Recently, in Douyin (Chinese version of Douyin), the hottest e-commerce livestreamer is undoubtedly Dong Yuhui.
It is reported that Dong Yuhui was originally an English teacher under the Chinese education giant New Oriental Education & Technology Group Inc.(New Oriental). Since June 2022, he has been selling a range of products, including agricultural products, to millions of people through the East Buy livestream, which is owned by New Oriental. At its peak, Dong Yuhui had 20 million followers, and the customer base of East Buy increased to 30 million.
However, on December 6th, the editing team of “East Buy” attempted to attribute most of the product introductions in certain livestreams to themselves, claiming that some of the scripts were entirely the team’s work. This sparked a controversy among Dong Yuhui’s followers.
After this event occurred, the then CEO of East Buy, Sun Dongxu, responded to the matter in a livestream. However, his response, which lasted over 10 minutes, further fueled the waves of the event.
In his response, Sun Dongxu revealed that Dong Yuhui’s annual income exceeded tens of millions of yuan, intending to demonstrate the company’s correct understanding of Dong Yuhui’s value. However, some internet users exposed that Dong Yuhui’s actual annual salary was much lower, and many followers voiced their dissatisfaction, believing that Dong Yuhui’s value was greatly underestimated.
At the same time, Sun Dongxu’s alleged act of angrily throwing his phone in the livestream and his criticism of “fandom culture” further intensified the discontent among internet users. Some users posted comments saying, “East Buy is enjoying the traffic dividends brought by followers while insulting them as ‘fandom culture’. It’s like biting the hand that feeds you.”
The entire incident even affected East Buy’s stock price. During that time, the stock price of East Buy fell by a cumulative 14% over three trading days, leading to a market value loss of over 2 billion yuan ($279.1 million).
Subsequently, New Oriental’s CEO, Yu Minhong, personally responded to the matter and appeared in a livestream with Dong Yuhui, revealing that East Buy would “establish a studio, create a separate account, and a dedicated livestream room for Dong Yuhui.” Currently, the account is named “Yuhuitongxing” (“与辉同行” in Chinese).
On January 9th, after Dong Yuhui “went independent,” his new account “Yuhuitongxing” held its first livestream, with the Gross Merchandise Volume (GMV) surpassing 100 million yuan ($13.96 million) within two hours, making him the top performer on Douyin’s livestream e-commerce list that day. As a result, Dong Yuhui is now considered the new top influencer on Douyin after Little Yang.
CHAILEEDO noticed that in the livestream on January 22nd, “Yuhuitongxing” promoted the only “beauty” product (note: only looking at the beauty category) since its launch—the Dabao Vitamin E Cream. Can Dong Yuhui, after going solo, still successfully promote cosmetics when he has only promoted one vitamin E cream in half a month?
Dong Yuhui becomes the new “top influencer” on Douyin
Following the East Buy incident, East Buy host Dong Yuhui has been promoted to a senior partner of East Buy and has registered a new livestream account called “Yuhuitongxing.” On the evening of January 9th, at 7 p.m., the “Yuhuitongxing” livestream room kicked off its first livestream for e-commerce. Without a doubt, Dong Yuhui is the leading host. Apart from Dong Yuhui, the livestream room also features seven other hosts.
As the first livestream after Dong Yuhui’s solo venture, the “Yuhuitongxing” livestream room immediately demonstrated its strong ability to attract fans. Within half an hour, the number of fans for “Yuhuitongxing” reached 4.552 million, with a gain of 400,000 fans. As of the time of writing, the “Yuhuitongxing” account has reached 13.361 million followers.
It is worth noting that in the first livestream, Dong Yuhui stated, “‘Yuhuitongxing’ will adhere to the original intention of promoting agricultural products, while also exploring possibilities in fields such as books, culture, and tourism. We plan to launch a series of strategic deployments after the new year.” At around 8 p.m. that evening, East Buy founder Yu Minhong also appeared in the “Yuhuitongxing” livestream room and had a face-to-face conversation with Dong Yuhui.
It is worth noting that this livestream can be described as a peak from the start. According to Feigua data, the first livestream of “Yuhuitongxing” had a staggering viewership of 54.314 million, and the sales revenue reached over 100 million yuan ($13.96 million) within two hours, making it the top performer on the overall Douyin livestream e-commerce leaderboard that evening. Achieving such impressive results from the first stream, some industry insiders even believe that Dong Yuhui has the potential to become the new “top influencer” on Douyin and may rival Little Yang in the future.
It is reported that the “Yuhuitongxing” livestream room follows a daily livestreaming model, with different hosts taking turns during daily livestreams. It is similar to the livestream format of East Buy. Dong Yuhui’s livestreams usually take place from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. each night.
According to Feigua data, the “Yuhuitongxing” livestream room has conducted 22 livestreams, with an average viewership of 18.229 million per stream. The highest viewership is still from the first day of the livestream. Currently, the average sales revenue per stream is around 25-50 million yuan ($3.49 million-$6.98 million).
