On the evening of May 28, Lin Sheng, the founder of Zhongxuegao, appeared in the Taobao live broadcast room of "Zhongxuegao Laolin", selling sweet potatoes, hairy tripe, tea and other products, and bringing goods for his own ice cream. He admitted frankly in the live broadcast room that he hoped to alleviate the company's cash flow pressure through live broadcasting, and bowed and apologized to the 729 employees who were owed wages.
Lin Sheng repaid his debts through live broadcasting, which was the same as Luo Yonghao's debt repayment path back then. For Lin Sheng, in the context of more and more live broadcasts, how to replicate Luo Yonghao's success?
Sell sweet potatoes to pay off debts
On May 28, Lin Sheng, the founder of Zhongxuegao, officially walked into the live broadcast room and started the road of live broadcast to repay debts. In the live broadcast room, Boss Lin, who was restricted from high consumption due to arrears, said, "Doing live broadcast is a particularly tangled thing for me, and I will gradually repay the money to 729 employees after making money from live broadcasting." ”
In addition to expressing his position, Lao Lin's main purpose in entering the live broadcast room is to sell goods. On the same day, 75 items such as sweet potatoes, hairy tripe, tea and Zhongxuegao were placed in the shopping bags of the live broadcast room. For his own products, Lin Sheng said that the second and third Zhongxue high inventory will not be enough to sell, and it will take 20 days to prepare.
However, the most controversial product in the live broadcast room that day was sweet potatoes. "5 catties of sweet potatoes for 42.9 yuan" was accused of "sweet potato assassin". Some netizens said, "Do you want to engage in sweet potato assassins after the ice cream assassin?" Some netizens even questioned, why not buy those lower-priced goods in the vegetable market?
For the price is too high, according to the sweet potato R & D personnel, the product is a newly developed sweet potato type, which has a better taste and is very delicious. Lin Sheng also emphasized in the live broadcast that behind a delicious sweet potato is the hard work and dedication of farmers, and we need to cherish it. Netizens don't seem to buy this explanation. After the live broadcast, the cumulative number of orders for the sweet potato was only 200+, which shows the attitude of consumers. Although the profit margin of selling sweet potatoes is low, Lin Sheng believes that helping farmers and helping high-quality sweet potatoes find sales is his focus, and it is expected to bring more traditional intangible cultural heritage cooperative products in the future.
The founder of the former "Ice Cream Assassin" came out with goods to pay off his debts, attracting many netizens to watch. According to the data, as of the end of the live broadcast, the cumulative number of views in Lin Sheng's live broadcast room was nearly 850,000 times. As the first show, Lin Sheng did not have a high-spirited slogan in the live broadcast room, but an immersive "slow live broadcast" to attract consumers to place orders step by step.
Zhong Xuegao fell
The American economist Veblen proposed in his book "The Theory of the Leisure Class" that the higher the price of some commodities is set, the more favored they will be by consumers. This is known as the "Veblen effect". Zhong Xuegao's fame is a successful case of this effect.
Founded in 2018, Zhong Xuegao can be seen from the name that the founder has lofty ambitions. It is reported that Zhong Xuegao is a homonym for "Chinese ice cream", and Lin Sheng's goal is to "make the best ice cream in China".
As an emerging brand, Zhong Xuegao has great ambitions, directly abandoning the parity market, deciding to take the high-end route, pursuing less and refined, and fighting a bloody way in the cold drink market of the Red Sea. For the high-end route, the price is the main embodiment. It is reported that most of Zhong Xuegao's products initially cost more than 20 yuan.
Relying on labels such as foreign origin, high pricing, and scarcity, Zhongxuegao has gone quite smoothly on the road to high-end. To this day, when it comes to Zhong Xuegao, many people still think of that Ecuadorian pink diamond ice cream. The price is 66 yuan and the supply is limited, such a marketing strategy made Zhong Xuegao an instant hit and quickly out of the circle. The unattainable Zhongxuegao is known as the "Hermes of the ice cream industry".
