I woke up too abruptly and saw that Xiaohongshu is encroaching on Xianyu's turf!

Looking at this title, many people may be puzzled.

One is a content community, and the other is a second - hand trading platform. How did they end up in a PK?

Please see.

Media screenshot

The so - called “Quick Sale” mentioned in this news is actually the second - hand trading function.

Let me quickly introduce it to those who haven't seen it yet.

Open the settings and you can apply for the experience in the new feature experience section. The threshold is quite low. The requirement is that the account registration time should be more than 180 days, and you need to complete the personal professional account and real - name authentication. No deposit is required.

Xiaohongshu's second - hand trading function

It's still very convenient. You can link the products/services you create to notes and comments.

Right from the start, Xiaohongshu acts like other established second - hand trading platforms: it charges a transaction fee. If the annual collection is ≤ 600,000 yuan, it charges 0.6% of the transaction amount; if it exceeds 600,000 yuan, it charges 1% of the transaction amount.

The overall trading process is not much different from Xianyu.

Before making a purchase, you can view the details and communicate with the seller. However, the communication entry seems to be the user private message entry. Before the other party follows/responds to you, you can only send 1 message. Haha, it feels like you have to cherish the opportunity.

The transaction is guaranteed by the platform. That is to say, your money is paid to the platform, and the platform settles the payment to the seller after you confirm the receipt. If there are no special circumstances, the goods will be automatically confirmed as received 10 days after shipment. In contrast, Xianyu only takes 3 days.

Xiaohongshu screenshot

After - sales service is one of the difficulties in second - hand trading. How to solve the after - sales problems?

Maybe because it's still in the internal testing phase and the trading volume hasn't picked up yet, I haven't seen many after - sales problems. However, according to the platform's relevant terms, when a dispute arises in a transaction, the buyer and the seller should negotiate first. If the negotiation fails and it meets the conditions for the platform to intervene, the platform will step in for mediation.

That's all for the introduction of the function.

Actually, last month, Xiaohongshu's official account @Rule Encyclopedia Potato had already introduced the Quick Sale function. I saw it at that time, but I wasn't very interested.

When the growth of the first curve reaches its peak, Internet giants are actively looking for the second curve. Those in the e - commerce business start delivering food and doing hotel and travel services. Those making drones start making floor - sweeping robots, and those making floor - sweeping robots start making drones, cars, and mobile phones and even try to enter the aerospace field.

Xiaohongshu just wants to do some second - hand trading. What's wrong with that!

Whether it will make a splash is another matter...

But recently, I've found this matter quite interesting and think it's worth talking about.

First of all, the second - hand market is no longer a blue ocean. It's even extremely competitive.

On the left, there is Xianyu, a giant in the C2C market. On the right, there are Zhuanzhuan and Aihuishou, two strong players in the C2B2C market. In addition, there are local players like Kongfuzijiushuwang, which have built moats in a specific niche for many years.

Xiaohongshu, a content - based platform, wants to squeeze into this market now. What gives?

Without some unique skills, it will basically just be a source of entertainment.

The beauty of Xiaohongshu lies in its unique advantage: algorithm.

Well, Xiaohongshu's algorithm is famously “sharp - eyed”. People often succeed in finding people or things on it.

Xiaohongshu screenshot

Finding target buyers and sellers is a piece of cake for it.

Take the simplest example. You're planning to move recently, so you search for “moving” and “packing tools” on Xiaohongshu. You don't search for any furniture, but as you browse, a note about “selling second - hand items due to moving and decluttering” pops up right in front of you.

Looking at the location, it's only 10 kilometers away from your home, just a short drive.

Xiaohongshu screenshot

The same goes for car fans. If you're recently obsessed with old - style Mini cars and search for some car owner's daily life posts a few times, the algorithm will immediately kick in. Soon, you'll come across a post from a local individual car owner: “Selling my beloved car with a heavy heart. It's a limited - edition 2008 R56. Those who understand, come.”

This logic can be perfectly applied to cameras, keyboards, vinyl records, vintage bags, Lego, and so on...

To verify that this isn't just my imagination, I lurked under the topic of “selling second - hand items due to moving” for a few days.

