Does this new O2O shopping services matters to you?

Facy, an O2O (offline to online) service platform for fashion and apparel stores offering by Tokyo-based startup company Styler launched last September.

This service make it possible for consumer to have a new shopping experience simply by test messaging. Consumers with questions about fashion can ask for advice, and stores respond to those questions on the platform, like on Quora.

With the addition of the e-commerce function to Facy, it will allow physical fashion and apparel stores to easily set up their online storefront. For this function, Styler takes care of everything from the delivery of goods to the settlement of payments for online customers of shops on Facy. From the shops’ point of view, it is similar to Uber Eats’ system. Styler provides a series of services for shops and in return takes 20% of the price of items sold.

Tsubasa Koseki is the CEO and founder of Facy. He said their app was designed for people age between 25 and 35 who have jobs and cash to buy fashion items, but they don’t have much time to shop. Many of the stores on the platform are middle-priced brands, which are strong in the country.

Even though they got a really well result with 500,000 monthly active users who use the mobile app to interact with shops or browse interactions between shops and other users. Could they tell the exact difference with social network service-based interaction apps?

As Tsubasa mentioned, rather than post questions, most users just read conversations and find the right item which could also be possible for other apps customer review page. At the same time, they still need to develop and improve their chatbots and AI system for better operation.


reference:
https://www.techinasia.com/talk/tsubasa-koseki-facy

#2

Facebook Back to China?

The blockage of Facebook began around 2009 based on Chinese government political concerns. Since then, along with the booming internet culture, alternative (chinese) social networking websites have established their own huge market. 

This week, Chinese president Xi Jinpin is visiting the US, and yesterday (09/25) he had a dinner with several Tech CEOs, including Apple CEO Tim Cook and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, also Disney CEO Bob Iger and DreamWorks chief Jeffrey Katzenberg at the White House. Interestingly, the news mentions that “the four CEOs lead companies doing billions of dollars of business in China -- with the exception Zuckerberg, whose Facebook is officially banned in the country.” We don’t know the details about their conversation, but after the dinner, Zuckerberg posted this on his Facebook page:

Seems like it is a fine opportunity for Facebook coming back to China. Also, rumor says that several big advertisement companies are already trying to contact Facebook about future cooperations. First of all, we don’t know if everything will work out. Secondly, there are a lot of problems waiting for Facebook, even if the blockage is over. Since the political concerns are still on the table, Facebook may need to design a special version for Chinese users to access. On the other hand, the targeting users already build their own social networking webs, and it is going to be hard for them to set up a new one, especially the “new one” has similar functions and structures. 

For me, among Facebook, Google, Twitter, and YouTube, I think YouTube has the greatest opportunity (or maybe the easiest one) to establish its own market in China. Overall, if Facebook really comes back to China, as marketers, we are looking at a great channel to play with.

http://www.cnn.com/2015/09/25/politics/china-state-dinner/