When young people are scrambling to check in the "Hermes of ice cream", the crisis seems to be surging undercurrent. Because of the "butterfly effect" caused by negative information such as "ice cream can't burn" and "ice cream assassin", Zhong Xuegao fell into the predicament of tight cash flow. In August 2023, Zhongxuegao's multiple self-media operation channels will stop updating. Subsequently, information such as arrears of employees' wages was exposed one after another.
According to public information, Zhongxuegao Food (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. has 2 pieces of information on the person subject to execution, with a total amount of more than 9.83 million yuan, and its subsidiary Zhongmao (Shanghai) Food Technology Co., Ltd. has been executed for more than 23.72 million yuan since the beginning of this year. In addition, Zhongxuegao Food (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. was involved in a number of legal litigation cases, most of which were service contract disputes, sales contract disputes, etc. In February this year, Lin Sheng, the founder of Zhongxuegao, was saddled with a consumption restriction order and became a "lai".
In order to get out of the predicament, Lin Sheng actively raised funds, but with little success. On April 21, after a party, Lin Sheng said through social media, "I have to pay off my debts even if I sell sweet potatoes!" Although Zhong Xuegao's fall is sighing or questioning, in the face of debt, Lin Sheng's attitude of "not running, not running and not cowardly" is still worthy of praise.
The end of "Lai" is live streaming?
Lin Sheng's "selling sweet potatoes also has to repay debts" has become a hot topic among netizens. As the so-called "old lai", Lin Sheng's debt repayment plan is to bring the goods live in person.
In the face of huge debts, these bosses "meet" live broadcast to bring goods to repay debts, no wonder some netizens jokingly said that the end of the "old lai" is live broadcast goods. However, one of the topics that Toutiaojun is more curious about is, can Lin Sheng become the next Luo Yonghao?
Relying on live broadcast to repay debts, Luo Yonghao is of typical significance. He once laughed at himself that this debt repayment experience was a realistic version of the "true repayment", and he paid off the debt of 600 million yuan in less than 3 years. After him, "bring goods to renew the life of the Tianya community" and "sell sweet potatoes to repay debts"......
The protagonists of each "True Story" are different, but they all try to quickly fill the black hole of funds by using live streaming to make quick money. However, there are not many people who can become the next Luo Yonghao, most of the "old lai" are either struggling in the live broadcast track, or quietly hiding.
Let's take a look at Luo Yonghao's premiere transcript: 3 hours with goods, a transaction volume of more than 110 million yuan, and 48 million viewers. After 8 months of live broadcasting, Luo Yonghao ranked among the top three in the whole network, second only to Wei Ya and Li Jiaqi. His success is not only due to personal factors, but also to the platform and outlets.
First of all, the personal IP foundation is good. Through years of accumulation, Luo Yonghao has a certain influence inside and outside the circle. The data shows that Luo Yonghao has a large number of fans on social platforms, with more than 20 million fans on the whole platform. This is an IP with a huge fan base and traffic base.
Secondly, the support of Douyin. When Luo Yonghao debuted as a live broadcast, there were already head anchors in the domestic goods circle, such as Simba of Kuaishou, Wei Ya and Li Jiaqi of Taobao. Douyin urgently needs its own head anchor. Luo Yonghao, who has a good personal IP foundation, hit it off with Douyin, and each took what he needed. After eating the first wave of resource dividends on Douyin, the anchor Lao Luo left a legend of "debut is the peak" for the industry.
Finally, the team and supply chain advantages. Behind Lao Luo, there is an operation team with mature experience and supply chain support. It is reported that in the field of live broadcasting, Luo Yonghao has received cooperation invitations from thousands of brands, which has allowed its "press conference + live broadcast" form to be smoothly promoted.
For Lin Sheng, if you want to become the next Luo Yonghao, the first thing to do is to review Luo Yonghao's successful experience. Toutiaojun believes that although live streaming is becoming more and more popular, the industry is becoming more and more involuted, and it is becoming more and more difficult to make a name. For Lin Sheng, selling sweet potatoes to pay off debts is not a new story, and it is difficult to continue to gain consumer recognition if there is enthusiasm or miserable sales in the live broadcast room. He clearly needed to think fresh and new.