The success of every phenomenal IP is inseparable from the blessing of the torrent of the times.
Li Jiaqi finally revived before Double 11. Li Jiaqi, who returned after more than a hundred days of interruption, onlookers are wondering whether Li Jiaqi's ability to bring goods is as good as ever. However, for Li Jiaqi himself, I believe that what he cares more about is obviously not whether the sales of Double 11 can break the record, but how far the head anchor can go on the road.
It must be admitted that no matter how enduring an IP, it has a life cycle. Judging from the situation of Li Jiaqi's return for more than a month, on the bright side, Li Jiaqi's popularity and sales data in the live broadcast room are still very beatable, but there are many crises lurking under the undercurrent.
The halo of the first brother is still there, but the low price advantage is gone
Li Jiaqi returned in September in a low-key manner, but the premiere of his return did not seem to be prepared. Li Jiaqi appeared in the live broadcast room on September 20 without any notice and publicity. If the sudden appearance is a surprise for fans, it is a little impossible to say that it was rushed to the air in just two hours because the goods were out of stock.
More likely than a surprise, this premiere was just a cautious test. In addition to giving a certificate to various brand manufacturers who are in a wait-and-see state, it is good that Li Jiaqi's team has a bottom in their hearts. After all, three months in the Internet dimension is enough to change the dynasty of live broadcasting.
Fortunately, Li Jiaqi's appeal is still there, it is reported that this rebroadcast is 2 hours, the audience exceeds 6300W, and the number of likes on the premiere reached 117 million. The total sales of live streaming exceeded 120 million yuan, and many products were sold out within 1 minute. However, it can be seen that Li Jiaqi and the brand have reservations about the premiere, because the selection of premiere is biased towards conservative fast-moving consumer goods, and the inventory given by the brand has also decreased compared to the past.
If you look at the surface live broadcast data alone, the number of likes and viewers in the live broadcast room are crushing other anchors with goods in the same period, and Li Jiaqi's halo of bringing goods is still there. Immediately after, it entered the annual Double 11 pre-sale with goods. Take a closer look, and you will find that the low-price advantage of Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room has begun to disappear.
After six years of operation in Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room, the cognition of "the lowest price on the whole network" has successfully won the minds of consumers. But budget-conscious netizens gradually found that the things Li Jiaqi bought in the live broadcast room were no longer the cheapest.
The trump card of Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room has always been the beauty category, but now even the best category Li Jiaqi has lost its bargaining power.
In Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room, a 60ml bottle of Lancôme Pure Face Cream is priced at 1338 yuan after counting all the gifts. However, when placing an order on Sam's APP, the same product is only 1259 yuan, and you can also make a 97% discount by brushing the designated bank. In addition, Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room now needs to be superimposed with various complex full reduction rules, and it is not as clean as in the past.
Even Li Jiaqi's best beauty and skin care category cannot guarantee the best deal, and other categories are even more difficult. For example, in the Li Jiaqi live broadcast room on October 24, the preferential price of Dyson HD08 hair dryer was 2790 yuan, and the price on Jingdong was 50 yuan cheaper than Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room, as long as 2740 yuan. There is also an iQOO Z5x mobile phone, Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room is priced at 1129 yuan, but the price of Jingdong is 1016 yuan.
"The lowest price on the whole network" is the belief that once belonged to the girls in Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room. The head anchor who can bargain with international brands with his personal strength has stepped down from the altar. Obviously, this year's Double 11 Li Jiaqi live broadcast room did not emphasize the slogan of "the lowest price on the whole network". In fact, as early as this year's 618 event, some netizens revealed in Xiaohongshu that Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room is not cheap for everything, and Li Jiaqi himself also responded that he would continue to negotiate prices with the brand.
The gradually weakening bargaining power is not because Li Jiaqi's popularity has deteriorated so the brand has raised the price, but the gameplay of live broadcast has been updated and the industry is changing.
The industry is changing, and Li Jiaqi is no longer the best choice
For consumers, Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room is not the cheapest, then for the brand side, Li Jiaqi is also not the only channel to bring goods.
The means for live streamers to attract traffic is actually product selection and low prices. And price is always the first consideration for consumers to place orders. Therefore, if the anchor with goods wants to maintain the popularity of his live broadcast room, the bargaining power cannot be abandoned. For the same product, except for the price, there are no other variables between the anchors as a means of grabbing customers. This is also why Li Jiaqi once turned his face because of price problems and L'Oreal and Lancome.
