Fascinating set of observations. Particularly on the margin pressure on Amazon. What do you think is the play for simple discovery engines like Pinterest and Google with x-border trade?
Hi Partha! I believe Google will continue to play a crucial role in facilitating B2B cross border trades. Alibaba.com is the largest B2B cross border platform out there but only holds <1% market share. Google remains one of the primary platforms for wholesalers and retailers to search for overseas suppliers and factories. For most suppliers, Google SEO is also their main customer acquisition channel. Pinterest is predominately geared towards B2C (which gave Shein a leg up in the early days). Consumer traffic is getting very expensive today, so individual sellers will all end up adopting a multi-channel approach including building a presence across Pinterest, Instagram, Tiktok etc.
It is not Google but the consumer who will decide how the market develops. If the online Stores (lazada, shopee, amazon, shein, TikTok, et al) can not reliably deliver products that meet the consumer's demands (eg actually work for longer than one week) then these stores will die. Amazon is the only store that ensures the products meet the customer's requirements.
No one will shop twice if the product is sh1t! Amazon know this. All the other online stores think they can let their suppliers / retailers scam the customer. Thus these stores are both scamming their customers. And their investors because capitalism kills scammers. It is called Creative Destruction.
I think this article is very clever. But it was written by a marketing / store person. Not by a shopper. And it was certainly not written by some one who understands that a poor Asian mother can not afford to waste money on a scam product.
Fascinating set of observations. Particularly on the margin pressure on Amazon. What do you think is the play for simple discovery engines like Pinterest and Google with x-border trade?
Hi Partha! I believe Google will continue to play a crucial role in facilitating B2B cross border trades. Alibaba.com is the largest B2B cross border platform out there but only holds <1% market share. Google remains one of the primary platforms for wholesalers and retailers to search for overseas suppliers and factories. For most suppliers, Google SEO is also their main customer acquisition channel. Pinterest is predominately geared towards B2C (which gave Shein a leg up in the early days). Consumer traffic is getting very expensive today, so individual sellers will all end up adopting a multi-channel approach including building a presence across Pinterest, Instagram, Tiktok etc.
It is not Google but the consumer who will decide how the market develops. If the online Stores (lazada, shopee, amazon, shein, TikTok, et al) can not reliably deliver products that meet the consumer's demands (eg actually work for longer than one week) then these stores will die. Amazon is the only store that ensures the products meet the customer's requirements.
No one will shop twice if the product is sh1t! Amazon know this. All the other online stores think they can let their suppliers / retailers scam the customer. Thus these stores are both scamming their customers. And their investors because capitalism kills scammers. It is called Creative Destruction.
I think this article is very clever. But it was written by a marketing / store person. Not by a shopper. And it was certainly not written by some one who understands that a poor Asian mother can not afford to waste money on a scam product.
Fascinating take! Also very comprehensive. I also argued at PDD Q3 earnings release that the market seems not to fully appreciate what disruptions they may have created for Amazon. https://open.substack.com/pub/robertwoo/p/politburo-moodys-pddtemu-stimulus?selection=7f9c95c6-8f59-46e3-a91b-5192f76234b8&r=1fe6hf&utm_medium=ios