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Instant Messaging with the Seller

If you want to ask the Seller a question (and we think its a good idea to always ask some questions) then the Wangwang Chat program is the best place to do it. You’ve probably seen this blue waterdrop-lookin guy around the website. That is the button that invites you to open up a chat with a Taobao Seller. First check to see if they are online:

wawa online offline chart 11 Instant Messaging with the Seller taobao international

If they are online, just click on the button (and brace for emoticons!)  Wangwang should appear in a pop-up window. Or if it is your first time, you may be prompted to install some plug-ins.

wawa chat window Instant Messaging with the Seller taobao international

There is also standalone Wangwang Chat software, but it is noisy and I don’t like using it. It is probably most useful for Sellers who are online all day, but if you want to give it a try if you’d like. It has the added benefit of keeping official chat records.

When chatting with a supplier, start with a big ni hao. When they reply, copy/paste the link of the product you are looking at, and follow up with your questions. See our guide on What to Ask a Taobao Seller to learn more.

Update: if you have trouble getting the chatting to work right, try clicking the little chat button from a different page. You can find chat buttons on the search page, on the product page, on the seller page, and from your shopping cart. Each of these buttons may behave differently. So if you have problems with one, try another.

(The link from the product description page works best for me.)

30 Comments »

  • Karen said:

    clicking on the wangwang button now takes you to the instant messaging page but seems to require that you download the Wang Wang Chat software, and enter a “captcha” phrase. I am unable to just chat with the seller as indicated in your guide, and trying to download the software is difficult. Any suggestions??

    # 24 June 2009 at 10:44 am
  • The Field Guide (author) said:

    Welcome back, Karen!

    There are two ways to chat – with the standalone software and directly in your web browser. The web browser chat may also require downloading a little plugin.

    Which browser are you using? Do you continue to have trouble if you switch browsers?

    # 24 June 2009 at 2:20 pm
  • Karen said:

    I have successfully chatted in the past using IE, by just clicking on the wangwang chat button but now it seems I have to download the software when I click on the chat button. So I tried to download it and not really understanding what I was clicking, I now get an error page in IE every time I click on the wangwang chat button, so not sure what to do now. I’ve deleted the software and restarted the PC but no go????!!!!

    # 25 June 2009 at 8:31 am
  • The Field Guide (author) said:

    Hmm, I am going to check on this with Laobanniang. I bet you are gonna have to flush your SSL cache or something like that. But lemmie check first.

    # 25 June 2009 at 9:46 am
  • laobanniang said:

    Hi Karen, yes, looks like Taobao added more security with Wangwang chat recently – the captcha phrase. I tried both in Chrome and IE, they both worked. Just type in the letters you see in the captcha, then click the big “submit”(提交) button on the way right. (it’s the biggest button at the most right side of the chat content box.) then you can begin type and chat no problem. (just fyi, the other two blue link in the chat content box is: “I can’t recogonize the captcha phrase, show me another one” – the top one; and “click here to download the independent chat program” – the bottom one)

    if you already installed the Wangwang chat program, then IE would send out the program directly when you click the “little blue poping head”, if you don’t want to use the program, just uninstall it first, then next time when you want to chat, IE would just lead you to the browser chat as I described above. please let us know if you still have problems.

    # 25 June 2009 at 4:36 pm
  • Karen said:

    OK, I chose a random seller and it worked for me that time!! I wonder whether some sellers can require you to download the software before they will chat to you? Anyway, thanks for the great follow up and for your great site. I’ve now made two successful purchases thanks to your site!!

    # 25 June 2009 at 5:01 pm
  • laobanniang said:

    Congrats, Karen! It’s our pleasure! =D

    # 26 June 2009 at 4:26 pm
  • The Field Guide (author) said:

    Top-notch work, Laobanniang!

    # 26 June 2009 at 4:53 pm
  • The Field Guide (author) said:

    Update to previous problem: the chat button will behave differently depending on where you click from. So try clicking from a different page if you have difficulties. (Field Guide updated.)

    # 29 June 2009 at 11:31 am
  • Karen said:

    I am still having problems using the chat window. I can access it the first time and enter the captcha phrase, hit the button on the right and wait for a response, but after that I am unable to send anything further. Another warning screen appears (that I can’t understand nor translate)asking me if I want to navigate away from the page or not. If I navigate away I am taken back to the logon screen. If I elect to stay I cannot do anything on the chat screen page, and it doesn’t allow me to send any further chat messages.

    As suggested I have tried hitting the button from different screens but don’t get further with any of them. Hope this makes sense….Help!!!

    # 3 July 2009 at 1:46 pm
  • laobanniang said:

    Hi Karen, Called Taobao hotline on this just now. Their explanation is that some of the IE settings might be the cause of this problem. (well I think that’s caused by bad programming of this chat app, it didn’t do a good job adjusting to various browser setting environment…) The suggestion is: go to IE, click tools –> internet options –> “general”, click delete cookies, delete files, clear history; then select the 2nd tab – “security”, click custom level, then select “enable” for “Automatic prompting for ActiveX controls”. After confirming all the settings, close your browser, and preferably log off and log in again to your windows system. this should fix the problem. Have a try. Good luck! =)

    # 3 July 2009 at 9:30 pm
  • Karen said:

    thanks laobanniang I’ll try that and let you know….

