Top selling pictures suspected to be stolen! Arrow pointed at Temu sellers

Temu has been developing rapidly in overseas markets with rock-bottom prices. While it has put pressure on platforms such as Amazon, it has also caused some selfish sellers to have crooked ideas.

There are frequent reports of malicious new tactics in the seller group: they purchase goods from Temu, only refund the money after the products arrive at the overseas warehouse, re-label the products and put them into Amazon warehouse for sale. They are well aware of the loopholes between platforms and want to make a fortune through the 0-cost no-source model, so they want to take advantage of Temu and sellers for free, and even worse, they want to make a profit on both Temu and Amazon platforms. However, can this kind of speculative tactics really have the last laugh?

Temu , which is in the spotlight, seems to be a hot topic all the time. Recently, even the 3C big seller Anker has been involved. The picture of a popular earphone on Temu is very similar to the picture of a popular earphone on Anker on Amazon. People in the industry have made many speculations because the same situation has occurred to many sellers.

It is undeniable that Temu has been a controversial platform since its launch. The outside world has never stopped paying attention to and criticizing it, but this is not necessarily a bad thing. Temu did not enter the cross-border e-commerce market on a whim, so what are its business data like? Are the sellers on the platform really losing money? What methodologies do the sellers who really make money have?

It’s too bad. Some sellers use Temu to start a 0-cost no-source mode.

Since its launch last year, Temu has swept across Europe and the United States at lightning speed, surpassing Amazon to become the most downloaded shopping app in the United States in one month, with over 70 million downloads in 10 months, 23 sites opened in less than a year, and daily sales of veteran sellers exceeding 10,000 orders. Industry insiders estimate that Temu is expected to achieve an annual GMV target of US$10 billion this year.

With its rock-bottom low prices, Temu has been surging in overseas markets, putting considerable pressure on competing platforms including Amazon, which have responded with a series of powerful moves. However, it is precisely this extremely low price that has made some sellers start to think carefully.

"Has anyone done this? I saw some sellers buy goods from Temu at low prices, and then refund the goods when they arrive at the overseas warehouse, and then re-label them and put them on sale in the Amazon warehouse," a seller said on the social platform.

As soon as the news came out, Temu sellers complained: "We are already suffering from the platform's low-price policy, and now sellers from other platforms want to take advantage of us. This is killing us."

Worse still, there are Amazon sellers who want to get something for free: "If I sell my own goods on Temu, and then use my own account to get the goods linked to my Temu for free, how does Temu settle the account? Can I get the money?" If the seller's move is successful, it means that the seller not only gets his own products and shipping costs for free, but also achieves a win-win situation for Temu and Amazon. The seller is nicknamed "the big boss of the 0-cost, no-source model" by insiders.

Although this approach is quite cruel to Temu sellers, it has received support from a large number of sellers↓

Isn't this 0-cost, no-source business going to make a lot of money?

Let my friends in overseas warehouse try it

What a great trick to get something for nothing

Control the cow and use magic to fight magic

Some sellers admitted that Temu sellers had previously snatched away a large amount of traffic and orders with their low-price policy, and this operation was just a way of giving them a taste of their own medicine. However, some industry insiders also admitted that the platform was driving sellers crazy, so much so that they came up with all kinds of ways to exploit platform loopholes to make money without regard for the consequences.

However, is this operation really feasible? Some sellers are trying to cooperate with Chinese sellers to test whether this method is feasible. On overseas social platforms, videos related to "how to achieve no need return on Temu" have gone viral. Some sellers have confirmed that there are indeed many local wholesalers in the US market who purchase goods from Temu, and the prices are relatively cheap.

But if, as mentioned earlier, sellers use Temu as a wholesale website and resell products to other platforms such as Amazon, once this model is widely adopted by sellers, it will be a war of words for both sellers and platforms, and the most unlucky ones will be the sellers on the Temu platform.

As we all know, Temu was able to quickly gain a foothold overseas by purchasing at low prices, which is what sellers often refer to as bottom-line price pressure on suppliers. Some sellers admit that in order to cope with the platform's actions and protect their own profits, they choose to cut corners, and the fabrics and craftsmanship of the products supplied to Temu and other platforms are different.

A Chinese netizen living in the United States also confirmed this statement, saying that the two children's swimsuits he bought from Temu had an unpleasant chemical smell when he opened them. "I dare not let my children wear such products, and I will not dare to buy anything from Temu in the future," the netizen said bluntly. Being restricted by the platform, dealing with attacks from sellers on other platforms, and maintaining profits have become problems that some Temu sellers have to solve.

Regarding the sellers' zero-cost and no-source model, some sellers still gave sincere advice: "Don't try it. If you operate it too many times, you will probably be restricted from placing orders, or even worse, your account may be blocked." Such malicious competition not only hurts sellers and platforms, but also disrupts the market and accelerates the market's internal circulation.

Although many e-commerce platforms have implemented a "refund only" policy, there are many consumers who take advantage of the platform loopholes to get free stuff. However, nowadays, some sellers have changed their minds and think that the impact of getting free stuff from sellers and platforms on the market can be imagined.

