iSuite Insights Spotlight - Issue #10 Discover The Latest E-commerce Trends And Opportunities

Xiaohongshu (XHS), China's leading social commerce platform dedicated to enriching lives, has transformed into a vibrant #community where users enthusiastically share insights about fashion, beauty, food, travel, and more. Seamlessly integrating content, community, and ecommerce, XHS stands as the ultimate destination for Chinese consumers.

The Chinese Labor Day Holiday is an exciting time for the tourism market. The 2023 Labor Day Holiday is the first "Golden Week" holiday since lifting travel restrictions. It showcased a remarkable surge in outbound travel, with spending surpassing pre-pandemic levels. Data from Ctrip shows that overall outbound travel booking volume climbed by about 700% compared to the same period in the previous year, with outbound air ticket and hotel booking volume jumping by almost 900% and 450%, respectively, compared to the same period in 2022.

China is one of the largest travel and tourism markets in the world. Despite the challenges posed by the pandemic, the outlook for Chinese outbound tourism remains optimistic, with a strong rebound expected in the coming years. According to the forecast of China Outbound Tourism Research Institute, the number of outbound trips is expected to reach 115 million by the end of 2023, showing a strong desire for overseas travel.

China has eased its zero-COVID policy and reopened its borders to tourists after three years of COVID-19 closure. The border reopening is a significant step towards economic recovery and the resumption of cross-border activities. According to travel platform Trip.com, outbound travel orders surged 640 percent YoY over the Chinese New Year holiday, while Chinese mainland tourists' bookings for overseas hotels and international flight tickets both soared more than four times over the same period of last year.

China, the world's largest market for outbound travel pre-COVID, reopened its border to international travelers on Jan 8 2023, lighting up prospects for global economic recovery. According to Trip.com Group data, overseas travel orders for the seven days during Spring Festival had surged by 540% YoY. It is expected that overseas tourist destinations will welcome an influx of Chinese tourists during the holiday.

After 14 years of development, China’s Double 11 Shopping Festival has matured. This year, instead of announcing sales results, E-commerce platforms are focusing more on achievements in areas such as helping farmers, going green and environmental protection, as well as long-term retention and conversion of core customers.

Hainan’s duty free retailers have fully resumed business since September after a COVID-enforced 47-day closure just in time to welcome visitors for Golden Week celebrations and the grand opening of China Duty Free Group’s Haikou International Duty Free Shopping Complex and its 280,000 sqm duty free zone i.e. CDF Haikou International Duty Free City, which is dubbed as the world’s largest single duty free store.

In recent years, Metaverse became one of the buzzwords, a concept linked with technologies such as augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR), artificial intelligence (AI), and the Internet of Things (IoT) and has elevated buzz in countries such as China. According to iiMedia Research, a survey conducted in 2021 among Chinese netizens, over 70 percent of respondents stated that they had a sufficient understanding of metaverse, the most popular applications were game IP avatars, followed by personal and community virtual spaces. Riding on the growing popularity of the metaverse, fashion brands can now interact with consumers in more diversified touchpoints, bringing new virtual shopping experiences to the industry. According to China Metaverse Investment and Financing Data Report, China’s metaverse industry has received at least USD 780 million investment in 2022. With the emergence of the metaverse, Chinese fashion brands can engage their customers more digitally and creatively. Check out our 5th issue of “iSuite Insights Spotlight – Chinese metaverse-related fashion brands in the Spotlight”, leveraging the latest Chinese netizens’ data provided by the iAudience platform to understand the profiles, demographics, and psychographic dimensions of audiences interested in metaverse fashion.