Chinese e-commerce giant JD is starting to cultivate key opinion leaders (KOLs) to build up its strength in the field of e-commerce, according to a report by technology media 36kr.

At its JD Shopping Circle, a mini program for WeChat providing a platform for users to post reviews on products and share experiences, JD launched a "Super Partner Program", aiming to incubate online celebrities in the e-commerce sector to take a share of the fan economy.

It has formulated a set of support plans, such as brand cooperation, network traffic distribution, packaging and promotion. And it will provide exclusive agent for every super partner on the platform to help the super partner make decisions and amplify the effect of their contents.

In April 2017, JD for the first time launched the shopping circle function, which allows users to join online interest groups of beauty products, maternal and child products, fashion, photography and food, and share recommended products and their shopping experience.

In November 2018, the mini program for WeChat based on the shopping circle function was launched.

As new e-commerce players such as Xiaohongshu taste success from social shopping, online celebrity and fan economy, JD also noticed that besides the traditional "search for products" mode, for an e-commerce platform there are new opportunities in community building and user-generated content.

By building a content community to keep users in its content ecology as far as possible, JD expects this will not only change its brand image but also bring more users and orders to its JD Mall.

Besides JD, Alibaba is also constantly investing in the construction of online shopping content sharing platform. It has launched a Taobao version of Xiaohongshu called Onion Box.

A report from marketing data technology company AdMaster said about 40 percent of Chinese consumers have been influenced by KOLs in making purchasing decisions and cooperation with KOL becoming the most popular marketing way of advertisers in China.