11.11. World Day of "fake" discounts

A bit of prose

The annual sale on Aliexpress, which takes place on November 11 of each year, is a very remarkable event. The folk holiday, the Bachelor's Day, which is celebrated annually on November 11 in China, in 2013 received international publicity and became akin to the American “Black Friday”. Customers are promised big discounts, bonuses and gifts for all sorts of necessary and useful things, many people are waiting for this day all year.

However, after last year's similar sales, many buyers still had doubts about the reality of the discounts that the sellers were able to offer.

This year we decided to check how fair the discounts are for the buyers on the 11.11 sales day and to monitor the pricing situation.

Input data

The base of goods with Aliexpress was collected for all the headings by the “best offer” and “most bought” filters from page one to nineteen - about 540,000 products were collected in total, and over 30 thousand items were removed from Aliexpress during the monitoring. At the moment, there are 510 797 products in our database, which is slightly more than 5% of 10 million goods declared by Ali. Since the most popular and recommended proposals were collected, we consider our sample to be representative.
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So, the sending data:

• The number of monitored products 510 797 in all categories available on the site.
• Tracking changes began on September 16 of this year.
• During monitoring, for each product such indicators as price change, discount change, change in the number of orders, change in the number of reviews were collected daily.

This year, Aliexpress has laid out in advance a list of products that will participate in the sale with data on the price on the day of the sale. Thanks to this, today we can carry out our analysis and answer the main question - will there be real discounts and how forthcoming does the upcoming sale promise to be?

From our selection in the sale will take part 412,000 products.

The number of products for the main headings of the site:

Product Category	Tracked goods
Clothing and accessories for women	42326
Clothing and accessories for men	28417
Phones and Telecommunications	12833
Childen's goods	25165
Cars and Motorcycles	28428
Jewelry	17986
Clock	16368
Computers and network equipment	21667
Luggage and bags	16591
For home and garden	14061
Consumer electronics	12126
health and beauty	28779
Sports and entertainment	40485
Footwear	14721
Lamps and lighting	13391
Toys and Hobbies	11785
Weddings and Celebrations	13326
Furniture	8829
Electronic components	3553
Food	3871
Office and school supplies	16077
Home Improvement	8976
Security and Protection	5538
Non-standard goods	6701
Total	412,000

First swallows

At the time of the start of monitoring, the number of goods that were sold at a discount was more than 70% of the total number of tracked items. Discounts appeared somewhere, disappeared somewhere, but the overall result was about the same.

However, 11 days before the sale (i.e., 01.11.16), the discounts started to “disappear”, so 30.10 of goods with a discount was 388 606, and today (06.11.16) the quantity of goods with a discount is only 424.

At the same time, a list of promotional items and their future value appeared on the website of Aliexpress. An official promotion of the upcoming sale was launched.

Conclusion: before the sale almost all discounts were removed, even those that existed from the day of the start of price monitoring.

How to identify "fake" discounts

We recorded all the above price fluctuations, compared with the prices laid out for 11.11 and set up the following filters:

• the product on sale will cost 10% or more lower than the minimum price * for the last month - a real discount ;
  
  
• the product will be cheaper, but it will not be cheaper than the minimum price * for the last month - a discount is lime ;
  
  
• the product will be cheaper, but the discount will be from 0 to 10% compared with the minimum price * for the last month - a slight discount - this is also a negative result. Why do I need to declare large discounts, and sell the product with minor or even zero discounts.

* Minimum price with current discounts (if any). For example, the price of a product is 1200 rubles without a discount, and with a discount of 896 rubles, this means that the minimum price is 896 rubles.

Overall results

Product Categories	Total goods	Real discounts	Linden discounts	Minor discounts
Clothing and accessories for women	42326	8882	13411	20033
Clothing and accessories for men	28417	6404	8026	13987
Phones and Telecommunications	12833	3355	3600	5878
Childen's goods	25165	4993	9038	11134
Cars and Motorcycles	28428	5669	8105	14654
Jewelry	17986	6953	4001	7032
Clock	16368	3806	3595	8967
Computers and network equipment	21667	4377	6919	10371
Luggage and bags	16591	4042	4423	8126
For home and garden	14061	4084	3888	6089
Consumer electronics	12126	2107	4365	5654
health and beauty	28779	7358	8421	13,000
Sports and entertainment	40485	9501	10848	20136
Footwear	14721	3420	4116	7185
Lamps and lighting	13391	2354	4455	6582
Toys and Hobbies	11785	2725	2936	6124
Weddings and Celebrations	13326	3969	3056	6301
Furniture	8829	1861	2579	4389
Electronic components	3553	814	590	2149
Food	3871	1058	886	1927
Office and school supplies	16077	3796	3701	8580
Home Improvement	8976	1789	2372	4815
Security and Protection	5538	1030	1223	3285
Non-standard goods	6701	1663	1615	3423
Total	412,000	96010	116169	199821

The results are as follows: every fourth product participating in the 11.11 sale will be sold with a “fake” discount. Every second product - without a discount, or with a slight reduction in price.

