Chapter 102: Crush Competitors, Expand Mall Rebate Version

February 8th, the sixth day of the Lunar New Year.

A black BMW 750 entered the He-Xu Expressway and sped away.

Wang Zihao sat in the driver’s seat, handling the steering.

Meng Jie leaned back in the rear seat, binge-watching the latest hit drama “Palace: Heart Jade”; after hearing two lines about “love offerings,” Chen Yan silently put on his earbuds and scrolled through news on his phone.

“Alibaba and Yahoo’s equity dispute escalates, further deteriorating their relationship.”

“Intense competition among group-buying websites like Meituan, Lashou, and Nuomi—who will ultimately prevail?”

“Weibo’s new user growth in February continues to climb; Yang Mi and Feng Shaofeng have joined, solidifying its position as the top social media platform.”

Chen Yan squinted in thought: after the Year of Group-Buying, competition in this sector had reached a head-splitting intensity—it looked like a battle between platforms, but was really a power struggle among their back-end venture capital firms.

To attract new customers and merchants, every site pulled out all the stops, slashing service fees again and again: you offered 5%, I’d drop to 4%; with deep pockets, some even shouted “3%!”

Compared to the 10% rates a decade later, these rates were downright ethical.

At present, Lashou held the largest market share, followed by Nuomi, then Meituan, then Dazhong Dianping; the remaining 40% was split among 24 Quan, Gaopeng, and Wowo.

No one could have predicted that Meituan would emerge as the ultimate victor of the Thousand Group-Buying War.

“Before competitors react, seize the group-buying business first.”

Chen Yan immediately decided.

Mogujie, Meilishuo, and Taofenba were all copying FoxTao’s Super Rebate model, unaware that mall rebates and search rebates were the other half of the guide website’s moat.

Thinking of this, Chen Yan called Lin Chenfeng at Penguin Capital; after a brief exchange, the other side exclaimed in surprise: “Group-buying is already a service-and-sale model—do you still want to take a cut from them?”

In plain terms, today’s group-buying sites rely entirely on capital to stay afloat; service fees under 5% can’t even cover operational costs, let alone the exorbitant advertising expenses.

“If they can pay Baidu money, why can’t they pay me?”

Chen Yan countered.

At this time, group-buying sites relied mainly on search engines, portals, and ground promotions for external advertising, especially keyword bidding ads; during the Thousand Group-Buying War, Baidu made a fortune from ad revenue alone.

After hearing this, Lin Chenfeng laughed and said: “I’ll try connecting you with Gaopeng’s marketing director.”

Gaopeng was a joint venture between Penguin and Groupon; its offline sales team was heavily drawn from QQ Group, and though newly founded, its business expansion was extremely rapid.

Penguin held half the equity; with Lin Chenfeng stepping in, the probability of cooperation increased significantly.

Half an hour later, Gaopeng’s marketing director Zheng Yun called back.

“How does Mr. Chen propose to cooperate?” Zheng Yun asked politely.

“Two cooperation models: mall rebate and Super Rebate. I suggest you try both,” Chen Yan replied simply.

“But group-buying and e-commerce operate differently—products have strong regional attributes; for example, a hotpot group-buy package in Shanghai has low purchase intent and scattered traffic in other regions…”

Zheng Yun, eyeing FoxTao’s daily active users of over a million, was tempted but worried about poor results and wasted manpower and budget from his marketing team.

“That’s easy to solve: first, choose nationwide chain store group-buy packages, like KFC or McDonald’s; second, FoxTao can push products based on user IP.”

Chen Yan answered without hesitation; in his view, these problems troubling Zheng Yun had dozens of solutions already in place over a decade later.

“Mr. Chen, brilliant idea! I’m convinced—you’ve linked guide shopping and group buying together; no wonder you turned FoxTao into a $2.8 billion valuation in just half a year.”

Zheng Yun praised him without restraint.

As an O2O-born marketing director, he should have thought of this first—but his thinking had been constrained by the guide e-commerce model.

“Let’s set up a group to discuss the details slowly; once finalized, we’ll talk about mall onboarding and the CPS interface.”

Chen Yan didn’t waste time with more words—he settled the cooperation intent in just a few sentences.

Gaopeng had just completed its Series A funding, valued at only $130 million—far behind FoxTao; Chen Yan had Zhang Jiancheng facilitate the connection, and they naturally jumped at the chance.

