Consumer Choices in Live Streaming Retailing, Evidence from Taobao eCommerce

Live streaming retailing, a new form of e-commerce equipped with live streams, brings more interactive and vivid shopping experiences to consumers. The overall scale of China's live streaming retailing was estimated to reach 1,050 billion RMB in 2020 [1]. As live streaming retailing flourishes, answers to the following questions are crucial for brands, retailers, and streamers: Who like live streaming retailing? What aspects do consumers care about? What marketing strategies should retailers and streamers use to attract consumers? Prior researches mainly explore the motivations of consumers’ watching and engagement behaviors in live streams from the perspective of the technology acceptance and consumers’ social needs. This study further explores consumers’ actual purchasing behaviors in the context of live streaming retailing and brings marketing strategies into consideration. A questionnaire survey towards 222 consumers who watch Taobao live streams frequently and an interview to a streamer with over 500,000 fans on Taobao are conducted to solve the above three questions. First, this paper identifies the demographic factors contributing to consumers’ watching and purchasing behaviors in live streams. Second, this paper presents further analysis of consumers’ diverse behaviors in the clothing and beauty products categories: Beauty product lovers care about the streamers’ popularity the most, and clothing product lovers rank price as the number one factor. Third, this paper studies the marketing strategies of streamers. Limited discounts appear to be the most effective way to increase consumers’ watching and purchasing behaviors. These findings not only give insight into better understanding how live streaming retailing affects consumer choices but also help brands and retailers leverage this new business model more effectively.