【经济学人精读】为什么直播女王薇娅带货能力这么强？

      *注：本文摘自6月4日《彭博商业周刊》

　　1.Viya’s team likes to say she’s successful because she’s picky on behalf of her customers.Once a day,her teams present their top picks.One recent evening,a few dozen employees were packed into a conference room at 1 a.m.,eager to see what their colleagues would put forth—and to hear Viya’s verdict.

　　薇娅的团队称薇娅的成功来源于她的挑剔。她的团队每天都会给她看他们选出来的最佳产品。最近一天晚上，凌晨一点，几十名员工挤进一间会议室，急切地想看看薇娅会选什么，想听听她的意见。

　　2.An electric shaver was deemed too noisy,a sugar candy too sweet,a silicon Peppa Pig ice tray a possible copyright violation.She’s also sensitive to price.“There’s no way they sell this for 399 and want us to sell it for 389,”she says,holding a Zippo-style butane lighter.“Go bargainfor below 300.”

　　她觉得一款电动剃须刀噪音太大，糖块太甜，粉红小猪的硅胶冰盘可能侵权了。她对价格也很敏感。她手里拿着一个zippo风格的打火机，说“这玩意儿他们卖399美元，却想要我们卖389美元，这不可能。去，把价格谈到300元以下。”

　　3.Good stuff at low prices isn’t enough to break through in China’s crowded marketplace,let alone get rich.Viya’s show is a master class in salesmanship,said Andy Yap,a social psychologist at INSEAD business school in Singapore.She’s personable and appears genuine without trying too hard.

　　物美价廉的商品在中国竞争激烈是市场是很难取得突破，更别说是大赚一笔了。新加坡欧洲工商管理学院的社会心理学家安迪·雅普说，薇娅的直播在推销方面简直是大师级的。薇娅和善真诚，丝毫不刻意。

　　4.But then,she’s been doing this a long time.Born into a family of retailers in Anhui province,Viya opened her first store in Beijing with her then-boyfriend,now-husband Dong Haifeng,when she was 18.He ran the inventory and back-end.Viya modeled and sold the apparel.

　　薇娅在这一行已经干了很长时间了。薇娅出生在安徽，她家就是做零售的。18岁时，她和当时的男友、现在的丈夫董海峰在北京开了第一家店。他负责库存和后端，薇娅担任模特并销售服装。

　　5.She craved a bigger stage and,in 2005,won the“Super Idol”TV reality contest in Anhui.For a while she fronted a pop group.In the end,her home was in retail.She and Dong opened stores in the central Chinese province of Xian,but by 2012,they’d moved their entire business online.When Taobao launched its livestreaming initiative in 2016,Viya was one of its first recruits.

　　她渴望更大的舞台，2005年，她在安徽的“超级偶像”电视真人秀比赛中获胜。有一段时间她担任一个流行乐队的主唱。后来，她还是回到了零售行业。她和董在中国中部省份西安开了家店，到2012年，他们专做线上。当淘宝在2016年推出直播计划时，薇娅是淘宝首批招募的员工之一。

　　6.A blend of performance and sales,livestreaming suits Viya.When her show traveled to Wuhan this spring to promote products from the virus-torn city,she dug into local delicacies likecrayfish and duck neck with relish.She raved about the flavor while answering real-time viewer questions,like whether delivery is free to far-west cities or how spicy a given snack was.

　　直播集表演和销售于一身，非常适合薇娅。今年春天，她在直播间推销饱受病毒蹂躏的武汉的产品的时候，她津津有味地品尝了小龙虾和鸭脖等当地美食。在回答实时观看者提出的问题时，她滔滔不绝，回答了是否包邮，食物够不够辣等问题。

　　7.And,of course,everything is available at a deep discount,as long as it lasts.The link to buy a product isn’t released until after Viya’s done pitching and counts down:“5,4,3,2,1.”If a particularly popular deal runs out,she sometimes pleads with her off-camera producers on behalf of her audience to release more.It’s an honest question—the team is keeping track of inventory and sales in real-time—and a heck of a tactic.

