How the Launch of SoYoung's '66 Double Eyelid Festival' Drives the Medical Aesthetics Industry Toward 'Greater Beauty and Better Health'
As the first nationwide mid-year shopping festival in the post-pandemic era, this year’s 618 has attracted significant attention. Major platforms have released high-profile promotional videos, with JD.com featuring the slogan “Living Up to Every Passion” and Tmall using “Life, Why Not ‘Ignite’ It?” The launch of SoYoung, the first publicly traded internet medical aesthetics company in China, with its “6.6 Double Eyelid Festival,” has added even more appeal to the mid-year sales event. Its strong opening performance has further unleashed consumer demand for medical aesthetic services. “In the past couple of days, elevators in both my office building and residential community have been filled with SoYoung advertisements, and the promotional offers seem quite substantial.”“A medical aesthetics consumer said. Recently, New Oxygen’s latest building advertisements have sparked heated discussion among netizens. Images shared by users show slogans such as ‘Free Consultations with 100 Renowned Experts’ and ‘Double Eyelid Surgery at Up to 60% Off.’”and other information.
According to New Oxygen Technology, thanks to its outstanding performance in content and user operations in the first half of this year, the “6.6 Double Eyelid Festival” was exceptionally popular. The platform’s daily active users (DAU) saw a significant month-on-month increase compared to the pandemic period, providing strong momentum for industry recovery. It has become a “reservoir” for medical aesthetic institutions, helping users make informed and safe consumption decisions.
The head of So-Young Inc.'s e-commerce business stated,As the “618” shopping festival of the medical aesthetics industry, the “66 Double Eyelid Festival” can, on one hand, stimulate a surge in the medical aesthetics consumer market in the post-pandemic era and boost the economic recovery of the sector; on the other hand, as a vertical platform for the medical aesthetics industry, So-Young’s official participation in the 618 mega-sale ecosystem helps promote the standardized and high-quality development of the industry.
China’s medical aesthetics market has entered a golden period of rapid growth. According to iResearch’s “2020 White Paper on Insights into China’s Medical Aesthetics Industry” (hereinafter referred to as the “White Paper”), the market size of China’s medical aesthetics industry reached RMB 176.9 billion in 2019 and is expected to peak three years later, with the market size projected to reach RMB 311.5 billion by 2023.
The immense market potential represents the “fire” of the medical aesthetics industry, while chaotic practices such as illegal medical aesthetic services constitute the “ice” hindering its development.“The White Paper” shows that the number of illegally operated medical aesthetic clinics exceeds 80,000.
Becoming “more beautiful and healthier” is not only the aspiration of medical aesthetics consumers but also one of the development goals of the medical aesthetics industry.To achieve this goal, the government, industry associations, and enterprises have joined forces to usher in a “new era of collaborative governance” for the medical aesthetics industry.
In April this year, the National Health Commission and seven other ministries jointly issued the “Notice on Further Strengthening Comprehensive Supervision and Law Enforcement in Medical Aesthetics,” explicitly calling for enhanced comprehensive regulatory oversight and law enforcement in the medical aesthetics sector.
In response to national policy calls and in earnest promotion of high-quality development in the medical aesthetics industry, New Oxygen, as China’s largest internet-based medical aesthetics platform, has amassed extensive experience in combating illegal medical aesthetic practices through seven years of exploration and accumulation. It has established industry advantages in scale, technology, operations, and services, thereby playing a significant role in facilitating the implementation of strengthened national regulations on the medical aesthetics sector.
“The most critical factor is to forge a synergistic effort, leveraging internet-based approaches and mobilizing resources from all sectors of society to enhance the quality of medical practices and empower the medical aesthetics industry,” pointed out Yang Rongya, Vice President of the Chinese Association of Plastics and Aesthetics. “New Oxygen can leverage its big data and technological advantages to provide innovative solutions for the rapid and effective implementation of supervision and management in the medical aesthetics industry, thereby ensuring that regulatory measures are genuinely implemented.”
“Managing an online industry platform is far more efficient than overseeing tens or even hundreds of thousands of offline institutions. Therefore, moving industry self-regulation online is key to the standardized development of the entire sector,” said Jin Xing, Chairman and CEO of So-Young Technology. He added that this year, So-Young will fully leverage its internet technology advantages to drive the digitalization of merchants and the online supervision of the medical aesthetics industry.