However, it is difficult to really implement this strategy of making money out of nothing. Violation of the platform's logistics policy and insufficient product tracking rate are one of the reasons; Temu's product packages already come with praise cards, etc., and once they reach Amazon consumers, once they are reported, the store will be closed in a matter of minutes; as mentioned in the previous article, due to the low prices, some sellers choose different fabrics and craftsmanship, and the product quality cannot be guaranteed at all.

This kind of reselling has happened before, and the ending is a bloody lesson. A media report said that a seller took advantage of the differences between platforms and resold low-priced products on different platforms, which eventually led to the freezing of funds and the blocking of his account by Amazon. "Reselling seriously infringes on the intellectual property rights of sellers. Some sellers will unite to collect evidence and finally sue the sellers who infringe," one seller admitted.

As we all know, Temu has always been at the center of the topic, and recently Amazon's 3C hot seller Anker has also been involved.

Anker's best-selling product was stolen by Temu merchants? Seller: Maybe they opened a fake account

"The picture of Temu's previous popular earphones is exactly the same as the picture of Anker's best-selling earphones. What's going on?" a seller asked on a social platform. Could it be that the Temu sellers stole Anker's product pictures?

On Amazon, the best-selling earphones are Soundcore, a brand under Anker. The current rating number exceeds 50,000, there are 3 colors, and the product is priced at $79.99. The scene picture in the Temu best-selling earphones is almost the same as the Anker best-selling one, and the product is priced at $25.

The top one is a picture of Anker's popular product , and the bottom one is a picture of Temu's product

Comparing the two sets of pictures, we can find that the same male and female models, the same set of pictures, the same time, only the background and the headphones are different, and the level of detail of the pictures on Temu is far better than that on Amazon. Under these doubts, a number of sellers have made multiple speculations ↓

The store on Temu is actually a small account opened by Anker, so it makes sense to share scene pictures. However, in order to avoid suspicion of stealing pictures, they use product pictures of different scenes.

Temu store found the same model, wore the same clothes, and re-photographed a set of pictures in the same scene;

This set of pictures came from a picture selling website, and it happened that Anke and Temu sellers both bought the commercial use rights of this set of pictures;

Temu sellers stole Anker’s product images;

In response to these four speculations, the sharp-eyed sellers analyzed them in a consistent way: "The picture of the female model in the Anker link seems to be photoshopped, but the male model does not look like it is photoshopped." " It is obviously the same set of pictures, but the details and movements are different. If it is not Anker's small account, it is really incomprehensible. "

However, sellers are more inclined to believe that Temu sellers stole the pictures from Anke. In their opinion, the theft of Amazon store pictures by Temu is not an isolated case. The editor learned that Anke's set of pictures has been used in many of its listings, and it is likely that it has exclusive copyright. An industry insider pointed out: If Anke and the two models signed an exclusive agreement, it would confirm the fact of stealing the pictures; if no exclusive agreement was signed, Anke could also sue based on the poses used in the pictures.

In fact, there is a reason why most sellers believe that Temu stole Anker’s pictures.

Previously, some sellers complained that their product pictures were copied and sold on Temu. Not only were the detailed pictures the same, but even the listing copy was exactly the same. What was even more infuriating was that the price was half that of Amazon, and the number of orders reached more than 1,000, far exceeding the seller’s own sales on Amazon.

"I took and edited all these pictures myself, and I also spent a long time learning photography and Photoshop," said Xiao Liu, a solo seller. In the past few months, Xiao Liu's store sales have dropped by about 20%. Although he is not sure whether it is caused by Temu's "competing products", there must be some connection between the two.

Cases of stolen images are common on Temu, with many sellers complaining directly: "They steal our Amazon images and even the brand name is still there, it's just copy and paste." At the same time, Amazon sellers are also advised to search for their products on Temu to see if any of their images have been stolen.

Some sellers admitted that they look for various hot-selling products on Amazon's best-selling list, then go to suppliers to wholesale the same products, and then move the products to Temu. This strategy is very common among Temu sellers.

Some sellers thought it was too troublesome to contact the platform to complain, so they just ignored it. Some sellers also filed complaints with Temu, but most of the complaints were ignored, and only a few sellers succeeded in their complaints. Some sellers chose to inform Amazon customer service that Temu's products infringed their intellectual property rights, hoping that Amazon would help them protect their rights.

Regarding the frequent theft of images, some sellers have given two more feasible suggestions: find a local American lawyer to sue Temu sellers for infringement. The platform will also freeze Temu sellers' funds like Amazon. Sellers can get compensation if the settlement or lawsuit is successful. However, sellers need to invest money in finding a lawyer in the early stage, which takes a long time.

Another way is to use a website to report Temu's stolen images, which is the BBB (American Consumer Rights Protection Agency). This is similar to the domestic consumer association. Although legally, the BBB has no right to deal with companies that have been complained about, it will display the credit reports and fraud warnings of some companies and charities. It is an important reference for many consumers when making consumption choices. Therefore, many companies will respond positively to complaints to the BBB to maintain the company's good reputation.

