Shop Like a Billionaire, Temu
The most downloaded marketplace app between Jan — Aug 2024
These are the steps people go through when being introduced to Temu. This happened to me and almost all of my friends.
Now, we are in this phase: ‘The goods aren’t of great quality, to be honest. I’ve stopped shopping on Temu.”
One day, while checking my X feed, I noticed everyone started sharing a coupon image. It felt like a scam at first because I didn’t know the app’s name. After seeing the keyword ‘Temu’ in every tweet, I thought, ‘Let me check this out.’
Temu is a website/app where you can spend a lot of time, but you’ll probably end up buying stuff that’s less valuable than the time you spent on the app. :)
What is Temu?
Temu is an online marketplace that connects consumers with a wide range of products at competitive prices. Launched in 2022 and owned by PDD Holdings, which also operates the popular Chinese platform Pinduoduo, Temu has quickly established itself as a significant player in the e-commerce landscape. The platform offers a diverse selection of items, including clothing, electronics, home goods, and beauty products, catering to a broad audience.
Why Temu Became so Popular?
Temu stands out in the e-commerce space due to several features:
- Affordability: Temu is known for offering low prices, often undercutting competitors by leveraging direct sourcing from manufacturers.
- Wide Product Range: The platform boasts millions of products across various categories, making it a one-stop shop for consumers.
- User-Friendly Interface: The app and website are designed for easy navigation, enhancing the shopping experience.
- Frequent Promotions: Temu regularly offers discounts, coupons, and flash sales, attracting price-sensitive shoppers.
- Social Shopping Elements: Inspired by Pinduoduo, Temu incorporates social features, allowing users to share deals and shop collaboratively.
- Gamification: Temu has many gamification elements in its app to reward loyal customers.
- Affiliate Marketing: Temu knew that giving users the opportunity to get coupons just by sharing Temu’s coupons would create a huge boost for the platform.
- One-Pack Solution: Temu sends all the items you’ve bought in one package, so you receive everything at the same time.
Since Temu has a wide product range, its app also offers a wide range of features. The app’s UX is much better than Aliexpress, Amazon, eBay, etc. They did a really good job with it.
It’s time to check the numbers of Temu and compare them to other marketplace apps’.
Temu with Numbers
After checking the download numbers of marketplace apps on AppMagic, you’ll notice the differences between giant marketplace apps.
Of course, Temu is still young compared to other applications, so it’s expected that more established apps would have higher download numbers. But still, their marketing team has prepared very well for global promotion.
Temu reached 113.7 million users between Jan — Aug 2024, placing it first among all marketplace apps in Tier 1 Western Countries (AU, CA, FR, DE, UK, US). Second is Amazon, which has 23.8 million downloads. Among the top 5 apps, Temu accounted for 64% of total downloads.
After analyzing Tier 1 West Countries, Temu spread its slogan “Shop Like a Billionaire” very effectively. If we compare the web traffic of these marketplaces, Amazon is way ahead of Temu and others, but Temu drove people to download their app with a really good voucher system. And to be honest, their app’s UX is way better than Amazon’s.
While checking Temu’s download numbers since September 2022, I realized there were 3 countries where people knew nothing about Temu in 2023. But all of a sudden, in Q1 and Q2, Temu’s growth in those countries — Turkey, Colombia, and Brazil — was enormous.
As you can see in the previous graphics, Google Trends and download numbers showed similar trends in these countries. In a quarterly analysis, focused on these regions and gained over 40 million downloads. For this calculation, I collected data on Temu’s popularity from September 1 — 2023 to May 1 — 2024, and from May 1 to August 31.
Even in this short period, Temu almost doubled its download numbers in these 3 countries compared to Amazon’s download numbers in Tier 1 West Countries (6 countries included). To achieve these download numbers, the app owner had to spend a lot on advertising, but after checking Temu’s ad impressions on different networks for Turkey and Brazil on AppMagic, I realized they used social media power very well.
For Turkey, after May 1, Temu’s average daily bought impressions increased by 12 times compared to the period before May 1 (since September 1, 2023). However, the average daily download numbers increased by 48 times. The difference is huge — even with the best creatives and tools for app install campaigns, it’s not possible to increase your campaign efficiency by 4x. It’s just impossible.
As I mentioned before, Temu followed a very effective strategy at key points and took advantage of WOMM (Word of Mouth Marketing). They sell really cool and fun items that people love to show off in their Reels or TikToks, driving curiosity around Temu. After seeing all the affiliate and discount coupons on X, people were eager to explore Temu. Of course, with a very low minimum cart value, people could buy whatever they wanted at affordable prices. Curiosity also lingered about whether people would even receive their items. And when they did, they were shocked because everything came in one bag, unlike Amazon.com (swh). In the end, many people ended up buying small things just to treat themselves. :)
I bought some small items that I didn’t use after two weeks. The experience was fun, but for me, it’s enough Temu time for now.
If you want to reach out to me about my post or a different topic, feel free to contact me on LinkedIn.
- Mehmet Onur Yaman, Digital Dive
