In an unprecedented leap, Idle Fish (a.k.a. Xianyu), Alibaba's leading second-hand trading platform, has broken significant ground in China's digital marketplace.

As of 2023, the platform has astonishingly surpassed a daily Gross Merchandise Volume (GMV) of 1 billion yuan (US$141 million), marking a colossal shift in consumer behavior towards the second-hand market.

This surge reflects not only changing economic patterns but also evolving societal attitudes towards sustainability and consumption.

The platform's success is underpinned by its massive user engagement, with over 100 million individuals listing their idle goods, contributing to a vibrant circular economy.

The platform sees 4 million items listed on a daily basis, ranging from tech gadgets to apparel, highlighting a shift towards more conscientious consumption among Chinese netizens.

A noteworthy trend is the rising influence of post-95s consumers, who are not only active participants but also key driv...

More than 60% of brands choose to launch new products online during the past one year, and most choose Tmall, according to a joint report by Yicai and Alibaba.

According to the data of the report, in recent years, the total number of new products on the Tmall platform has doubled year by year, and the turnover of more than 30% of the market is driven by new products.

New products account for over 35% of all transactions on Alibaba's Tmall platform in 2020. The number of new products on Tmall doubled in 2020 to over 200 million.Click To Tweet

At the same time, the average unit price of new products is 1.3 times the overall market, which brings more value to the brand.

The post-90s and post-95s have gradually become the main consumption force of new products online, and their average transaction ...

Among the potential buyers of cars in China in the next six months, the post-95 generation (born between 1995-1999) accounted for 11%, according to China New Car Purchase Intention Study 2021 by JD Power.

Over 60% and nearly a quarter of the post-95 potential customers tend to buy domestic brands and new energy vehicles (NEV), the highest among all age groups.

The study finds that the purchase intention of Chinese domestic brands is 49%, up from 22% in 2016. Generation Z has the highest purchase intention (61%) among all age groups, which is 8 percentage points higher than the average and 9 percentage points higher than people born between 1990 and 1994.

The top reasons for Generation Z to consider domestic brands are attractive design and styling exterior; comfortable drive and ride experience; interior is spacious and comfortable; safety and fuel efficiency.

Consumer purchase intention of NEVs also increases to an all-time high of 16%, up from 3% in 2018, among which Gene...

Attention is the first impetus for people to start thinking and take part in the action. It has become a scarce resource in the prosperity of the Internet. Today's young people's daily cross-screen multithreading behavior has intensified the dispersion and switching of resources.

When is their attention most active? What do they focus on? What formats? How to activate? What are the characteristics? All these will have an important impact on the economic and social practice in various fields.

As a group of young people growing up in the Internet age, the distribution, capture, switching and other aspects of attention of the post-95 generation are different from other generations.

Compared with those born before 1995, many post-90s have not yet formed a family, and they are more "time independent"; post-00s are new to the society, facing dramatic changes in social identity and pace of life, and also have more "freedom of consumption", according to a Tencent research.

The rese...

China has the largest group of Generation Z (Gen Z) in the world with a population of 149 million. Gen Z is between 15 and 23-year-old and will account for 40% of consumption power in 2020. Their average time spend on mobile internet is 4.7 hours per day. And, they like Zhihu, Tantan, Xiaohongshu more than WeChat.

China's Gen-Z has an average monthly income of 3,501 yuan (US$493), among which the studying group (19-23 years old) has multiple sources of income. Their top interests are video, social networking, music, online shopping, and gaming.

They spend an average of 56.2 minutes daily on social networking and instant messaging. Videos also take a significant amount of their time (over 53 minutes).

Word of mouth through friends is the top source for China's Gen-Z to know products, followed by online ads, shopping mall, TV commercials, and etc.

Gen-Z Sources of Products Discovery: Male vs. Fema...

Post-90s was the main force of Chinese Haitao users while post-80s held the strongest per capita consumption power. Surprisingly, post-95s attracted extensive attention as its expenditure on overseas products growing at 80% year-on-year. Every 7 out of 10 Haitao users turned out to be females.

