Meet the firm that wants to bring cutting-edge product discovery to live selling

Remember infomercials? Those TV programs tried to sell audiences everything from pots and pans to sealant tape, and production quality was a hit or miss affair.

One thing they all had in common, however, was the reliance on a charismatic presenter whose enthusiasm knew no bounds. And that’s no different with the modern-day equivalent: live commerce.

“Live commerce is not just selling,” says Wong Zi Yang, CEO and co-founder of Upmesh, a live selling enablement platform. “It’s a new mix of selling and engagement, where there’s a relationship between the buyer and the seller. People are attracted because they feel a certain connection to other people. ​​It’s more akin to a friendship.”

Wong Zi Yang, CEO and co-founder of Upmesh / Photo credit: Upmesh

In 2021, Southeast Asia’s internet economy saw 40 million new customers. This growth has led to a surge in retail innovations such as live selling as ecommerce companies compete to tap into the region’s potential.

Launched in November 2020, Upmesh aims to make it easier for live sellers to scale their businesses.

Live selling grows in SEA

Paving the way in the live selling space is China. The country’s millennial and Gen Z influencers have turned live selling into a US$423 billion industry, driven by talents like local singer Viya and Taobao star Zhang Dayi alongside small-scale sellers.

Platforms such as Taobao Live and WeChat have coded social media directly into the DNA of China’s ecommerce platforms, says Wong. “When you make a good buy, you have to share it with a friend,” he adds.

Live selling is also seeing growth in Southeast Asia. Within the first quarter of 2020, the number of live sales in the region increased five-fold, proving especially popular with shoppers in Singapore and Thailand and establishing itself as a tool that empowers SMEs to differentiate themselves from larger competition.

Major ecommerce firms are also joining the fray. Shopee, for one, reported a sharp increase in live selling streams in 2021, culminating in 450 million views during its 12.12 shopping festival.

Previously from the blockchain industry, Wong says he was “enamored” with livestreaming because of its role in the future of content creation, adding that he was also fascinated by the success of video game streaming. However, he believes that video game streams weren’t effective monetization tools – there’s a lack of integration between Amazon’s ecommerce business and its livestreaming service Twitch, for example.

When Wong and his co-founders looked in their home markets, they discovered that the communities they wanted to serve already existed in the form of niche Facebook groups that were only just beginning to gain mainstream awareness.

The missing pieces

Despite their dedicated fanbases, live sellers face a number of infrastructure problems that make scaling difficult. For example, Wong explains that they have to manually write down orders one at a time.

These gaps remain largely unresolved by technology companies across the spectrum. Wong argues that pure ecommerce players like Shopee and Lazada come up short because they aren’t building products that can help sellers cultivate “sticky” customer bases.

“Live selling quickly grows user bases because it’s directly connected to your social media followers, who in turn share streams with their own networks,” he explains. “That’s not the case with dedicated ecommerce platforms – they’re ultimately just places for shopping.”

Upmesh helps these underserved sellers with technology that not only streamlines their operations, but also boosts their discoverability among shoppers.

Wong says that most other live selling SaaS firms only focus on providing administrative fixes that help sellers manage inventory or process orders, but they don’t help with search and discovery. “Buyer discovery capabilities haven’t happened with live commerce because you can’t do search on live video,” he adds.

Upmesh’s suite of tools directly integrates with Facebook Live and Instagram Live to help sellers drive orders with keyword recognition software. During streams, buyers’ comments are captured and consolidated into shopping carts that can be checked out straight away. This cuts out the manual labor of writing down orders, allowing sellers to focus on their streams.

Photo credit: Upmesh

Wong emphasizes Upmesh’s strategy of building off existing platforms like Facebook and Instagram as a way to ensure continued growth for sellers.

“Companies that try to enable live selling independent of social media platforms will not see much growth,” he says. “The key to growing the ecosystem lies in building the tools and solutions around the existing social media audience.”

For instance, Upmesh’s integration also enables interactive functions that let sellers run activities like lucky draws and overlays, much like their counterparts in China.

The future of recommendations

Having recently been included in CB Insights’ top 100 list of retail tech companies, Upmesh is set to launch a handful of AI-powered product discovery tools for live selling in the years to come. Wong describes scenarios where buyers would be fed post-checkout recommendations that highlight other related products or sellers.

“Once we allow buyers to search for anything and finalize a sale, it opens up the purchase opportunity for any product,” he says. “Previously, if you’re buying cooking tools, you’d have to go hunting on Shopee. With live selling, you can purchase recommendations directly from a famous chef.”

Wong says that Upmesh wants to encourage a brand of ecommerce that’s based on interpersonal relationships – not algorithms.

“Ecommerce platforms are all about algorithms and numbers, but with live selling, you understand that a real human being is explaining to you the value-adds of a certain product,” he explains.

He speculates that there could even be a future where Upmesh is able to matchmake certain suppliers to sellers who are better equipped to sell via livestreams or serve recommendations to anyone with a smartphone.

“With live selling, there are a lot of permutations that can actually create lift across industries. And when you put it into the right ecosystems, it explodes very fast,” he says.

Upmesh is a live selling enablement solution that is reimagining the future of how consumers shop with the power of shared experience and community. Powered by live sales analytics and engaging overlays, Upmesh streamlines back-office processes so sellers can focus on connecting with their audience in exciting, new ways.

To learn more about how Upmesh Live supports live sellers, visit its website.

This content was produced by Tech in Asia Studios, which connects brands with Asia’s tech community. Learn more about partnering with Tech in Asia Studios.