　　当然，只要还有库存,薇娅直播间的每件产品折扣都很大。在Viya完成推销并倒数“5,4,3,2,1”之后，购买产品的链接才会发布。如果一件特别受欢迎的东西抢完了，薇娅有时候会替观众问工作人员可不可以再上一些。这关乎诚信，团队实时跟踪库存和销售情况，这个策略非常好。

　　8.“The perception of scarcity is a powerful psychological tool to get people to act fast,which leads to impulse buying,”said INSEAD's Yap.“In a livestream,it’s even more intense because the time is shorter and there are a lot of other viewers who may be potential buyers.People feel more urgency.”

　　欧洲工商管理学院的Yap表示:“稀缺感是一种强大的心理工具，可以促使人们迅速采取行动，从而导致冲动消费。在直播中，这种稀缺感更加密集，因为时间更短，而且还有很多其他观众可能也是潜在的买家。人们感到更加紧迫。”

　　9.Alibaba’s technology,meanwhile,makes buying really easy.Viewers need a log-in to watch on Taobao,the company’s online marketplace,which means their shipping address and payment information are already stored.Viya uses the platform’s lottery feature for giveaways throughout the show,and that gets the audience engaged and primed to click.When a shopper chooses a product,the broadcast window gets smaller but never disappears.The transaction ends and the window grows again.There’s Viya,still talking,hyping the next deal.

　　与此同时，阿里巴巴的技术使得购买更加便捷。观众要登陆淘宝账号之后才可以观看直播，这就意味着他们的收货地址和支付信息已经都已经被采集到了。在整个直播过程中，薇娅使用淘宝的抽奖功能来发放赠品，这让观众充分参与进来，随时做好下单的准备。当顾客选择一种产品时，直播窗口会变小，但不会消失。购买结束，直播窗口再次放大，而薇娅还在介绍下一件产品。

　　10.Whether livestream shopping will catch on outside of China seems to depend in part on the ability of companies like Amazon and Facebook to integrate their entertainment offerings with shopping and payments.As of now,you might learn about a product on Instagram,but you can’t buy it there,points out Evans.Meanwhile Amazon has the opposite problem:It’s great at selling things,but only if you already know what you want.

　　直播购物能否在国外发展起来似乎取决于亚马逊和Facebook等公司能否将娱乐服务与购物和支付结合起来。埃文斯指出，到目前为止，你可能在Instagram上了解到一款产品，但你无法直接在那里购买。与此同时，亚马逊却遇到了相反的问题：亚马逊擅长销售产品，但是是在消费者已经知道自己想要的是什么的前提下。

　　11.In China,users spend a lot more time inside what are known as“superapps.”Alibaba in particular is ubiquitous:its infrastructure powers shopping sites Taobao and Tmall;the banking and credit affiliates Ant Financial,Alipay and Sesame Credit;the logistics arm Cainiao that handles shipping and returns.

　　在中国，用户在“超级应用”上花了很多时间。阿里巴巴无处不在，它有推动购物的淘宝和天猫，有支撑银行和信贷的蚂蚁金服、支付宝和芝麻信用，还有负责运输和退货的物流部门菜鸟。

　　12.“You have to have an environment to cultivate a habit,”Viya said.“For example,in order to create trust between us and our customers,which is the most important thing,the customers should have solid trust in Taobao.They know they won’t buy fake goods from the platform,they trust the logistics system to guarantee the freshness of whatever food they order,and they trust the services.That’s the prerequisite.”

　　薇娅说，“你得有一个培养习惯的环境，比如，在我们和客户之间建立信任，这是最重要的，客户应该对淘宝有牢固的信任。他们知道这个平台上不会出售假货，他们相信物流系统能够保证他们的食物新鲜，他们也相信服务会很好。这是前提条件。”

　　13.Outside China,more graceful retail technology does seem to be on the horizon.Facebook’s partnership with Shopify moves Instagram one baby step further along.Livestream gamers who get cash tips from fans get part of the way there.Gambling companies are working in a similar vein,developing real-time online sports-betting platforms to run alongside live events.Alibaba is building its stable of western influencers,and TikTok parent ByteDance debuted its own high-profile Chinese shopping show in April.

　　在国外，更成熟的零售技术似乎即将出现。Facebook与Shopify的合作让Instagram又向前迈出了一小步。从粉丝那里获得现金奖励的直播游戏玩家也在慢慢走向直播销售。博彩公司也在进行类似的工作，开发实时体育博彩平台，以便与现场赛事同步运行。阿里巴巴正在打造自己在西方的影响力，TikTok母公司字节跳动今年4月推出了高调的中国购物秀。

　　14.Procter&Gamble,which spends more money on advertising than any other global company,is certainly intrigued.When executives from other parts of the world come to China,company spokesperson makes sure they get an introduction to livestreaming.

