No matter if you’re just starting out with e-commerce business or have an established online shop, expanding your business outside your country’s borders is a great idea to boost your sales and earn more revenue.
Lots of people have doubts about expanding to other markets. But the recent study on e-commerce business done by McKinsey states that…
More than 1,8 billion people will enter the consuming class before 2025 and that their annual spending will be $30 trillion, which is half of the world’s current consumption.
This is the direct consequence of more people getting internet access and realizing the advantages of this way of shopping.
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Why Your eCommerce Business in Global Market not doing well?
In this article, we’re going to review some of the best strategies for going global with your e-commerce business and ways to conquer new markets.
1. Not Analyzing Your E-commerce business Target Markets
The First thing you need to do is to gather plenty of market intelligence.
You should learn a lot about different countries, people and their consuming and shopping habits.
You have to make the e-commerce business strategy for building brand awareness.
The best way to start with this project is to find people from abroad that are already buying your products.
If you have lots of customers from a certain country or a region, expanding there would be a much safer bet.
In collecting all this information, you can use research tools and help from various government agencies like the U.S. Small Business Administration or Export.gov. On websites of these agencies, you can find downloadable business planning tools and templates that will help you a lot with choosing the right market to expand.
There are the “Big Six”, the most popular e-commerce business markets in the world today are…
- United States
- United Kingdom
- Australia
- Brazil
- China
On the other hand, there are plenty of markets where online shopping is becoming more popular in recent years.
Combination of GDP increase and the number of people who have internet access will soon turn these markets into great environments for running an e-commerce business:
- India
- Nigeria
- Philippines
- Mexico
- Indonesia
2. Not Adjusting Your Offer to Local Customs and Consumer Habits
One of the biggest mistakes when it comes to expanding e-commerce business on foreign markets is trying to translate your website with Google Translator tool, or using built-in translation offerings to translate messages from customers and business partners, or social media posts and comments.
In this case, hiring a professional translator is money well spent, and the same goes for local market experts and marketing agencies.
You need to localize your website and your marketing strategies, including social media pages.
Read the strategies to make the most of social media business pages. It will be very helpful to grow your e-commerce business.
In China, for example, most people use QZone instead of Facebook and Sina Weibo instead of Twitter and in post-Soviet countries, people use VKontakte and Odnoklassniki.
People also shop differently depending on the country they live in. Not everybody shops on Black Friday.
- Chinese shop around their New Year’s Eve that falls on 8th February.
- Russian Christmas is not on 25th December, but on 7th January.
Another important thing, especially when it comes to developing markets, is to introduce alternative payment methods.
A significant percentage of people don’t like leaving too much of their personal data on commerce websites or simply do not have access to conventional methods of payment.
All this gives you the opportunity to realize the importance of local customs, and their ability to influence the retail market.
3. Not Using the Latest Technology
Both Western and developing markets have one thing in common. Consumers from Nigeria and the ones from the United States have the same appreciation for the latest technology. Which in this case, means functional and customized e-commerce business platforms that are easy to navigate and offer lots of features.
Don’t be stingy when it comes to technology.
Use Shopify or WooCommerce and add as many plugins and features you need, for your website to be smooth, user-friendly and transparent. Follow the standard web design practices for developing eCommerce websites.
Shipping costs for sending goods to foreign countries are much higher.
You should also use Geolocation apps. These apps enable you to track and verify the locations of customers who ordered products. The application gives you the location of the customer’s device used for ordering and this way you’ll be able to cut down fraudulent purchases.
E-commerce business offers you unlimited solutions when it comes to business. One of its main benefits is that it overcomes geographical limitations and enables entrepreneurs to launch their products easily on the global market.
Follow all the tips to promote your eCommerce business in global market as we shared with you in this article. Also, maintain a good quality of your products. You can easily get ahead in the global e-commerce business race and win over customers from far away.