However, the low price of the product can only be achieved by the transfer of the brand side. Part of these profits given up by the brand side is given to consumers, and the other part is given to anchors with goods. So in essence, consumers and Li Jiaqi are sharing the profits of brand transfer.
Since low prices can attract consumers to place orders in their live broadcast rooms, anchors roll up internally to earn a low price advantage. In the past, the promotional slogan of the first sister of the live broadcast used words such as "one yuan lower than Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room", and the price was regarded as the core competitiveness of her live broadcast room.
Although brands have to meet sales targets, they also have to make money. When the brand slowly discovered that if consumers are all buying for their lowest price, then why should I sell in the live broadcast room, directly give profits to consumers, and convert them into sales and marketing sales growth. This is actually very understandable, live streaming e-commerce has come out of the era of floods, and the market of buyers and sellers tends to be rational. For any merchant, the lowest price strategy cannot be played to the end.
Similarly, if you want to rely on the lowest price to get traffic, the meaning of the anchor with goods no longer exists. In fact, super-head anchors like Li Jiaqi are more suitable for "small profits but quick sales" products, and after the short-term performance and sales outbreak, the merchants themselves need to refine their own operations to undertake the traffic in the live broadcast room.
In fact, in the live streaming ecological chain, the interests of merchants, platforms and anchors are not consistent. Of course, this contradiction is not new, but when the traffic of the head anchor is larger and the pricing discourse power is stronger, the contradiction behind it is intensified. For the platform, it is sweet and painful to be tightly tied to a super IP like Li Jiaqi.
In the past, Taobao spent a lot of money to pull the live broadcast brother and sister into its own live broadcast camp, and as a result, two super-head anchors had accidents one after another. Although Li Jiaqi is back, Taobao clearly feels that it cannot put eggs in the same basket. So in a short period of time, the "2022 Home Live Broadcast Plan" and the "2022 Live Broadcast Incentive Plan" were released to the public, the former is to poach corners everywhere, and the latter is to encourage the growth of new anchors. All the measures point to one purpose: decentralization and reducing the traffic monopoly of the top anchors.
This is an unavoidable trend. The wheel of history is rolling, and the head anchor effect created in this live broadcast era has slipped from its peak. Li Jiaqi is no longer the optimal solution for live broadcast for consumers, brands and platforms, and a more reasonable and fair traffic model and live broadcast operation model have gradually formed with the help of all parties.
The pain of "de-heading" transformation
The company behind Li Jiaqi, Mei ONE, once said that "we are all in Li Jiaqi", and this strategy is indeed successful. But it caused an embarrassing situation: without Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room, it can be said that there is nothing.
The vigorous "decentralization" and "de-heading" live streaming movement has shown signs since last year. More and more professional and high-quality practitioners are joining the industry. At the same time, the main body of live broadcast has become richer, and even virtual anchors have debuted, bringing more colors to the industry. As one of the first people to enter live broadcast e-commerce, Li Jiaqi naturally has a sense of the change in the direction of the industry.
As a result, Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room also began to cultivate assistants. After the rebroadcast, Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room had more than an hour of "broadcast assistance", and the broadcast assistance became the main force in the warm-up stage of the live broadcast room. Apparently MeiONE is also preparing another basket of "alternative eggs".
Whether the user group that originally liked Li Jiaqi bought it is unknown, and whether Li Jiaqi's assistants can get rid of Li Jiaqi's personal aura is also a big problem. These will have to pass the test of time to know the answer.
But now Li Jiaqi is facing the embarrassing period of transformation in a down-to-earth manner, even if he begins to cultivate assistants, Li Jiaqi's ability to resist risks is still relatively weak. Because Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room and beauty ONE are typical asset-light operation models, only focusing on live broadcast and online celebrity incubation.
Only under the self-built supply chain system, the anchor's ability to resist risks will be greater, Zhang Dayi is a typical example. After Zhang Dayi collapsed with peachy negative public opinion, Ruhan, the company behind Zhang Dayi, was finally delisted despite a sharp drop in stock price. But this did not affect Ruhan to continue to make money, because Ruhan is a delivery platform with its own supply chain and product selection system. Iron supply chain, flowing anchor. It is precisely because of this mode that Ruhan's hole cards will not be drawn.
Nowadays, all the changes in live streaming e-commerce mean that the industry has finally reached the next cycle. Li Jiaqi's team has also made corresponding changes in the face of environmental changes. The round of live streaming e-commerce horse racing has passed, and barriers have been established. Whether Li Jiaqi can adapt to the evolution of the industry and smoothly transition his business model to the next life cycle will be interesting to see.