Since getting a big order from Gu Yanqing’s company, Qiao Wanqing’s Taobao store has seen a dramatic improvement in business.

The number of visitors increased from a few hundred per day to several thousand.

Her store’s repeat customer rate was very high, and almost everyone who bought from her left positive reviews, with some even including photos.

[I stumbled upon this online, and it’s incredibly delicious! It’s very crispy and fragrant, with a slightly sweet taste that isn’t cloying. Highly recommended!]

[I was hesitant to buy a brand I hadn’t heard of before, but I’m pleasantly surprised. It’s so tasty that I couldn’t stop eating. The color is also beautiful (see picture).]

[I’m not a paid reviewer, but these dried fruits and vegetables are fantastic! I’ve already recommended them to my friends. They’re tasty and not greasy, perfect as a snack (see picture).]

…

Seeing these positive reviews flooding in, Qiao Wanqing smiled, as it was almost exactly what she had hoped for.

She no longer needed to buy reviews.

Qiao Wanqing kept in touch with Chen Yu and others to get the latest industry news, as rules were constantly changing.

It was important not to operate in isolation.

Recently, Chen Yu and his team had spent a lot of money on a new product—a well-known type of mushroom from a nearby county.

However, due to aggressive review manipulation, they got caught and had to pay a hefty fine.

Qiao Wanqing learned that they had tried to cut corners by placing orders in a private WeChat group, where normal review orders cost around 20-30 yuan, but they only paid 15 yuan. The group leader had assured them that everything was fine, but problems arose.

“How could you, being part of the company, fall for such a cheap trick?”

“Don’t get me started. Our supervisor is so stingy and has a huge appetite. He gives us very little operating funds but expects us to achieve high performance. We can only find ways to cut costs.”

“Your supervisor, isn’t that Zheng?”

“He handles training, not our department. Ugh, we thought we’d benefit by staying, but it’s been a nightmare. With such low funds each month, we have to spend on fake orders and car expenses, pay suppliers, and still meet high sales targets. It’s awful!”

“That’s terrible,” Qiao Wanqing remembered that they had offered good conditions to keep their talented staff, “How about your compensation?”

“The compensation is still as promised. If it weren’t for that, I’d have left long ago. I’m just staying because the pay is decent, even though the supervisor is a pain!”

Qiao Wanqing comforted her and offered some advice.

She then asked how they were managing their advertising costs.

Nowadays, direct advertising is expensive and hard for individuals to afford, but Qiao Wanqing wasn’t in that situation.

She decided to start investing in advertising after the New Year, aiming to build a hot-selling product to reduce the need for fake orders.

Fake orders are risky.

Even platforms that claim to be zero-risk still have people getting caught.

Qiao Wanqing’s shop currently sells various products like mixed dried fruits and vegetables, dehydrated okra, taro chips, purple sweet potato sticks, persimmon cakes from their hometown, and river yam chips.

The best seller is the mixed dried fruits and vegetables, which includes pumpkin slices, okra, green beans, potato sticks, taro sticks, purple sweet potato sticks, kiwi slices, and banana slices.

They look colorful and taste great.

She decided to focus on making this her best-selling product.

Creating a hot-selling product isn’t easy, and with her wedding coming up in a little over a month, followed by the New Year and a honeymoon, she won’t have time to manage this until after her honeymoon.

Since she’ll be going to City X for the New Year, Qiao Wanqing has prepared a lot of dried fruits and vegetables with an eight-month shelf life, so they won’t spoil quickly.

However, producing these herself isn’t practical.

She decided to buy a machine for making dried vegetables and hire two or three workers to help with production.

Additionally, due to production reasons, the farm stay can’t supply fresh vegetables for sale, which almost led to a fallout with Boss Cai.

Boss Cai knew that such a gesture couldn’t guarantee long-term support, so despite his dissatisfaction, he didn’t say much.

Additionally, Qiao Wanqing had wisely prepared an elaborate apology gift.

Seeing the valuable gifts, Boss Cai decided to “let bygones be bygones” with a smile.

Since the annual contract with the school had expired, the supply would stop, so now Qiao Wanqing only provided for her own vegetarian restaurant, while growing vegetables and fruits for her dried fruit and vegetable business.

…

For New Year’s Day, the family flew to X City.

Madam Gu mentioned that for their wedding, they needed to personally deliver red envelopes and gifts to relatives on both the Gu family side and her own family side.

Madam Gu had already prepared the gifts for them.

Qiao Wanqing saw that the gifts included red dates, peanuts, longans, and lotus seeds, each gift set also contained eight red eggs and a red envelope, with nothing else included.

She knew that the red eggs were meant for fertility, but eight red eggs…

“These are called ‘Friendship Eggs,’” Mrs. Gu explained when she saw Qiao Wanqing’s confusion. “They symbolize that you are joining our family, and it’s important to have good relationships with everyone.”

“Oh, I see.” Qiao Wanqing found the concept of Friendship Eggs quite novel; she had never heard of them before.

“Yes, there are eight families on Yanqing’s side to visit, and four on my family’s side. You should start early today to finish delivering everything.”

“Okay.”

As the household staff loaded the gifts onto the car, Madam Gu reminded Gu Yanqing: “For Yan Ze’s place, deliver the items there. But for Shi Shi, take some gifts personally. It’s not easy for her, a woman with children, so don’t neglect her.”

“Understood, Mom.”

Even if Mrs. Gu hadn’t mentioned it, Gu Yanqing would have gone to visit Chu Shi Shi anyway, as he had feelings for her since she had been with him for so long.

The family got into the car and first headed to Madam Gu’s family home.

The drive took about an hour.

Koukou was fast asleep, and Qiao Wanqing used her phone to check on her Taobao store.

Her customer service was already outsourced, so she didn’t need to manage it herself.

She only had to handle fake orders, shipments, and after-sales issues.

For the past few days, she had asked her literate second aunt to help with shipping, and someone else took care of her farm-related tasks.

Qiao Wanqing opened Taobao and saw an after-sales issue.

“Hello, how can I assist you?”

Using a quick reply, she checked the customer’s order.

Four days ago, the customer had ordered 5 packs: two mixed, and one each of okra, persimmon cakes, and sweet potato chips.

“I bought five packs of dried vegetables from your store. They were highly praised in the reviews, but I didn’t find them very tasty.”

Dealing with complaints about taste was always difficult.

Even the best-rated restaurants can have customers who don’t like their food.

“If you don’t like them, you can return them.”

“Can I return them if I’ve already opened them?”

“Opened items cannot be returned, but you can keep the unopened package and return the rest.”

The customer replied, “I’ve opened everything. What now?”

Qiao Wanqing realized this was an attempt to cause trouble.

What could she do? She had to offer compensation.

To keep the customer satisfied and avoid negative reviews, she usually offered a small amount of compensation.

Otherwise, a bad review was almost guaranteed.

The customer, hearing about the compensation, typed faster.

“Fine. I spent 168 on these items. Considering it’s hard for you, compensate me 100.”

Qiao Wanqing: “……”

This was outright extortion!

This person was taking advantage of her new shop, hoping for a high compensation to avoid negative reviews.

The worst part was that some people would even use a different account to continue extorting if the compensation was high, knowing they weren’t the ones losing out.

At this point, Qiao Wanqing couldn’t be too accommodating.

She replied to the customer, saying that her cost was high and, being a small business, she could only offer compensation of 10 yuan at 2 yuan per pack.

Of course, the customer wasn’t happy.