After filing a complaint on the BBB website, Temu customer service will respond to the lawsuit filed by the seller. The seller will provide some relevant evidence. After Temu confirms it, it will quickly remove the relevant products involved. Judging from the feedback from some sellers, the success rate is still quite high. Relevant data shows that in 2022, Temu had 235 complaints on the BBB and received a customer rating of 2.1 stars (out of 5 stars).

Behind the controversy, what did Temu do right?

Temu has been controversial since its launch, and its popularity in the industry has only increased. Sellers have never stopped complaining about it, and the reasons are not much different. But this is not a bad thing for Temu. Regardless of whether these voices are praise or criticism, they are all attention. The more and bigger the voices, the higher the attention Temu will receive. A rapidly developing platform needs attention.

It seems that Temu suddenly entered the cross-border e-commerce market and quickly harvested traffic and users. However, behind this, it was not just a whim of Pinduoduo, but also a decision made after stepping on countless pitfalls.

As early as 2010, Huang Zheng began to try to do cross-border e-commerce. At that time, the company was named Lebei, which mainly sold wedding dresses. At that time, the SHEIN brand had not yet been established, and it was still selling wedding dresses under the name of "She Inside". Lebei gradually ran away from major women's clothing websites including Floryday and JJ'S House, with higher prices than SHEIN. After 2018, Lebei merged with the major website teams and launched the brand vova, which mainly sells popular online celebrity products and imitations of big brands.

However, this approach was soon proven to be inefficient and was eventually divested by Pinduoduo. It can be said that today's Temu is also the product of Pinduoduo's continuous trial and error.

This time, Pinduoduo no longer focuses on cheap clothing, but positions Temu as a full-category platform that delivers small Chinese commodities. The country route for the online site is also very clear, starting from a single market with high purchasing power and going all the way down, from the United States to Canada, and then to the United Kingdom, etc. Under the unified operation strategy, Temu's downloads in new countries are among the best.

It turns out that Temu’s approach is feasible and the data is very impressive.

Although no one in the industry has broken down Temu's data, it is recognized by insiders that it is large. As early as May this year, its sales were 20% higher than SHEIN. Currently, its user retention data is significantly better than AliExpress, SHEIN and other platforms, which is a favorable signal for the future development of the platform.

"Temu has raised the freight costs of the entire cross-border logistics industry. Nearly 80% of the air freight space is occupied by Temu," an industry insider previously said. A logistics industry insider estimated Temu's sales, based on 1 million orders per day and a customer unit price of US$25, Temu's annual GMV will exceed US$10 billion. Taking into account the growth rate of the platform, the annual sales will reach US$50 billion in less than two years. However, this estimated data may not be as high as the actual data.

Temu's rapid growth also confirms Huang Zheng's point of view that "when it comes to consumption, everyone is the same, whether rich or poor, affordability is a universal demand." Whether or not you agree with the current market strategy of focusing on low prices, the market and competitors have already given the answer.

Today, Temu is still booming at an alarming rate. Some Temu sellers said that it is common to receive hundreds of orders a day. Some veteran sellers, who have high sales levels, receive over 10,000 orders a day. This also confirms what an industry insider said: many sellers are packing while complaining, after all, everyone is jealous of the traffic on the Temu platform.

“I heard that all the sellers on Temu are losing money?” That’s not the case. There are so many sellers on the platform, so naturally some will make money and some will lose money. Only a fool would keep doing it while losing money.

A popular Amazon seller said: "My Temu store now has 18,000 orders a day, and the overall gross profit margin is 30%, so the profit is still considerable." Initially, a large number of sellers may have used Temu as a place to clear inventory, but some sellers have tasted the sweetness and found that it is a good order-placing platform.

Some sellers have their own strategies for Temu's price-cutting policy. "We don't just buy from factories, we have our own team, we have original products, and we also modify existing products," said seller Xiao Li. If you can make unpopular or exclusive products, Temu will basically approve any supply price you offer.

Products that are representative and differentiated have price advantages, and the platform review will not be too strict. Although the supply price of pet products made by Xiao Li is relatively high, the platform will also review and approve them. At present, Xiao Li has received more than 10,000 orders per month on the platform with his own strategy, and has experienced many explosive orders and has made good profits.

"Only by making products that are rare in the market can you gain profit margins for yourself," one seller revealed. In addition to understanding the nature of the platform, sellers who want to gain a foothold on the platform must also understand which products of their products are easy to sell and which are not, and cut out cheap or low-profit products and focus on profitable products.

Regarding product selection, some sellers have pointed out a direction. That is, relying on Temu's product list, product price and grade, Amazon sellers can adjust their product development and try to avoid low-priced products, which may have a good effect.

Some old sellers quit, and some new sellers join. This is the alternation of a platform. At present, there is news that Temu is conducting a survey on the merchant information in the Southeast Asian market. Those who meet the conditions will become the first batch of merchants to join the Southeast Asian Japanese and Korean sites. Let us wait and see how Temu develops in the future!

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