Alibaba.com Global Marketing Opportunities
Opening Doors for European Enterprises to Profit Globally
Aug 21, 2008
Even in the Internet’s early days, Alibaba.com founder Jack Ma understood that small and medium-sized companies around the globe were searching for an effective e-commerce strategy to enter and thrive in fiercely competitive world markets.
Now Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of multinational giant Alibaba Group, Jack Ma has spearheaded the development of what has become the world’s leading online business-to-business (B2B) marketplace. Alibaba.com is an English-language website that enables exporters and importers from over 240 countries and regions to access global resources and find new markets online.
Recently, Alibaba.com senior management team’s focus is on enriching European small and medium-sized entrepreneurs through Alibaba’s richly featured online community of global trading partners.
Global E-Commerce Gateway to Europe
Over 750,000 businesses based in Europe have signed up for Alibaba.com services to date. This represents 15% of the 5 million members currently registered on Alibaba.com’s English-language website.
About 900,000 users from the U.K. visit Alibaba.com monthly, accounting for almost 10 million page views. The United Kingdom has about 300,000 registered Alibaba.com members, more than any other European Union country. Germany, France, Italy and Spain are some of Alibaba.com's other top markets in Europe.
Alibaba.com projects steep membership growth from European enterprises wanting to expand their international e-commerce sales. Home to a fast-growing cohort of 400 million Internet users, the European Union represents a potential market of millions of businesses and consumers for Alibaba.com’s 13.5 million online trade leads. Already, an additional 2,000 U.K. companies join Alibaba’s online community of global traders each week.
Alibaba.com Is Among World’s Top Websites
Estimates from Web traffic monitoring sites Quantcast.com and Alexa.com show that over 40 million users visit Alibaba.com monthly. Alibaba.com is now among the 201 most-visited English-language websites in the world. In contrast, the EU’s official website at Europa.eu welcomes a total 7.4 million visitors monthly despite having pages available in all major European languages.
Among visitors to Alibaba.com, roughly 18 million per month are from China (44.7%) while 3.5 million are from India (8.7%) – two of the world’s fastest-growing emerging economies. Alibaba.com also operates a Chinese-language marketplace for domestic China trade with over 25 million members.
During July 2008, the United States accounted for 4.4 million Alibaba.com users - more than 10 times the number of visitors to America’s busiest trade site at importers.com.
Alibaba.com Targets UK-Based Operations
While Alibaba.com has an office in Geneva, Switzerland, senior management is also enthusiastic about developing Alibaba Group’s presence in the United Kingdom.
The U.K. is strategically important to Alibaba.com’s European operations since they represent the EU’s largest region of first-language English speakers.
In March 2008, Jack Ma and Alibaba.com Chief Executive Officer David Wei led a team of senior executives who presented a trade conference in London endorsed by the China-British Business Council. The Chinese management team showcased some of the global trade opportunities that Alibaba.com affords to U.K. businesses.
The conference’s message was simple: Alibaba.com provides a proven Internet marketplace that can help millions of U.K. small and medium enterprises become millionaires.
Europe’s Competitive Advantages Lead to Strategic Partnerships
In a European Union country like the U.K., small and medium-sized enterprises employ close to 11 million people. This vast pool of prospective clients can use Alibaba.com’s online international trade tools as part of a long-term entry strategy to buy and sell on global markets via the Internet.
Mature U.K. businesses have expertise in machinery, contract solutions, engineering, high-technology, intellectual property and patents. Therefore, Alibaba.com’s senior management is interested in strategic alliances with established European firms that can share their knowledge with entrepreneurs from other nations on European small and medium businesses, related international laws and global trade marketing. Of particular importance is an understanding of the factors that can make or break an international deal with European enterprises.
Export-to-China
Alibaba.com recently launched a new service called Export-to-China that helps European traders sell their products directly to China. Until now, European companies have found it difficult to break into the China market because of language and cultural barriers and the high cost of developing a new market and setting up a sales network.
China's role in the global market is evolving from a top manufacturing hub and exporter into a powerful global buyer as well which creates new opportunities for suppliers around the world. China currently ranks third in the world in trade volume and is expected to become the world's biggest import market within 10 years.
Export-to-China provides European traders who do not speak or write Chinese with an online storefront on Alibaba.com’s Chinese-language marketplace, which has an active community of over 25 million buyers and suppliers. It is an easy-to-use, direct channel to connect sellers with millions of buyers in China. Export-to-China members will also benefit from Alibaba.com's professional translation services and promotion at more than 40 major trade shows in China every year.
Other New Alibaba.com Offerings to Benefit European Entrepreneurs
Alibaba.com continues to upgrade its online trade features, enabling global businesses to further profit from e-commerce opportunities.
A new bi-weekly trade list called Trade Trends now provides insights into the most popular products and industry categories beijing searched for on Alibaba.com. The country-by-country list can be accessed through Alibaba.com’s Homepage.
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