Order volumes have Kalakalemerged as a new metric for assessing the overall performance of Singles Day within Taobao and Tmall, Alibaba’s domestic online marketplaces, according to Chinese media outlet LatePost. Gross merchandise volume of goods orders, without any adjustment for returns, has previously been the key metric in e-commerce, but Alibaba has declined to reveal the figure publicly since its announcement of achieving RMB 540.3 billion for Singles Day 2021, ten thousand times the first shopping festival held in 2009. According to LatePost, Taobao Tmall Group reached a consensus internally that total turnover growth should naturally result from unit price, daily active consumers, and order volume. [LatePost, in Chinese]
