Singles’ Day: Mini games keep shoppers coming back for more on Taobao and JD.com
- E-commerce platforms in China are gamifying the world’s largest shopping festival to keep shoppers spending more time in their apps
- Getting friends to join a team can lead to even bigger deals, but some people on social media liken the sharing feature to spam
Since late October, Mao Biying has been spending four to five hours every day feeding and dressing up a virtual cat on her smartphone. But the college student based in China’s Hebei province, who asked to go by a pseudonym, was not playing for the sake of caring for a digital pet. What she was really after were coupons for products sold during the world’s biggest shopping festival, Singles’ Day.
Playing games has increasingly become part of China’s online shopping experience in recent years as e-commerce platforms compete for consumers’ attention against a plethora of other online entertainment options. With in-app mini games, shoppers compete for the best deals possible during Singles’ Day, China’s massive shopping bonanza on November 11 that saw shoppers spend US$38.4 billion last year.
“In general, e-commerce in China has become more than just filling your cart and clicking ‘checkout’. It is becoming even more engaging and social,” said Allison Malmsten, China market analyst at Daxue Consulting. “Many mobile users shop as a form of entertainment, and brands are getting more competitive to keep and maintain user attention. Selling products alone just doesn’t cut it any more.”
While some platforms are finding success with these games, they also risk alienating some consumers fatigued by what they perceive as spam from constant invitations to play the games.
But the rewards are too enticing for shoppers and platforms alike. Two of China’s largest e-commerce platforms, JD.com and Alibaba Group Holding’s Taobao, said they are each distributing 2 billion yuan (US$301.8) through virtual games this year. Alibaba is the parent company of the South China Morning Post.
Taobao said it will be distributing the money in “red packets”, or shopping coupons, through a game in which players level-up virtual cats. JD’s coupons will be distributed through a mini game in which players open virtual shops across different Chinese cities.