TikTok Ban Drives Brand Interest to Chinese Video App RedNote: Will Retail Sales Follow?

With the United States Supreme Court having ruled unanimously in favor of enforcement of the TikTok ban via the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, it appears the extremely popular social media platform's days are numbered. In fact, barring a very quick sale to an American party, ByteDance will be forced to withdraw from the U.S. market by Jan. 19.

The impending ban has, according to Modern Retail, spurred a significant brand expansion into an entirely different Chinese app focused on short-form video content: RedNote — also known as Xiaohongshu, or "little red book" in Mandarin.

NBA, The North Face, Arc'teryx, and Other Brands Make a Splash on RedNote

American users appear to be flocking to RedNote in advance of the potential TikTok ban, with the former being the most downloaded app for the iPhone this week, per Modern Retail. Further, Duolingo is reporting a whopping 216% increase in people attempting to learn Mandarin Chinese versus the same time period a year ago.

But individual users aren't the only ones making an appearance on RedNote. According to SportBusiness, the NBA has made a full-court press to join the Chinese social media platform ahead of other major sports leagues. And as Gripped pointed out, several climbing and outdoor adventure brands are also enjoying a presence on the platform, including high-profile examples such as The North Face and Arc'teryx.

RedNote Poses Several Barriers to Actual Retail Sales, Both for Established Brands and Independent Sellers

Not everything about RedNote is as promising as it might appear at first glance, however.

Modern Retail profiled several entrepreneurs who spoke to the difficulties they faced when attempting to actually sell products via the app.

Lisa Guerrera, founder of TikTok-viral beauty brand Experiment, recently signed up for RedNote. And while Guerrera found that the platform may offer the ability to increase her brand's visibility and reach — and is, according to her, a great place to enjoy and share memes — she remained unconvinced of its current capabilities in terms of acting as a sales platform.

"I would have no idea how to formally sell anything on RedNote, and I imagine we’re probably not even capable of doing so, frankly," she said. "I’m just trying to figure out what’s going on."

Gabriella Scaringe, founder of underwear brand Cherri (which boasts over 700,000 TikTok followers), also placed her brand on RedNote this week. Her take, from a business perspective, on RedNote seems to mesh with Guerrera's.

"My experience on RedNote hasn’t been great. Besides the language barrier, as most of the app is not translated, it is not a place where I can advertise my business based on the terms and conditions,” Scaringe said, gesturing toward the nature of the product she is selling, and the advertising method employed to do so. RedNote, as Scaringe indicated, has strict rules regarding content.

Juozas Kaziukėnas, founder of Marketplace Pulse, was concise in his critical assessment of RedNote's potential to rival TikTok from a sales perspective.

"RedNote is a blink of a moment, like a small, knee-jerk reaction thing,” he said. “It’s not going to be the place for TikTok users to go and somehow continue doing their thing.” 

Language Barrier Persists, and RedNote Itself May Face the Same Treatment as TikTok in the Future

There are other issues surrounding the adoption of RedNote, as Slate underscored. First is the significant language barrier: As RedNote isn't designed with English speakers in mind, most content is entirely presented in Mandarin.

"It’s clear that none of this is localized for non-Mandarin speakers at all; that could make it more complicated for users who can’t read Mandarin characters (especially as Mandarin is a language entirely of memorization, rather than of phonetics). The logo, reading Xiaohongshu in Mandarin, has no Pinyin (romanized pronunciation) for foreigners to learn pronunciation, and many of the captions you see on the homepage are still entirely in Mandarin," Slate's Steffi Cao wrote, before noting that the flood of newcomers and increased ratio of English subtitles was impressive and helpful.

Finally, it's completely unclear what the future holds for RedNote in the American context. Given that it is a Chinese-owned app, the likelihood of it joining TikTok as a banned platform seems fairly high.

However, with President-elect Donald Trump signaling that he may push to delay the ban as he takes office, all things remain somewhat in limbo. Industry analysts and social media fans alike may have to wait a bit longer to see how this drama plays out.