In the nearly half a month since starting the livestream, Dong Yuhui has only promoted a single “beauty” product
There is no doubt that Dong Yuhui, after going solo, has high expectations placed on him. At the same time, the question of whether Dong Yuhui will promote beauty products in the future has become a topic of widespread industry concern.
CHAILEEDO has noticed that since the start of the “Yuhuitongxing” livestream room, Dong Yuhui has only promoted a small number of cosmetics, with the majority being personal care products such as shampoo and hand creams. However, on the evening of January 22nd, the “Yuhuitongxing” livestream room promoted a vitamin E lotion from the official flagship store of Dabao. According to Feigua data, this product sold approximately 5,000 to 7,500 units in the livestream, with sales revenue ranging from 250,000 to 500,000 yuan ($34,893-$69,786).
It is worth mentioning that this product is the only “beauty” category product promoted in the “Yuhuitongxing” livestream room since its inception.
Looking at the showcased products on the “Yuhuitongxing” account, there is no separate category for beauty products. It only has a “personal care and home cleaning” category, which includes a few cosmetics but mostly consists of shampoo and personal care products such as Longliqi hand cream, Pantene shampoo, Head & Shoulders shampoo, Dettol hand sanitizer, and Changfa Xiaozhai shampoo. Additionally, within this category, there are also several toothpaste and mouthwash products from Canban and Yunnan Baiyao.
It can be seen that currently, the products promoted in the “Yuhuitongxing” livestream room mainly revolve around food and beverages, fresh produce, books and education, and household items.
It is worth noting that on the first day of the “Yuhuitongxing” account’s livestream, a netizen mentioned in the comments section that they hoped Dong Yuhui would promote cosmetics. In response, Dong Yuhui stated, “I still can’t overcome it in my heart.” In fact, he had previously mentioned that promoting cosmetics was the most embarrassing moment in his life and that it was beyond his knowledge boundaries.
Some industry insiders believe that what sets Dong Yuhui apart from other top influencers is that he primarily attracts followers through his personal charm. Most of the consumers who make purchases in his livestreams are drawn to appreciate his talent, not just for the prices. “Moreover, Dong Yuhui himself doesn’t really match well with beauty products. Besides a few brands with a strong cultural appeal that can approach promotion from a cultural perspective, other brands don’t seem to fit well either.”
“The possibility of expanding into the beauty category in the future will be significant.”
From this, although Dong Yuhui has garnered attention since going solo and the fan growth of the “Yuhuitongxing” account has been fast, it currently shows no intention of focusing on beauty products.
However, some industry insiders believe that “it’s only a matter of time.” Because when East Buy initially started livestreaming product promotions, beauty products were not their main focus. However, as East Buy gradually built up their livestreaming matrix, beauty products became one of the important segments.
Currently, East Buy primarily promotes beauty products through the “East Buy Beautiful Life” account. Looking at the showcased products on this account, there are a total of 822 items. In addition to beauty and skincare, makeup and perfume, and personal care products, it also includes non-cosmetic categories such as women’s and men’s clothing, kitchen utensils, and more. Among the beauty and skincare, makeup and perfume categories, it covers almost all well-known domestic and international brands, as well as many emerging domestic brands. The best-selling skincare product is the Cetaphill , with sales reaching 543,000 units. In the makeup and perfume category, the top-selling makeup product is a black tea makeup remover cream from Shervy Larne.
It is worth mentioning that according to information released by the “East Buy Beautiful Life” account, they will hold a special livestream event for L’Oreal on the 24th of this month. Additionally, the account has also released several episodes of the “Zhen Mei Xiao Ke Tang” video series, which mainly focuses on popular science knowledge about beauty and makeup, such as “How to Nourish the Skin with Oils.”
Therefore, based on East Buy’s development path, some industry insiders also believe that “as a major influencer and with beauty being an important livestreaming category, there is a significant possibility that ‘Yuhuitongxing’ will expand into the beauty sector in the future.”
In fact, a spokesperson for a new and emerging brand also told CHAILEEDO that they had contacted East Buy before but did not reach a collaboration. They mentioned, “Their business approach is quite traditional, focusing on mechanisms and prices, but Dong Yuhui himself is not a traditional type of influencer.” Furthermore, the spokesperson also stated, “We have also approached Xiao Yang Ge, but the price negotiation was too intense, leaving almost no profit margin for the brand, so we didn’t collaborate.” They believe that new brands on Douyin still rely on self-promotion or collaborations with mid-tier influencers to sell products.
It can be seen that in the livestreaming product promotion field for beauty, apart from Li Jiaqi, there has yet to emerge a top influencer who can rival him. Whether Dong Yuhui can break this pattern in the future remains to be seen and will require time to prove.