The top 3 countries selling to China were America, Japan, and South Korea. Though users in Guangzhou, Jiangsu, and Zhejiang had the highest consumption power in buying overseas either through online platforms or individual agents, those from Hebei, Shanxi, and Hebei grew fastest, according to the report from Taobao.

Cosmetics, female clothing, and bags & suitcases are still what users primarily buy through Haitao platforms. Jewelry and accessories are gaining popularities quickly with an increase of 116%. Sales of beauty instruments grow by 56%. The queries for “emerging or new tech skin care” surged by 430% year-on-year.

Users also showed particular interests in cosmetics from l...

Centennials is already an economic powerhouse globally as the population born after 1997 now accounts for 35% of the world’s total population. In China, this cohort is generally a combination of post-95s and post-00s. They are quickly becoming the mainstream of Chinese consumers as well. 40% of Chinese consumers will be from these two age groups by 2020– together they form the biggest Centennials population in the world.

To win them over, brands need to start to study their behavior and attitudes now. What does consumption mean for them?
Buy for social
Many people from this age group are the only child of their families, as China’s one-child policy lasted from 1980 till 2015. Even though there were some exceptional conditions to allow a family to have two children, such as if the spouses were the only child themselves, the majority of post-95s and post-00s have no siblings.

This has planted an especially strong need in them for socializing – they want to establish their soc...

With enough passion, the fans of an online TV drama can "light up" a twin skyscraper in Shanghai. Guardian, an online drama adapted from the namesake popular online novel became the hottest online video this summer. Its total video views exceeded 2 billion.

On June 14, the day after it premiered on Youku.com exclusively, its Baidu search index jumped to 150,000 and remained around 220,000 throughout its showing period. It has also become a hot topic on Weibo with its hashtag received more than 11.42 billion impressions – making it the only topic that came near the popularity of the FIFA World Cup.

When the online drama was closing to its finale, Youku invited fans to "like" the show on its website and with 6.66 million likes, the website will sponsor an out-of-home ad on the gigantic screens of Shanghai's Global Harbour Twin Towers.

Surprisingly, within only five days, the fans accumulated 6.66 million likes. In total, they gave more than 9 million likes in 10 days!

...

According to the Annual Report of CNNIC in 2017, Chinese netizens under 29-year-old account for 52.2% of total users. In terms of internet usage frequency, post-95s and post-00s are the most active users. It indicates that post-90s and post-00s are becoming the core users of the Internet.

In 2017, the average daily messages of post-95s QQ users has increased by 18%. So, what does QQ do to keep attracting the young, the core user of the internet?

WeChat attracts more and more middle-aged and elderly people while post-90s and post-00s become QQ’s die-hard fan. Smart device MAU for users aged 21 years or below increased year-on-year, indicating higher stickiness among young users. In the eye of post-00s QQ users, as WeChat is widely used by parents, teachers, and eldership, QQ looks more fun, cool, and free.

In view of the above, QQ is for now still at the peak. With the growth of young users, QQ is more featured with youth than ever.

As early as 2016 Tencent Global Partne...

No sooner did retailers decipher the buying habits of the generations born after 1980 and 1990 then the generation born after 1995 came into its own as a consumer group. Since they grew up alongside the internet, they're sometimes called "internet natives", and the way they consume has been changed by the circumstances they grew up in.

Data from the "2016 Import Consumer Insight Report" shows that the Chinese post-95s devote more purchasing power to "celebrity brands" than other age groups do. On average, they spend 1,314 yuan (US$198) each month, close to the average per capita income in China, 1,830 yuan. So the question is, how do they spend it, and on what?

More post-95's shop online, especially for clothing, than do either of the generations preceding them...

...but most still prefer to shop in physical stores over phones or tablets.

Chinese post-95s are more likely to use social media and social networking apps...

But are influenced differen...