Often, for the second - hand item posts by bloggers, the items have already been sold, but in the comment section, there are still people who have been precisely pushed asking: “Is it still available? How can I contact you?”

Xiaohongshu screenshot

So, even before the official intervention, Xiaohongshu had already spontaneously developed a wild but efficient second - hand trading ecosystem. Now, what the official needs to do is just build a path to make it more standardized and see if there's still a chance in this market.

Well, at this point, do you think Xiaohongshu's second - hand trading is about to take off and Xianyu will lose sleep?

Don't be hasty. There's still a long way to go.

Bringing sellers and buyers together (matching supply and demand) is just the first step in second - hand trading. After taking this step, there are two more crucial things: trust and guarantee.

To put it simply, when I'm buying second - hand items, should I trust the other party? And if there's a quarrel during the transaction, how to solve it?

These two points are exactly the problems that Xianyu and Zhuanzhuan have spent many years, stepped on countless pitfalls, and spent a lot of money on but still haven't completely solved.

Zhuanzhuan couldn't solve these problems and couldn't compete with Xianyu, so it simply cancelled its self - owned market and focused on “official inspection”.

Xianyu, a well - known Internet “rich second - generation”, has a wealthy “father” and a powerful “big brother” in the payment field. It's one of the most reliable second - hand trading platforms in the market. Before a transaction, you can check the other party's Sesame Credit, historical transaction records, and historical reviews to build a credit profile of the other party and judge their reliability.

But unfortunately, has it completely eliminated problems like scammers, post - purchase price - haggling, and too many merchants?

Not yet.

A senior practitioner in the second - hand e - commerce industry told me: “The cost of doing evil is too low. You can just create a new account.”

How Xiaohongshu will handle the problems in terms of trust and after - sales guarantee remains to be seen.

But it's clear that this requires the support of a team and funds. The idea of just letting netizens play on their own is not very realistic.

Xiaohongshu screenshot

Moreover, this matter is quite difficult. This senior practitioner told me: “Reverse transactions are extremely difficult. The platform needs to allocate a dedicated team to handle them. Even if it doesn't involve returns and refunds, it will still be very complicated. Look at the disputes on Xianyu's small court. There are all kinds of them.”

From my experience, I haven't seen a strong trust system yet. Currently, when I want to judge whether someone is worth trading with, I mostly observe their Xiaohongshu profile.

This model works well for categories that allow offline transactions, such as second - hand furniture and rental services.

But for high - value, non - standard items that need to be mailed, it seems a bit fragile.

Xiaohongshu screenshot

Many people are attracted on Xiaohongshu and have a good chat, but when it comes to paying thousands of yuan to place an order, they may ask to use other platforms that they think are more secure and reliable.

It's like a real - estate agent brings in a deal, but the buyer and the seller end up making the deal secretly.

In addition, the good experience of Xiaohongshu's current second - hand trading is largely due to the fact that it's easy to distinguish personal second - hand items on the platform. It's truly a C2C business. But as the trading scale grows and new opportunities emerge, it will inevitably attract merchants pretending to be individuals, which will eventually ruin the atmosphere.

At the same time, Xiaohongshu is a content community. How to develop this business without affecting the existing community ecosystem also needs to be considered...

Existing second - hand trading platforms have a first - mover advantage, a foundation of trust, and moats such as value - added services. An industry insider told me, “Although Xianyu is mainly a C2C platform, it also has an inspection service. As far as I know, many users recognize this product.”

If the goal is to boost user activity through this business, it may achieve some results.

But if the goal is to transform a community based on lifestyle into a trading market where real money is involved and every detail matters, there are still many difficulties to overcome.

Only by overcoming these difficulties can it become a closed - loop trading platform. Otherwise, it may still just be a high - quality information gathering place...

Written by: Dudu Bird Warrior

Edited by: Mangshan Pit Viper Mianxian

Designed by: Huanyan

Source of pictures and materials:

Xiaohongshu

This article is from the WeChat official account “Chaping X.PIN”. Author: Chaping Jun. Republished by 36Kr with permission.