Taipei, Taiwan – Alice Guo sparked quite a lot of curiosity on Xiaohongshu, the Chinese language e-commerce and social media platform, when someday in 2021 she determined to share recommendations on methods to put together for a job interview.
Guo, born in China, was residing in Toronto on the time, grounded by the COVID-19 pandemic after years of alternating jobs in Vancouver, Hong Kong, New York, Los Angeles and Shanghai.
“I began making some posts and someday I posted in regards to the interview course of that obtained me to a enterprise capital agency,” Guo, who’s in his early 30s, advised Al Jazeera.
“I awakened the following day and immediately I went from about 20 followers to 500 followers in a single day.”
Earlier than lengthy, Guo’s web page, known as “Ali is working arduous” in Chinese language, gained an viewers of round 45,000 followers, drawn by a mixture of profession recommendation and updates about his each day life in Canada.
Guo’s web page is amongst numerous Xiaohongshu accounts which have tapped right into a consumer base comprised primarily of younger, extremely educated ladies, each in main Chinese language cities and in migrant communities overseas.
Though it lacks the worldwide recognition of Fb, Instagram, or
The platform, which has been described as China’s reply to Instagram, had 200 million month-to-month energetic customers in 2022, in accordance with self-reported information, about 70 p.c of whom have been ladies.
Whereas Xiaohongshu interprets as “Little Purple Guide” in English (the identical title as Mao Zedong’s well-known textual content), the platform has little else in widespread with the Chinese language chief’s assortment of speeches and writings.
Slightly than selling revolutionary values, the platform, which mixes weblog posts and brief movies, exemplifies China’s post-communist client tradition, which is aspirational, bold and globally minded.
And for ladies in a society the place political dissent is strictly managed and socially conservative attitudes prevail, Xiaohongshu has develop into a type of sanctuary for like-minded friends to freely talk about problems with widespread curiosity.
Customers share content material on a variety of subjects, from comparatively uncontroversial subjects like work life and trend, to semi-taboo (though not overtly political) subjects like divorce, home violence, and the notion that girls who They haven’t married or had youngsters by their 30s, they’re failures or undesirable.
“These are all stereotypes, however they’re there. It’s actual and it generates nervousness,” Daniela, a Xiaohongshu consumer who requested to be talked about solely by her first title, advised Al Jazeera.
“And naturally, quite a lot of actually gifted ladies with unimaginable backgrounds face actually large profession challenges,” added Daniela, who posts content material associated to profession development and ladies’s empowerment to her greater than 125,000 followers.
Regardless of Beijing’s heavy Web censorship, discussions of controversial subjects are sometimes allowed on Xiaohongshu, particularly in the event that they concentrate on private experiences moderately than bigger systemic points in Chinese language society.
Nonetheless, there are pink strains.
One Xiaohongshu consumer, who requested to not be recognized, advised Al Jazeera that posts she made about her expertise freezing her eggs have been eliminated, though the Chinese language authorities is pressuring ladies to have extra youngsters.
The platform has additionally cracked down on some shows of conspicuous consumption, warning customers to be extra “empathetic” and never flaunt their wealth as it’s “nonetheless out of attain for a big proportion of individuals.”
Equally, customers have been discouraged from over-editing their images and movies.
A part of Xiaohongshu’s attraction is that it embodies a refined female aesthetic or “jinzhi” that requires “not solely cash, but in addition cultural and academic capital” to attain, distinguishing it from extra male-dominated platforms like WeChat and Weibo, in accordance with Jia Guo, professor of gender and cultural research on the College of Sydney.
“Jinzhi has at all times been a giant a part of Xiaohongshu,” Guo advised Al Jazeera. “What lies behind this jinzhi way of life is a labeled client tradition in post-socialist China and a labeled style distinction. To be jinzhi you needn’t solely cash, but in addition cultural and academic capital. “This middle-class city way of life is standard in Xiaohongshu and can also be extremely gendered, typically introduced by younger ladies.”
