Ted: Hello and welcome back to Babbel News – English Only, the show where we bring you current events in English sourced from Reuters to help you improve your language skills.

I’m Ted, English expert at Babbel, here to guide you through today’s news story. To start off, I’ll introduce the topic of the episode before going over important words and phrases that you should listen for during the story. And, as usual, if you want to read along while you listen, you can find the transcript by following the link in the episode description.

For today’s episode, we’ve picked an interesting news item about how the Chinese livestream industry is transforming both the shopping experience as well as employment opportunities.

Let’s get to it!

As usual, we’ll start off by going over some of the key vocabulary from today’s story. First up we have the verb “to be faced with something”, which means to find yourself in a difficult situation that you have to deal with. The next word, “to forge”, has many meanings, but in the context of this story it means to create something strong and lasting by putting in a lot of effort. Then we have “to broadcast”, or to send a program out through communication media, such as television, radio, or, in this case, a livestream. And an “interaction” takes place when two or more people communicate with each other. After that, we have a “boom”, a sudden increase in economic growth that leads to increased profits. And “consumer engagement” describes interactions between customers and a company that add to the user experience, such as social media campaigns, loyalty programs, or feedback forms. One important goal of consumer engagement is to create a “bond”, or a strong relationship or connection, so that customers feel encouraged to buy more. And finally, a “transaction” occurs when something is bought or sold.

Now let’s find out more about the livestreaming industry in China.

Reuters: Zhang Jinyu spends more than six hours a day talking almost nonstop into a camera.

The 28-year-old is one of millions of young Chinese people who, faced with record youth unemployment, are attempting to forge a career as a livestream sales host.

"I like presenting, I like the camera, I like expression. I hope to stand in front of the camera every day."

They use platforms such as Alibaba's Taobao to promote products online – from makeup to home appliances and even toilet paper – transforming the traditional shopping experience.
Only a few months into the job, Zhang had already clocked hundreds of hours of broadcasting time.

"I was a former model and a blogger as well, so I thought maybe the work of a livestream host would be more intuitive. The data from each live broadcast reflects my ability and there will also be a lot of comments and interactions in the live broadcast room. I enjoy all these factors and that is why I chose this profession."

With China's youth unemployment hitting 21% in June, it's no wonder more people are turning to the sector.

The livestreaming industry employed 1.2 million hosts as of 2020, according to iResearch, and a pandemic era boom in livestream sales helped the industry to generate $480 billion in business in China last year.

Initially the focus of livestreaming was on promoting massive sales via big discounts. Now it's more about storytelling and longer-term consumer engagement.

Livestream host Shi Jianing says her focus is on building a following and developing a bond with consumers.

"It is not as simple as me selling the goods and someone buying them. After all, we are separated by a screen, and there is no way to communicate face-to-face like what we are doing now. Being able to build that trust is not that easy. But as long as you can communicate well, you become almost like friends with the consumers. Only then will they build that trust with you. And that relationship will encourage the consumer to arrive at a transaction.

Ted: That’s all for today! I hope you enjoyed the episode and learned something new. Were there any words you didn’t quite catch? You can always go back and listen as many times as you need until you’ve got it.

And, just so you know, we’ll be taking a break next week. If you get hungry for more English news content before our next episode, you can always go back and listen to some of our previous ones.

But before I head off, I’ll leave you with an old saying: “Absence makes the heart grow fonder." And what does it mean? Well, a dictionary might be helpful in figuring it out.

We’ll be back with more news in two weeks. See you then!