After speaking, Chen Yan added Song Yuncheng and Xiang Pengfei to the group; Zheng Yun invited colleagues from marketing and tech; both sides began discussing product selection, commission rates, and new-user rewards.

By the time Wang Zihao drove off the highway toward Xucheng College, Chen Yan and Zheng Yun had already finalized the flash-sale items.

KFC Family Bucket set, 30% commission, 20% released, user price at 20% off;

Zhen Gongfu Mushroom Chicken Set, 35% commission, 25% released, user price at 25% off;

Dicos Pistol Chicken Burger, 25% commission, 15% released, user price at 15% off;

Xiao Feiyang Two-Person Unlimited Set, 20% commission, 12% released, user price at 12% off;

Products were mostly nationwide chain brands; aside from the merchants’ 3%-5% commission, the rest of the price difference was covered by Gaopeng.

Thus, Gaopeng strictly limited inventory, capped subsidy costs at 8 million yuan, and added a 40-yuan reward per new user—almost exhausting all of February’s advertising budget.

Twenty minutes later, Wang Zihao parked the car at the entrance of the Innovation Park.

Chen Yan handed his luggage to Meng Jie, asking her to take it to Room 0418, then headed upstairs.

“Senior Chen! Happy New Year!” Xiang Pengfei’s eyes, like built-in targeting, always spotted Chen Yan first.

“What’s the backend staffing rate?” Chen Yan walked into Room 206, casually clapping Xiang Pengfei on the shoulder.

“Only two are still on the train, expected to arrive this afternoon; everyone else is here,” Xiang Pengfei replied.

“How long until we finalize the CPS interface with Gaopeng?” Chen Yan asked again.

“Technically, it’s similar to B2C platforms—minimum three to five days, but since it’s our first collaboration, we need to unify order tracking and data standards,” Xiang Pengfei thought and answered.

“Then bring Hu Yun into the coordination group; this project is under Song Yuncheng’s responsibility—any issues, go to her.”

Chen Yan instructed.

“Got it,” Xiang Pengfei turned and entered the meeting room with him, preparing for the upcoming group-buying collaboration.

Chen Yan returned to his seat, turned on his computer, logged into the data backend, and first checked website traffic recovery.

During the Spring Festival, daily active users dropped below one million for three days; after express delivery resumed on the fifth day, traffic improved—yesterday’s DAU was 1.09 million.

At this moment, Yuan Wei walked over, serious: “Senior Chen, we’ve received feedback from merchants—some who joined Super Rebate have also signed up for brand flash sales on Mogujie and Meilishuo.”

“Hold a meeting with Yifeng and the merchandising team: whoever’s merchant, whoever’s responsible. First issue a warning; if they ignore it, blacklist them permanently; if merchandising doesn’t act promptly, reduce their monthly commission rate.”

Chen Yan instantly became alert, recognizing the severity, and gave immediate orders.

He had first-mover advantage—he wouldn’t give imitators any chance.

He didn’t stop merchants from going to Mogujie and Meilishuo to boost volume—but if their commission rates and final prices matched or beat FoxTao’s, don’t blame him for going hard.

“I’ll handle it right away,” Yuan Wei replied.

Chen Yan nodded slightly; he felt pressure, but wasn’t panicked—the e-commerce industry had very clear head effects.

Mogujie had just launched, with less than ten thousand daily active users; Meilishuo had been around less than two years, with only tens of thousands of DAU.

Merchants signed up simply because neither platform charged deposit or booth fees—pure commission model; not signing up would be stupid.

Though not a major threat to FoxTao, Chen Yan wouldn’t let his rivals get any breathing room.

Not long after, Xiang Pengfei returned from the meeting.

“Pengfei, come here!” Chen Yan waved him over.

“Senior Chen, what’s up?” Xiang Pengfei asked, holding his laptop.

“Set up monitoring of competitors’ product pools using title fuzzy matching and ID matching; once you detect any product that previously joined our Super Rebate, send an email alert to merchandising.”

Chen Yan laid out the instructions calmly.

“What’s the priority level?” Xiang Pengfei asked instinctively.

“T0—get it online ASAP,” Chen Yan replied without hesitation.

