Mei O, General Manager of Xiaohongshu's Commercial Channel Division, announced the strategic direction for channels in 2026, clearly stating that the next year will focus on four dimensions: industry deepening, customer management, ecosystem co-construction, and capability accumulation. The core action is to promote agents from being simple ad placement channels to deeply integrated "industry operating partners."
From Ad Placement Channels to AI Operating Hub
The platform will open up AI capabilities covering the entire agent service process, along with additional incentive support. On the product side, Xiaohongshu announced the upgrading of commercial products and the construction of a complete AI product system, meaning AI will be embedded throughout the entire business process, from strategy, execution to review, rather than just remaining as a single ad tool.
This positioning aligns with the accelerated commercialization of Xiaohongshu. After brands re-recognized the value of community planting, the platform now needs agents to have industry understanding and long-term operating capabilities, rather than simply scaling up. Opening AI capabilities to agents essentially standardizes the "know-how" threshold through technology, enabling small and medium-sized agents to handle more complex industry clients.
For agents, incentives combined with AI tools are expected to reduce labor and trial-and-error costs, but also raise the bar for operational depth. When the platform sets "industry operating partner" as the upgrade goal, the competitive focus of agents is shifting from resources to service capabilities - only those who can truly penetrate their clients' businesses with AI will be able to survive in this round of channel restructuring.