Since its founding greater than a decade in the past, Xiaohongshu has additionally develop into adept at understanding its customers, because of its “revolutionary” algorithm, stated Sheng Zou, an assistant professor at Hong Kong Baptist College who researches the digital financial system.
Zou stated Xiaohongshu customers typically cite the algorithm as a part of its attraction.
“Most would agree that the algorithm is correct and efficient at detecting and/or predicting their content material preferences or elements of their id, extra so than different standard apps they’re utilizing,” Zou advised Al Jazeera.
“You may go actually deep into completely different communities,” James Hsu, a Taiwanese-Canadian primarily based in China who makes use of Xiaohongshu to advertise teaching and consulting companies, advised Al Jazeera, explaining how “many influencers really create group chats that you could simply be part of by going to your profile web page.”
“It feels extra like an actual useful resource than pure leisure, as a result of you possibly can positively go in there to study issues like arduous abilities or tender abilities, like methods to begin a enterprise, methods to interview for a job, and there are various, many intersections with that. ”Hsu stated.
Revenue issues
Regardless of having a loyal and rising following, Xiaohongshu has till not too long ago struggled to make cash.
In its early days, Xiaohonghsu had a robust e-commerce part, the place Chinese language shoppers might get dependable international merchandise, a boon in a rustic affected by counterfeit items and fakes.
The platform step by step shifted over time in direction of instructional and way of life content material and, extra not too long ago, with the rise of short-form movies, dwell purchasing and provides from influential manufacturers.
Olivia Plotnick, founding father of Shanghai-based advertising company Wai Social, stated Xiaohongshu seems to have discovered its area of interest in most of these offers.
“They’ve had quite a lot of hassle attempting to monetize over the previous few years, and I believe they’ve not too long ago discovered probably a great way to do it with dwell streaming,” Plotnick advised Al Jazeera.
These offers usually are not low cost, as Chinese language influencers can cost three to 5 instances greater than their Western counterparts, Plotnick stated.
An influencer with 10,000 followers can cost between $300 and $500 per put up, whereas an influencer with greater than 300,000 followers can cost $5,000, he stated.
Plotnick stated most of these partnerships are engaging for manufacturers, as Xiaohongshu has at all times been robust in rising model consciousness, even when its e-commerce part lags behind retail giants comparable to Taobao and Tmall.
In the meantime, the platform distinguishes itself from its opponents because of a live-streaming type that gives a sense of “tranquil luxurious,” he stated.
The method seems to be paying off.
Xiaohongshu, whose main buyers embody Alibaba, Tencent and US-based GGV Capital, made its first revenue final 12 months, incomes $500 million on income of $3.7 billion, the Monetary Occasions reported in March, citing folks knowledgeable on the matter.
Xiaohongshu didn’t reply to a request for remark.
Because it seeks to shore up its monetary place, Xiaohongshu has additionally been attempting to diversify its consumer base.
Regardless of having about 200 million customers, its buyer base remains to be small in comparison with platforms comparable to Weibo, Douyin and WeChat, which have between 600 million and greater than 1.2 billion customers.
Xiaohongshu’s push to develop its consumer base consists of outreach efforts to males and those that dwell outdoors China’s “tier one” and “tier two” cities, comparable to Beijing and Shanghai.
Xiaohongshu can also be gaining traction outdoors mainland China, together with in Hong Kong, Taiwan and Western cities with giant Chinese language diaspora populations, comparable to Toronto, the place Alice Guo of “Ali is Working Onerous” relies.
Guo stated {that a} third of her viewers comes from North America and that she herself is an avid client of content material created within the diaspora.
“It is like my Yelp, it is like my Google. So if I need to discover the place to eat, what to eat, I search for it in Xiaohongshu. Particularly in Toronto, there are tons of Chinese language, so virtually each restaurant has a great overview and I can discover content material about it,” Guo stated.
“If I need to learn a ebook and understand how good it’s, I’m going to Xiaohongshu. After which if I need to learn about make-up, I’m going to Xiaohongshu.”
