period of 2 stages to balance their customer service and logistics burden. This also gives merchants the opportunity to observe the sales result of the first stage and fine tune the second accordingly. 

Figure 1. 2020 Double 11 cosmetics flagship store preorder report

For merchants who have enough inventory and marketing budget, we recommend you to kick off your campaigns earlier by doing 1-day pre-sale to test out consumers’ purchasing power this year, and to collect sales leads for advertising as well.

Here’s how you can try with SHOPLINE’s “Preorder Product Setting” to collect and analyze customers’ data for a more effective Double 11 strategy. Enable the pre order feature to your products via the “Advanced Store Management Tools” module. 

Figure 2. Install ‘Preset Product Available Time’ in your via SHOPLINE app store

After installing the ‘Preset Product Available Time’ from Apps Store, go to “Products & Categories” > “Edit” > Enter “Settings” of the product page and set the preorder date and time. Please find detailed operation steps in the FAQ. Without further ado, if merchants want to test the water using the preorder, try it out for the upcoming Double 11!

Figure 3. Set ‘Preset Product Available Time’ to sell for preorders

In addition, merchants could also try two-stage promotions. Not only can separating Double 11 events into stages relieve the stress of the order amount during the brand’s anniversary, but continue the Double 11 fad, and make November a whole month for customers to go shopping.

Key takeaways:

• Merchants can organize preorder events via the preorder functions in SHOPLINE as a warmup for Double 11 this year and also collect preorder consumer lists for retargeting.
• Separating events into stages can reduce the order traffic between each event and keep on promoting the Double 11 events.

2. Brand new customer experience includes both online and offline campaign

In the past, traffic stayed online during the Double 11 period, making only a few offline merchants engaged. This year, the number of merchants in China who engaged in Double 11 offline campaigns has increased by almost 1.4 times. This is relevant with the resources and funds that platforms have put in. While in Taiwan, PChome 24h teamed up with Global Mall to open pop-up counters to take advantage of physical experiences along with the benefits from department stores anniversary sales, eliminate barriers between on and offline Double 11 campaigns, and build an excellent overall experience for customers.

SHOPLINE ourselves also opened our first pop-up stores, POWERED BY SHOPLINE, in Central, Hong Kong. Regularly inviting different SHOPLINE merchants as guests, launching various theme products, and demonstrating SHOPLINE POS system and live stream corner (for displaying SHOPLINE LIVE), POWERED BY SHOPLINE provides merchants access to the latest O2O trend. For the upcoming Double 11, POWERED BY SHOPLINE is also planning to hold events cooperated with brands in an O2O, both virtual and reality, way and create better retail shopping experiences for them. 

Figure 5. SHOPLINE’s first physical pop-up store – POWERED BY SHOPLINE

For brands that have physical stores, they can also try to set both on and offline marketing strategies. For example, selling special products on different channels or making use of the online traffic during Double 11 to stimulate purchases (especially for products at high prices). To reduce freight costs and satisfy customers’ needs, merchants can allow customers to pick up at physical stores and offer them actual experiences to lower the return rate at the same time.

As long as you sell on and offline simultaneously, the key in it is to sync your member’s information. By using SHOPLINE CRM – Credits Module can integrate your members both on and offline, the labor costs that are used to manually synchronize information can be reduced. The collected customer list can also be used after Double 11 events for remarketing to increase the rate of repurchase and drive visitors from physical stores to the website. 

Key takeaways:

• Merchants can hold promotion campaigns both online and offline and launch channel special edition products to stimulate purchase in each channel.
• Merchants selling products at high prices could allow customers to place orders online at a Double 11 discount price then pick up at the physical stores to reduce the possibility of them refunding after purchase.
• Integrate on and offline membership, collect the offline visitor list for online remarketing, provide them more channel options and increase the rate of repurchase

3. Focus on audience with increasing consumption ability: Baby boomers and Gen Z

Lastly, the structure of the shopping population has also changed due to the pandemic. Baby boomers (born between 1945-1965) who used to buy offline now start turning to online shopping, too. Additionally, more and more Generation Z are entering the workforce and gaining consumption ability. Hence in this year, these two audiences are the ones whom merchants could target. By communicating with them in their words and ways, the conversion possibility could be increased.

For instance, in past Double 11 events, many eCommerce platforms and brands offered various sales promotions, which have complicated mechanisms that confuse customers. Therefore, JD.com decides to simplify its discount tricks and provide clear preferential prices that confuse customers less. Meanwhile, baby boomers and Generation Z who have just joined the ranks of online shopping could be aware of the prices more straightforwardly and have a higher possibility to make purchases.

Nevertheless, merchants can make use of promotion functions in SHOPLINE, such as“Special discount with minimum spend of $xxx”, “Bundling sales”, “Item A + item B for special offer”, etc. Providing a clear and easy-to-use interface, customers’ unnecessary jumping between pages can be reduced; the point campaign can be engaged at the same time (e.g. 2x points reward); and member referral campaigns (e.g. recommend to your friends to get rewards), to attracts baby boomers to place their orders and share to gain more brand awareness. 

Figure 6. Member Referral Campaign drives customers refer your brands to others 

Summary

Have you already come up with any new marketing ideas for Double 11 after reading? Feel free to share with us! What’s more, due to the post-pandemic era with countless restrictions, it is possible for consumers to go vengeful shopping. Such as transferring the expense on travelling and hanging out to going shopping. Therefore, Double 11 this year may bring bigger traffic and sales than ever. Let’s hope merchants take good advantage of the trend and make the peak season last until 2021!