Taobao Looks To Online Video To Better Target Chinese Youth

According to information from CR-NetRatings, video websites in China have approx 103 million registered users and the average time spent on video websites has increased to 7.6 mins.

Armed with this knowledge Taobao (China’s premiere online shopping site) has recently launced it’s own video channel. Upon selecting your video, you will find yourself redirected to upstart video site, Joy.cn and preempting the video will be some brief Taobao ads.

The collaboration of Taobao and Joy is a win-win situation. Taobao can help drive more traffic to Joy – which is competing against more well established sites such as Tudou & Youku. At the same time, Joy’s video hosting capabilities add to the Taobao portfolio, helping it establish itself as more than just an auction website.

Streaming video online is a popular choice amongst Chinese youth, in particular for younger netizens, whom spend much more time online watching long winded TV series’. This segment is already used to the fact that there are ads before videos but will accept this streamlined viewing over TV broadcasts.

However, much like previous web advertising (e.g. pop-up ads), brands must be aware that their customer doesn’t tune out to their attempts at advertising. Companies need to consider how to best seed on websites to reap the largest rewards.