That afternoon, merchandising gained a new task: constantly switching between competitor websites, terrified of spotting their own merchants and products.

The boss had spoken: if you find three violating merchants in a month, your commission rate drops one level—for example, if your performance was 500,000 yuan with a 5% commission, finding three violators drops it to 4%; five violators, drop to 3%.

Chen Yan wasn’t completely without mercy: first offense, a warning; second offense, blacklist.

Suddenly, merchandisers were on edge, speaking to merchants with harsher tones.

“Boss, Meilishuo’s boss just @ed you on Weibo—called you some really nasty names.”

In the evening, Xu Xingxing approached, holding up his phone.

“@FoxTao CEO Chen Yan: Young man, don’t be so tyrannical in business! Merchants can only join FoxTao’s Super Rebate and can’t participate in Meilishuo’s brand flash sales—do you want to monopolize?”

Meilishuo’s boss Xu Yi named and shamed him.

Thanks to his freshman status, 2.8 billion valuation, and reputation as a business genius, Chen Yan’s Weibo followers had surged to 4.8 million; Xu Yi’s mention instantly attracted a swarm of online spectators.

In just one afternoon, over twenty merchants abruptly canceled their participation in Meilishuo’s brand flash sale; Xu Yi investigated and learned FoxTao had implemented “either-or.”

Merchants had to choose one: either FoxTao, or Meilishuo.

Sales data between the two platforms differed drastically; merchants quickly chose, terrified of offending FoxTao.

“@Meilishuo Xu Yi: Just because you’re older, can you bully people? Your company copied our Super Rebate UI and mechanics 1:1—when will you pay the copyright fee?”

Chen Yan hadn’t planned to respond, but Xu Yi was desperately chasing attention, so he fired back.

The design team’s side-by-side UI comparison images were posted in the comments—clearly showing who copied whom.

“@Meilishuo Xu Yi: Mr. Xu, explain this—same color scheme, font sizes, layout—all coincidence?”

“Pfft! So shameless!”

“This is the thief crying ‘stop thief!’”

Public opinion flipped instantly; netizens who previously thought Chen Yan was tyrannical now sympathized with FoxTao.

Xu Yi was publicly humiliated and ultimately deleted his Weibo post and disabled comments.

Mogujie’s situation was similar—very few merchants wanted to sign up.

Merchandising exhausted all effort to attract only dozens of white-label brands (unknown small brands), barely scraping together a brand flash sale—with almost no buyers.

No brand recognition, no promotional strength—users voted with their feet and knew exactly who to choose.

“Damn! This kid plays dirty!”

Xu Yi slammed his desk in his office, but had no solution.

A single brand group-buy campaign on FoxTao could generate 500,000 to 1 million yuan in sales; on Meilishuo, even with full-site traffic, they’d barely sell 30,000 to 40,000 yuan.

After venting for a while, he told his merchandising lead: “Start with the merchants FoxTao rejects—build up platform traffic first.”

……

……

The next morning, Chen Yansen arrived at the second floor of the Entrepreneurship Park.

He saw several men in suits seated in the conference room, with Song Yuncheng and another business executive from the Major Client Business Department receiving them.

“Brother Sen, they’re from Elong Travel—probably here to discuss mall listing.”

Wang Zihao, seeing Chen Yansen glance over, smiled and explained.

Chen Yansen smiled inwardly: this was the advantage of fame. In the past, negotiating B2C partnerships meant chasing channels himself; bad luck meant running into fools like Zhang Hanhua.

Now, people came to him at home, seeking collaboration.

The mall’s cashback segment covered vertical websites in beauty and personal care, maternal and infant toys, digital books, plus brand self-operation, travel ticketing, and group buying services.

Once the ecosystem was fully fleshed out, users would instinctively open FoxTa Tao when seeking discounts—boosting gross profit while enhancing user retention.

There were at least twenty to thirty thousand such websites in China; even if he secured just ten percent, Chen Yansen could collect tens of millions in deposits alone.

A week later, Elong Travel officially joined FoxTa Mall’s travel ticketing cashback section, with a brand group event planned for month-end.

The project team was busy bringing in B2C malls and increasing daily new brand group offerings, while Chen Yansen quietly founded a new company—Senlian Capital.

He transferred the equity of FoxTa, Miha You, and Yunsu Express under the new company’s name.

(End of Chapter)