Chinese tech giant Tencent just added a shopping search feature on its WeChat search bar, according to Chinese tech media Pingwest, as it’s deepening the tie-up with JD.com an investee.
JD.com is the second largest e-commerce firm in China.
Alibaba started it.
Alibaba and Tencent have inherently different business models, specifically in e-commerce and social media and gaming respectively. That said, the two have never stopped dipping toes into each other’s territories.
Alibaba’s Taobao has been working with Douyin to leverage on the latter’s stunning popularity, funneling Douyin user traffic into Taobao online stores.
Douyin, a lip-synching short video app, with recently announced 300 million monthly active users (MAU), has risen to one of the most popular Chinese social media app, and seriously challenged Tencent’s dominance on the social media sector.
For the partnership, Douyin integrated links to Taobao items in its videos. Thanks to the phenomenal popularity of Douyin, there were numerous cases of items showed up in Douyin videos went viral on Taobao. Think of Douyin plus Taobao as the mobile internet-based infomercials.
On the other hand, Tencent too, has been involved in its pursuit of partnerships to benefit from innovative ways of monetizing its WeChat popularity in addition to bolstering its investee JD’s growth in an increasingly competitive online shopping industry.
On March 10 of 2014, Tencent announced a $215 million investment in JD.com. The 15% stake in JD.com’s business paved the way for greater support going into the future.