Zhu Meiru, Deputy Secretary-General of the Chinese Association of Plastics and Aesthetics, also believes that moving the entire medical aesthetics industry online and onto platforms, and then using technology to promote self-regulation upgrades in the industry, may become the best way to address the current chaos in the medical aesthetics field.
As SoYoung drives the digitalization of the medical aesthetics industry, its past achievements have validated that this development direction has become an irreversible trend, benefiting all stakeholders across the industry chain. Data shows that in the first quarter of 2020, SoYoung recorded 88,000 video consultations, with over 7,000 professional “consultants” monetizing their services through the SoYoung platform. During the pandemic, the orderly rollout of online services such as video consultations provided a breakthrough and new opportunities for the industry and practitioners. Meanwhile, SoYoung previously invested more than RMB 35 million to support its industry chain partners during the COVID-19 pandemic, aiding the recovery of offline medical aesthetics institutions.
During the “6.6 Double Eyelid Festival,” New Oxygen will invest tens of millions in subsidies. Beyond the offerings highlighted in its advertisements, New Oxygen is also launching a comprehensive promotion centered on medical aesthetics and general health, covering high-demand categories such as facial features, anti-aging, body contouring, skincare, oral health, and hair transplantation. With double eyelid surgery serving as the core focus of this major sales event, additional benefits include special fixed-price offers for double eyelid procedures at nationally recognized chain medical aesthetic institutions.
During this year’s “6.6 Double Eyelid Festival,” in addition to special offers, SoYoung has heavily promoted initiatives such as free consultations with hundreds of renowned medical aesthetic experts and the Authentic Products Alliance.
Amid the current landscape where illicit aesthetic medicine practices distort public perception and damage industry reputation, New Oxygen has launched higher-quality, more standardized promotional campaigns such as the “66 Double Eyelid Festival.” Meanwhile, through a combination of initiatives—including the Authentic Products Alliance, joint industry self-regulation efforts with the Chinese Association of Plastics and Aesthetics, and China’s first public welfare project dedicated to repairing damages caused by illicit aesthetic procedures—New Oxygen is supporting the advancement of online regulatory oversight and accelerating the evolution of the medical aesthetics industry.
Online integration has not only served as a “pacemaker” for the post-pandemic recovery of the medical aesthetics industry, but also become a “remedy” for its healthy development.
Promoting the industry's development toward higher quality, standardization, and online operations has also brought positive benefits to New Oxygen.
According to the latest financial report released by New Oxygen, in the first quarter of 2020, New Oxygen Technology's total revenue was RMB 183 million, exceeding the company's expected range of RMB 160 million to RMB 180 million. The number of paying medical institutions on the New Oxygen platform reached 3,295, a year-on-year increase of 22%. The number of institutions paying for information services on the platform was 1,862.
QuestMobile data also shows that in April 2020, the New Oxygen app became the top traffic platform in the vertical medical sector, with its monthly active users far surpassing those of other medical platforms such as Ping An Good Doctor and DXY.
With the full launch of the “6.6 Double Eyelid Festival,” attention has been drawn to the event’s product coverage, which spans “nine popular categories and three major general health categories.” In light of So-Young’s previously established internet hospital, which offers services in medical aesthetics, obstetrics and gynecology, ophthalmology, dentistry, remote consultations, and medical devices, both upstream and downstream segments of the industry chain are poised to benefit.
Despite the heavy pressure of the pandemic in the first quarter, SoYoung’s robust growth momentum and strong scalability provided the confidence to invest tens of millions in launching the “6.6 Double Eyelid Festival.” This initiative not only reinforced SoYoung’s position as the absolute leader in the medical aesthetics industry but also enabled it to fully fulfill its corporate social responsibility, driving the overall healthy and upward development of the industry.
Gong Wei, Deputy Secretary-General of the Chengdu Medical Aesthetics Industry Association, stated that the “6.6 Double Eyelid Festival” marked a critical period for the concentrated surge in demand for medical aesthetics in the post-pandemic era, as well as the turning point for the market’s return to rapid growth in the second half of 2020.“Integrating So-Young’s comprehensive, all-around system upgrade into its brand strategy, So-Young is actively promoting the standardization, healthy development, digitalization, and collaborative governance of the industry. This initiative will once again give back to the medical aesthetics sector, accelerate post-pandemic resumption of work and production, and boost economic recovery.”