The likelihood that you will purchase goods at a bargain price is 1 to 4 — excellent pricing, isn't it?

The highest percentage of false discounts is observed in the following categories of goods:

• women's clothing,
• childen's goods,
• computers and network equipment
• consumer electronics,
• lamps and lighting.

In these categories, every third product has a fake discount.


The results are sad, the risk of being deceived at a discount and buying goods at an inflated price is great. But this is a general picture throughout the site. We decided to dig a little deeper and consider only those products that are in demand from buyers. Suddenly, sellers with a good reputation and a constant flow of sales do not deal with such feints with prices.

We chose products that have 100 or more orders on 11/06/16.

Results for best-selling products

After filtering by the number of sales, we got the following picture:

Product Category	Products involved in the sale and having more than 100 orders
Clothing and accessories for women	16941
Clothing and accessories for men	6761
Phones and Telecommunications	6388
Childen's goods	9854
Cars and Motorcycles	9086
Jewelry	13279
Clock	5432
Computers and network equipment	5866
Luggage and bags	4985
For home and garden	10513
Consumer electronics	6966
health and beauty	15359
Sports and entertainment	10364
Footwear	2727
Lamps and lighting	4501
Toys and Hobbies	5496
Weddings and Celebrations	297
Furniture	185
Electronic components	563
Food	346
Office and school supplies	4332
Home Improvement	3496
Security and Protection	301
Non-standard goods	1217
Total	145255

There are 145 255 such products in our database - i.e. 1/3 of all participating in the sale of goods.

Filters on the "calibration" of discounts yielded the following results:

Product Categories	Total goods	Real discounts	Linden discounts	Minor discounts
Clothing and accessories for women	16941	3837	5373	7731
Clothing and accessories for men	6761	1905	1906	2950
Phones and Telecommunications	6388	1883	1638	2867
Childen's goods	9854	2142	3399	4313
Cars and Motorcycles	9086	1933	2566	4587
Jewelry	13279	4793	3043	5443
Clock	5432	1631	1137	2664
Computers and network equipment	5866	1093	1990	2783
Luggage and bags	4985	1404	1353	2228
For home and garden	10513	2863	3095	4555
Consumer electronics	6966	1198	2461	3307
health and beauty	15359	3960	4603	6796
Sports and entertainment	10364	2509	2945	4910
Footwear	2727	801	777	1149
Lamps and lighting	4501	918	1427	2156
Toys and Hobbies	5496	1322	1308	2866
Weddings and Celebrations	297	100	62	135
Furniture	185	48	47	90
Electronic components	563	100	122	341
Food	346	96	81	169
Office and school supplies	4332	1011	1216	2105
Home Improvement	3496	760	945	1791
Security and Protection	301	55	91	155
Non-standard goods	1217	244	399	574
Total	145255	36606	41984	66665

The picture has practically not changed - every second product participating in the 11.11 sale will be sold without a real discount, or with a slight decrease in price. Every fourth product will have an inflated price relative to the minimum price of the last month of sale. And only one product out of four will be sold with a real discount of more than 10%.

It's a shame, even those sellers, whose goods are already bought, were implicated in such discount frauds.

The most "fake" are the following categories of goods:

• women's clothing,
• childen's goods,
• consumer electronics,
• computers and network equipment
• lamps and lighting,
• safety and protection
• non-standard goods.

findings

1. Sale 11.11 on Aliexpress - this is just a marketing ploy, the probability that you will get something with a discount of 10% or more is 1 to 4.
2. "Lime" discounts do not stop even sellers with a good rating and the number of sales.
3. Leaders in fraud discount categories:
   
   
   • women's clothing,
   • childen's goods,
   • computers and network equipment
   • consumer electronics,
   • lamps and lighting.

Thanks for attention.