Chapter 47: Chapter 46 Please Arrange at Will

    Cheng Zhu looked at the WeChat picture sent by Shen Minglang, and his first reaction was, “You old lecher can really do it, huh? Scouting for Pyrex at midnight on Weibo?”

    It’s only 2014 now, and the live streaming industry hasn’t taken off on a large scale yet.

    2016 was called the first year of live streaming by many, but it’s still early days.

    During this period, internet celebrities primarily gathered on platforms like Weibo and even thrived in the QQ Space.

    If Cheng Zhu remembered correctly, internet celebrities now have significant influence and can make a lot of money.

    Take Weibo as an example, if you have enough followers and high engagement, a simple advertisement can easily rake in thousands or even tens of thousands.

    ...

    The top Weibo internet celebrities could quote hundreds of thousands for a single ad post! Comparable to stars!

    Just one top account could bring in revenues worth tens of millions.

    Tens of millions in 2014 was quite considerable.

    Cheng Zhu had researched this industry in his past life and even contacted several well-known companies to get their price lists. He knew the quotes of many big-name V’s that were famous around these times.

    And when he started venturing into the e-commerce industry, he certainly heard of those few female internet celebrities in e-commerce.

    For some big internet celebrities, although there weren’t as many ways to monetize traffic as there would be later, there were still quite a few.

    Opening an online store was one of them.

    Especially in the women’s fashion industry, many successful shops were backed by female internet personalities.

    Among them, Wang Sicong’s former girlfriend was a representative figure here, having earned a fortune in e-commerce and even evading taxes.

    The internet celebrity Shen Minglang sent to Cheng Zhu had only a few hundred thousand followers, likely inflated with a large number of inactive accounts, or zombie accounts.

    Her post included nine pictures, in which she was wearing a stepmother dress from Cheng Zhu’s brand, shot from various angles while tactfully maintaining decency to avoid censorship.

    She was quite the seasoned edger.

    “Six or seven hundred comments, that’s not bad,” thought Cheng Zhu after taking a glance.

    He knew well that if a design was good and could set the trend, some internet celebrities would buy it for photoshoots.

    After all, the lesser-known ones were all about attracting attention.

    Cheng Zhu suspected that it was just a coincidence that Shen Minglang had spotted this edgy internet celebrity – there were likely many more smaller influencers wearing his clothes that went unnoticed.

    And let’s not forget, the internet was full of “female Bodhisattvas.”

    Or to put it another way, many Fortu-ni-ties.

    “As long as our clothes set the trends and are cleverly designed, then they’re my free models, my free publicity,” Cheng Zhu had realized this long ago.

    Don’t underestimate the traffic this could bring. After all, among the lechers who followed them, a portion indeed represented potential customers.

    Someone like Shen Minglang, on a whim, might start searching for the same style.

    “It seems our Persistent Visit doesn’t just benefit from internal site traffic,” Cheng Zhu chuckled to himself, pleased with this point.

    He picked up his phone to reply to Shen Minglang: “Cousin, send me 50 bucks as hush money, or I’ll share the stuff you’re looking at in the group chat at midnight.”

    Wang Anquan watched as Cheng Zhu bustled around and thought, “Where does Brother Zhu get all this experience from? It doesn’t seem like armchair strategy.”

    Hmm, armchair strategy? Isn’t that the perfect description for us paper pushers?

    He looked at Cheng Zhu who picked up his phone, stood up, and walked outside, clearly about to discuss deeper issues with Chen Bin.

    Outside, Chen Bin said to Cheng Zhu, “Boss Cheng, let me tell you, many factories here are now producing stepmother dresses. The trend has swept up.”

    “Brother Bin, I can’t control other factories; just don’t sell these goods to anyone else,” said Cheng Zhu as he lit a cigarette.

    “That’s for sure. Our factory’s number one goal right now is to fully supply Boss Cheng,” Chen Bin replied.

    Despite Cheng Zhu always calling him Brother Bin, Chen Bin wouldn’t go along with that and call him Brother Cheng. He always called him Boss Cheng.

    The patron is giving you face; you don’t really think that by calling him elder, you become his big brother, right?

    Of course, Cheng Zhu didn’t really want to call him Brother Bin either. He always wanted to call him Ah Bin and ask about his high school grades.

    Chen Bin’s intention in telling him all this was to let him know that many businesses were now jumping on the bandwagon, wanting a piece of the stepmother dress market pie!

    Cheng Zhu had already realized this.

    Forget about others, when he was using “Direct Auction,” he couldn’t outbid others for the keyword stepmother dress, and the keyword’s price became more outrageous by the day.

    While Cheng Zhu was the first to coin the term stepmother dress, it couldn’t stop others willing to spend big money.

    Because others were willing to burn cash, searching for stepmother dress on Taobao now brought up ads for other stores’ products.

    But fortunately, Cheng Zhu had already accumulated a good amount of sales, and key metrics like monthly sales were impressive, leading to a virtuous cycle.

    Plus, being a master at “running under the radar,” he wasn’t worried about traffic for the time being.

    During the call, Chen Bin could sense the calmness of the other party.

    “Is it that young people lack a sense of urgency, or is he really not worried at all?” Chen Bin wondered.

    Since starting his factory, he had never dealt with a buyer like Cheng Zhu.

    You just never know what’s going on in his mind.

    After ending the call with the factory owner, Cheng Zhu finished his cigarette by the window, looking into the distance.

    Then, he took out his phone to message Ye Zi.

    He had been so busy lately that he was only able to chat with Lin Lu when he could spare some time, and so he had neglected Ye Zi even more.

    But what do you know, the colder he was to Ye Zi, the more actively she sought him out.

    Ever since the invisible whip appeared, her attributes had been on full display, as if caught in a strange loop.

    And well, Cheng Zhu had once said he really liked the M routine; Ye Zi was utterly convinced of this despite it being bluff on his part!

    Cheng Zhu typed: “Let’s shoot some new products in the next couple of days.”

    Ye Zi replied instantly, sending three consecutive stickers.

    The first and the third were the same: a shower of flowers.

    Only the middle sticker was different.

    It was a text sticker that read – “At your command.”