　　宝洁公司在广告上的投入比全球任何一家跨国公司都要多，当然会对此很感兴趣。当世界各地的高管来到中国时，公司发言人会确保他们能接触到直播。

　　15.“It’s become indispensable for us to give them a half hour or more to experience livestreaming,not just watching but broadcasting on their own,”said Lu.“We give them a little training,teach them how to count down like Viya.”P&G also hosts its own live shopping channels in China,and while their reach doesn't match Viya’s,it foreshadows the tension between consumer companies with products to sell,the influencers who gather an audience and the platforms that execute the transactions.

　　该公司发言人说:“给他们半个小时或更长的时间来体验直播，这是必不可少的。不仅仅只是让他们看直播，还得让他们自己参与其中。我们会给他们一些培训，教他们如何向薇娅一样倒数。”宝洁还在中国开设了自己的直播购物频道，尽管这些频道的覆盖范围还远远比不上薇娅，但这预示着消费品公司、吸引受众的网络红人和执行交易的平台之间的紧张关系。

　　16.To bolster their own credibility,livestreamers demand deep discounts and generous add-ons from the brands they work with.And the long-term effects of a successful promotion can be modest.Less than 10%of customers through livestreams become repeat buyers,compared with 40%of the customers who come directly through Tmall,said Roger Huang,China CEO for Saville&Quinn,a U.K.skincare company.”“It’s just one wave,and then it’s over.They’re Viya’s fans and they follow her call,”he said.“Livestreaming is very effective,but we can’t get addicted.”

　　为了提高自己的信誉，主播要求合作品牌提供大幅折扣和附加服务。一次成功推销的影响可能是有限的。英国护肤公司萨维尔&奎因的中国首席执行长Roger Huang说，通过直播购买商品的顾客中，只有不到10%的回头客，而直接通过天猫购买的顾客中则有40%的回头客。他说，“只有这一波顾客，之后就没有了。他们是薇娅的粉丝，只会听从她的召唤。直播非常有效，但是我们不能太过依赖于此。”

　　17.For her part,Viya’s power is built on popularity,and she and her team nurture the audience accordingly.If a viewer complains about a product in the online chat that runs alongside the livestream,Viya will notice and,often,rectify the situation.Her fans call her Dora-Viya,anhomage to the time-traveling,wish-fulfilling anime hero Doraemon.

　　薇娅的吸引力建立在人气之上，相应地，她和她的团队也培养了观众。如果观众在直播聊天室中抱怨某个产品，薇娅会看到，还会纠正这样的做法。她的粉丝称她“哆啦薇娅”，和那个能够穿越时空，满足人们愿望的哆啦A梦一样。

　　18.During the worst weeks of the coronavirus outbreak,Viya promised her fans she would visit the Yellow Crane Tower in Wuhan.At the end of April,shortly after the city re-opened,Team Viya drove 11 hours to the 2,000-year-old landmark.“Let’s help Hubei together,”she said,on video filmed in front of the tower.Then she offered the ubiquitous phrase of encouragement:“Jiayou!”(“Cheer up!”)

　　在疫情最严重的那几个周里面，薇娅向粉丝承诺说她会去参观黄鹤楼。4月底，武汉重新开放不久之后，薇娅就和她的团队驱车十一小时来到有着两千年历史的黄鹤楼。她在塔前拍摄的视频中说，“让我们一起来帮助湖北。”之后，她还说了一句无所不在的话：“加油！”

　　19.Before Viya’s show came online that night,the footage rolled as part of a looped video tribute to Wuhan’s revitalization.By the time she appeared in the same yellow suit and fat white sneakers she’d worn in the video—there were more than 160,000 people logged in and waiting.She greeted them like long-lost friends.“Hello!Hello,”she said,as she does in every broadcast.“I am here!I am here!I am here!I am here!”

　　当晚，在直播之前，这段视频被当作是纪念武汉重新开放的致敬视频循环播放。当她穿着自己拍摄视频时穿的那套黄色套装和白色厚底运动鞋出现在直播间的时候，已经有超过16万人在直播间等着她了。她像久违的朋友一样问候他们。“你们好！你们好!我在这里!我在这里!我在这里!我在这里!”

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