In China, people don't go to the store. The store comes to their feed. We run that operation.

E-commerce is search behavior. A shopper already knows what she wants and goes to Tmall or JD to find it. Social commerce is discovery behavior. She did not know she wanted it until the feed showed her. Different mindset, different content, different metrics. Most brands need both, but they need to know which one drives the business.

Depends on the category. Beauty and lifestyle: RedNote first, Douyin second. FMCG and food: Douyin first. B2B and considered purchases: WeChat. Premium and luxury: RedNote and WeChat. Trying to be on all four platforms in month one is the most common mistake we see. You spread thin and you win nowhere.

Setup runs roughly 80,000 to 150,000 RMB depending on store complexity and content needs. (We have done one launch for less, but it cut corners we now regret.) Monthly operations run 50,000 to 250,000 RMB depending on content volume, ad management, and livestream frequency. Media spend sits on top of that. Plan for at least 100,000 RMB a month in media for the first six months while you learn what actually works for your category. Add the platform deposits: 30,000 RMB for Douyin and 20,000 RMB for RedNote, both refundable.

A 30,000 USD deposit, a 5,000 to 10,000 USD annual service fee depending on category, and a commission of 2% to 5% per transaction, plus a 1% Alipay fee. Cross-border, so no Chinese entity required.

On Douyin, first sales come within weeks if you run paid traffic. Profitability takes three to six months. On RedNote, brand build comes first. Sales follow at six to nine months. Anyone promising faster is overselling.

Six months out. The Chinese shopping festival calendar is the single most underestimated planning constraint we see with foreign brands. 11.11 prep starts in May. 6.18 prep starts in December. Brands that walk in three months out get the leftover ad inventory and the leftover KOL slots, both at premium prices.

Not always. Cross-border models (Douyin Cross-Border, Tmall Global, JD Worldwide) do not require one. Onshore Douyin, Tmall, JD does, or a TP partner who provides one. We can run either. And if you already have a WFOE that was set up for offline trade and now needs to do digital commerce, we will tell you whether to amend the business scope, set up a second entity, or stay cross-border. The wrong setup costs more than the right one ever did.

Almost never. Lighting, pacing, voiceover style, on-screen text, color grading, even the way hands are framed on camera. All different. Chinese shoppers spot translated foreign content in two seconds and scroll past. We re-shoot or re-edit for the local platforms.

KOL: Key Opinion Leader. Big follower count, higher fee, awareness driver. KOC: Key Opinion Consumer. Smaller audience, more authentic, conversion driver. Most campaigns need both. KOCs do the volume. KOLs do the credibility.

A mid-tier RedNote creator with 100,000 followers runs 15,000 to 40,000 RMB per note. A top-tier Douyin host runs 200,000 to 2 million RMB per livestream slot, plus a commission of 20% to 30% of GMV. Pure-commission deals exist with smaller hosts but margin gets thin fast. We benchmark every quote against the live market, because the rates move month to month.

Almost never. The big-name livestreams produce a spike followed by silence, and an inflated cost-per-acquisition that looks great in slide three of the campaign report. Store-led livestreams running three to seven sessions a week build a predictable revenue line. We recommend the second, nearly every time.

Chinese platforms require fast response, under one minute on Douyin during peak hours, and a high return tolerance. The 7-day no-reason return is standard. We run customer service in Mandarin, on platform, with response-time SLAs. Returns go through our warehouse or yours.

Specific words, claims, and images get flagged or blocked. Health claims. Direct comparisons with competitors. Certain political and cultural references. We vet every piece of content before it goes live. Mistakes cost the account, and sometimes the account does not come back.

WeChat Pay and Alipay dominate. Platforms collect on your behalf and settle on a schedule, usually weekly or every 15 days. Cross-border models settle in USD or EUR to your overseas account. Onshore models settle in RMB to your Chinese entity.

Yes, for awareness. KOL seeding, brand notes, livestreams hosted by creators selling from their own stores. You will not own the customer or the data, but it is a valid way to test demand before opening your own store.

On RedNote: 8 to 15 notes a month from the brand account, 20 to 40 KOC notes, 2 to 5 KOL notes. On Douyin: 15 to 30 short videos a month, 8 to 20 livestream sessions. Volume is not optional. The algorithms punish silence.

Three numbers we track every week: cost per acquisition, GMV per livestream hour, content engagement rate. Three numbers every month: repeat purchase rate, total media ROAS, brand search lift. Everything else is supporting detail.

Three things, mostly in this order. Brands underinvest in content production. Brands hire one cheap creator and expect a whole campaign to deliver. And brands stop spending after month two because the results are not there yet, which kills the momentum right before it would have started to compound. We have watched this play out maybe a dozen times in the last two years.

For B2C, you can probably skip WeChat in year one if the budget is tight, with one caveat: WeChat Channels has turned into a real social commerce surface over the last 18 months, and the gap with Douyin closes every quarter. For B2B, premium, and any brand selling a considered purchase, WeChat is not optional. That is where high-value customers stay long enough to buy a second and a third time.

A 30-minute call with our senior team, no junior intermediary. You tell us the category, the budget range, and the timeline. We tell you what is realistic, what platforms to start with, and what the first 90 days look like. No proposal until both sides agree the project makes sense.