    # 4 July 2009 at 7:43 am
  • Karen said:

    so not wanting to delete all my cookies, I just selected the 2nd tab – “security”, click custom level, then select “enable” for “Automatic prompting for ActiveX controls”, and this seemed to work, and allowed me to chat with a randomly selected seller, meaning I was able to to and fro a couple of times without getting pop up windows asking me to download wang wang chat software. thanks again…

    # 5 July 2009 at 7:37 am
  • The Field Guide (author) said:

    Good Luck, Karen!

    # 5 July 2009 at 10:46 am
  • EHF29 said:

    Thanks for the site. It’s what has finally helped me to take the plunge into the world of Tabao.

    I have question: At first I had no problem contacting sellers using the on-site instant messaging program. However, this week any attempt made to contact the seller in this way results in me having to sign in — regardless of whether I am already signed in. Yet signing in again brings me no closer to contacting the seller. I have tried pressing the “contact me” button from different parts of the TaoBao site, and while using different browsers (IE, Firefox, Chrome), all to no avail. I would be grateful for any guidance.

    # 23 July 2009 at 8:07 pm
  • Brad said:

    I’m having the same exact problem. I am signed in. I goto chat with the seller. It asks for my password like normal. I put in my password and instead of sending me to the chat page, it sends me to ‘my taobao’. Any attempt to chat always sends me to ‘my taobao’ making chatting impossible. I’ve tried deleting cookies, adjusting security settings, but none of it helped. Any help you could provide would be appreciated. Thanks for the site, it’s great.

    # 24 July 2009 at 11:51 pm
  • laobanniang said:

    Hi dear both, it’s true it’s not working at all… Just called & confirmed with Taobao, the web-page based chatting is currently under maintenance, they say it would be back to service next Monday. if you can’t wait that long, and you know a little bit Chinese, chat with the Wangwang program, you can download it here.

    # 25 July 2009 at 2:24 pm
  • Hilda said:

    Is this Wang Wang chat the same as Trade Manager?

    # 6 August 2009 at 4:26 pm
  • seb itachi said:

    wow, laoban,
    this is soo cool,
    i brought one recently,
    ATTENTION for sure!!!

    # 29 September 2009 at 6:27 am
  • mekyu-chan said:

    Hi everyone !

    I don’t understand something : why are there two “sign in” pages ? (the second one with a lock) because when I tried to talk with a seller, I have to sign in a second time. And my password doesn’t work with the page with a lock.

    Thanks for your help, this website is so cool !

    # 29 October 2009 at 4:03 pm
  • newbie said:

    Hi, I am just trying to get into the taobao world. I want to instant message a seller but would you happen to know how i can enter chinese text on it? thanks!

    # 29 October 2009 at 10:42 pm
  • The Field Guide (author) said:

    Sure thing! I will assume for a minute that you are using Windows.

    Check out this page for info on how to let your Windows know that you want to type Chinese.

    And then install this IME from Google – it will make typing Chinese much easier.

    # 30 October 2009 at 9:56 am
  • laobanniang said:

    Hi Mekyu, one is “secured sign-in” (the one with a lock)and the other is “un-secured sign-in”, if you’re not using the IE browser, and don’t have the alipay security plug-in installed, you can’t use the secured sign-in. for task like talking to sellers, make payment, order confirmation, they all need secured sign-in. I figured the un-secured sign in is Taobao’s compromised UI solution made to many ppl who hate to use IE for browsing.

    # 30 October 2009 at 10:15 am
  • mekyu-chan said:

    Thank you a lot Laobanniang for your answer ! So I have to use IE for this…

    Thanks again

    # 2 November 2009 at 7:08 pm
  • mekyu-chan said:

    Hello everyone (yes…again) !

    I tried to talk with a seller but I can’t sign in in the secured page (It told me wrong password)… I have installed the plug in with IE explorer but it doesn’t work at all… Can someone help me ?

    Thanks <3

    # 2 November 2009 at 8:15 pm
  • laobanniang said:

    Hi Mekyu, We really don’t know how to help you, usually using IE would solve the problem. I searched the web for that, only one other user encountered this and it was said to be a problem that happened during Taobao system upgrade, I don’t know if it’s correct. Please try again later and see if it works. if it still doesn’t work, you have to ask the ultimate help from Taobao Customer Service, you can reach them at +86-571-88157858. Good luck! =)

    # 6 November 2009 at 8:47 am
  • awingy said:

    recently all the sellers I contact using the taobao chat feature just have an automatic message saying contact them by QQ. I have no idea how to use QQ. Any advice?

    # 2 December 2009 at 7:05 pm
  • laobanniang said:

    Hi Awingy, QQ is a popular IM chat program in China, actually it’s the most popular one, almost every Chinese have a QQ account. But we’d rather advice you to stick to crappy WangWang chat, as Taobao only accepts wangwang chat record as valid proof if any disputes arises later.

    # 3 December 2009 at 9:48 am
  • Zoe said:

    Laobanniang,

    I’m using Mac and I can’t instal the AIM plugin. Everytime I chat with seller via the web-based chat, they keep asking me to use AIM. Have downloaded several times but couldn’t install it. It seems to work fine with Windows. Please help. Thx

    # 22 February 2010 at 12:57 pm
  • laobanniang said:

    Hi Zoe, the AIM currently doesn’t support Mac at all. I can’t help you with this, I’m afraid. If you really want to use it, the only way is to install a Windows system in your mac… =)

    # 23 February 2010 at 5:35 pm

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