MiShang Shows Off Fashion, Photos, and Social E-Commerce

Social e-commerce and fashion photo app MiShang is one of a bajillion new Chinese start-ups that fits into the category of a ‘light community’ – i.e.: a not-too-intensive or demanding social media service that you can enjoy as an adjunct to another SNS.

MiShang is a curious hybrid, being either a neat fashion-oriented photo app, or a social shopping platform – or both – to its users. It allows sign-up via a Sina Weibo or Tencent QQ account, and places a strong emphasis on sharing your fashion and brand ‘likes’ with your friends using Sina or Tencent Weibo, or QZone. The company’s own website uses the English phrase “stylecasting” to describe its social approach, in that it’s mostly about browsing a live-stream of stylish items from the people that you follow.

The MiShang app for Android.

The e-commerce aspect of MiShang ties to China’s largest online shopping platform, Taobao. That allows MiShang to earn money from click-thrus that lead to purchases on branded Taobao storefronts.

The service and app encourages users to also show what they love and what they’re wearing, allowing your MiShang fans to ‘like’ an outfit, or comment on it.

Mishang’s CEO is Jiang Fang, a former employee of Li Kai-fu’s Innovation Works who says he left the famous Chinese start-up incubator to make a light social network, inspired by the American interests/pinboard site Pinterest.

A MiShang user's profile page, showing off one of her outfits on the fashion-oriented social network.

MiShang works nicely, and is a lot more full-featured than Chaopin, the app that was made in just two weeks that we featured recently. But then, in fairness, MiShang has had time for a few months of traction. In some aspects, it’s also a bit like the cutesy Gezbox, to the extent that it encourages users to show off their stuff.

In another recent trend in small Chinese start-ups, there’s only an Android app – likely due to both the larger user-base and lower development costs on Google’s mobile OS. An iPhone iteration is in the works, though. Take a look at MiShang’s site, or its app on the Android Market.

[Hat-tip: TouMingTi – article in Chinese]