Tmall Medical Aesthetics Launches 'Renewal Plan' to Empower 100 Clinics to Achieve Tens of Millions in Revenue

A massive initiative aimed at enhancing the beauty of 300 million Chinese people has quietly emerged over the past year through collaboration between Alibaba Health and its partners.

On September 3, Alibaba Health, in collaboration with numerous medical aesthetics brands, medical institutions, and service providers, officially launched the Tmall Medical Aesthetics “Renewal Plan,” aimed at helping brands and institutions connect with Tmall’s 300 million consumers seeking aesthetic treatments. Meanwhile, the “Peace of Mind Beauty” alliance, established by Alibaba Health and its industry partners, leverages coordination across the upstream and downstream sectors to enable consumers to access more professional and transparent medical aesthetics services.

According to the "Annual Development Survey Report on China's Medical Aesthetics Industry" published by the Chinese Association of Plastics and Aesthetics, by 2018, the volume of medical aesthetic services had exceeded 10 million cases, with an annual market output value approaching RMB 125.1 billion and a year-on-year growth rate of 7.2%. However, on the other side of the market boom, traditional medical institutions, with their existing operational models, are unable to adequately meet consumers' demands for aesthetic enhancement.

On one hand, there is a growing number of individuals seeking aesthetic treatments both online and offline; on the other, medical institutions struggle to respond effectively to increasingly complex consumer scenarios. In light of this industry landscape, the “Renewal Initiative” aims to help medical institutions leverage digital operations to build stronger connections with consumers.

Wang Yajun, Senior Director of the Consumer Healthcare Division at Alibaba Health, stated at the press conference: “Tmall has over 300 million users seeking aesthetic improvements. We have observed that consumer groups in beauty, personal care, and other appearance-enhancing industries are increasingly overlapping with those seeking medical aesthetic services. Many people are now striving to look beautiful even after removing makeup and without relying on photo-editing apps. Regarding aesthetic enhancement, a growing number of individuals are embracing medical interventions as solutions, which presents significant opportunities for the industry.”

Since 2016, Alibaba Health’s Tmall medical aesthetics business has experienced rapid growth for consecutive years. In 2018, it ranked first in year-over-year growth within its industry during the Tmall Double 11 Shopping Festival, and during the Tmall 618 Mid-Year Sale in 2019, its performance surged by 572% compared to the same period the previous year. Behind these figures, a number of institutions have also achieved rapid growth alongside the platform’s development.

The “Renewal Initiative” announced at this press conference aims to replicate the proven methodologies from past collaborations between Tmall and the industry, thereby creating more success stories for the sector.

The “Revitalization Initiative” begins with “Store Revitalization,” the first step of which is to invite compliant and professional medical institutions to open stores on Tmall. By leveraging various store formats, such as flagship stores, these institutions can establish a presence on Tmall, bringing them closer to consumers. For these institutions, this approach ensures full visibility into traffic sources, category management of medical aesthetic services, and comprehensive data analytics throughout the transaction process.

“Entrance Renewal” Offers Offline Institutions the “1=N” Entry Opportunity. Alibaba is a vast ecosystem that has developed mobile applications across various domains and scenarios to meet the diverse needs of consumers. Medical aesthetics is a typical localized service, requiring the attraction of precise, nearby consumers. Once an institution joins Tmall, it can gain traffic from multiple local entry points within the Alibaba ecosystem, such as Alipay and Koubei, helping the institution connect with nearby individuals in need and integrating online and offline traffic into a unified strategy through these extensive consumer touchpoints.

“Super Hit Products” represent an initiative in “Product Revitalization.” Alibaba Health has developed several standardized medical aesthetics products based on localized traffic, transforming the previously overwhelming array of services offered by individual institutions into standardized online offerings (“standardized products”) for consumers to choose from. This allows consumers to first select a “standardized product” and then choose a service provider. This subtle change in the decision-making process significantly reduces consumers’ decision-making costs.

Furthermore, the “Dual-Beauty Synergy” initiative within the “Scenario Revitalization” framework is a key highlight of this newly launched revitalization plan. In the future, Tmall Medical Aesthetics will engage in robust collaboration with Tmall’s beauty and personal care divisions to provide consumers with comprehensive aesthetic enhancement solutions. The “Marketing Revitalization” initiative will open up various promotional campaigns on Tmall and Taobao Mobile, helping institutions better align with consumers’ aesthetic needs.

Wang Yajun, Senior Director of the Consumer Healthcare Division at Alibaba Health, summarized that the core of the newly released “Revitalization Plan” is to help industry players establish their own stores on Tmall, thereby securing their own user operation platforms and growing alongside the future dividends of Tmall’s medical aesthetics sector. “Moving forward, we plan to incubate 100 representative institutions on Tmall Medical Aesthetics with annual revenues exceeding RMB 10 million, encouraging all compliant and professional medical institutions in the industry to open stores on Tmall.”

According to 2017 data from the Chinese Association of Plastics and Aesthetics, 70% of hyaluronic acid and botulinum toxin products sold in the domestic market are counterfeit or smuggled goods. As market demand continues to rise year by year, consumers require more professional and reliable medical aesthetic products and services. It is therefore imperative to collaborate with supply-side stakeholders to establish a safe and standardized medical aesthetics ecosystem.

At this press conference, Alibaba Health announced the joint establishment of the Tmall Medical Aesthetics “Peace of Mind Beauty” Alliance with domestic and international pharmaceutical and device companies—including Allergan, Lint Pharma, Haohai Biological Technology, Bloomage Biotechnology, Huadong Medicine, Imeik, Alma Lasers, and Lumenis—as well as renowned medical aesthetic institutions such as Peng Ai, Biliansheng, Xichan, Yonghe, and Jianli Meishiqin. The alliance aims to help consumers enjoy a better experience with authentic products and services through medical information education, rigorous selection of preferred providers, and drug authenticity verification via barcode scanning.

After developing a demand for medical aesthetics, consumers can proactively learn about pharmaceutical companies’ brands, products, and service offerings via Tmall’s online platform. Once they have finalized their treatment plan, they select an authorized medical institution based on geographic location, consult online, and place an order for the services. Prior to their appointment, they use Taobao or Alipay to scan the product’s QR code for authenticity verification, thereby experiencing a fully traceable medical aesthetics journey.

Wendi, Allergan’s Director of Digitalization and Consumer Marketing, strongly endorses this model. “Currently, upstream brands can also open official flagship stores on Tmall to engage directly with consumers. This approach allows brands to provide medical education to consumers in advance. Furthermore, by forming ‘alliances,’ high-quality medical institutions and upstream brand flagship stores can offer exclusive product supplies. This reduces the cost of professional knowledge dissemination and minimizes the harm caused to consumers by counterfeit goods, marking an industry-first innovation.” To date, pharmaceutical companies such as Allergan and Linte Pharma have already launched these services on the Tmall platform.

“Providing users with a comprehensive, end-to-end safe medical aesthetics service experience and creating an efficient digital operations platform for institutions—this is the original intention behind our initiative,” said Shen Difan, CEO of Alibaba Health.