Sponsored Special Report: China's online holiday shopping season starts Nov. 11

Online retailers selling in China experienced significant year-over-year sales growth on Nov. 11, the e-commerce shopping holiday called Singles’ Day and the largest online sales day in the world.

by Azoya

Online retailers selling in China experienced significant year-over-year sales growth on Nov. 11, the e-commerce shopping holiday called Singles’ Day and the largest online sales day in the world. The value of goods sold just on Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.’s marketplaces rose 32.3% to 120.7 billion yuan, approximately $17.8 billion. And many other Chinese e-retailers also participate in what’s become an online shopping spree since Alibaba launched the e-commerce sales event in 2009.

“These megasale figures from the online shopping extravaganza prove that Singles’ Day has become an essential approach not only for local players, but also for international brands to enhance their branding and promote web sales in China,” Don Zhao, co-founder and executive director at Azoya International, tells Internet Retailer.

Established in 2013, the Shenzhen, China-based Azoya helps overseas retailers build their Chinese e-commerce sites with marketing, China payment, international logistics and customer services in a revenue-sharing model. With its one-stop collection of services and a dedicated specialist team, Azoya works with more than 35 overseas retailers in 11 countries. They include La Redoute, the second-largest online retailer of women’s apparel and general merchandise in France, and Feelunique.com, the leading online premium beauty retailer based in the United Kingdom.

“Most e-retailers working with Azoya increased sales on their Chinese sites five to ten times during the latest Singles’ Day sale compared to a normal day. For example, Pharmacy Online, a large Australia-based e-retailer, grew its online sales 10 times in China this Nov. 11,” Zhao says.

By meeting customer expectations for product quality and delivery, the return rate for Azoya retailer clients is lower than the industry average. According to the China Industry Research Network, the average return rate was more than 40% for Singles’ Day in 2015. Azoya’s retailers, according to Zhao, have kept their average return rate under 3%.

Chinese consumers are expected to maintain their shopping enthusiasm through the end of the year as merchants continue to lure them with incentives on key shopping days. In 2015, for example, Azoya launched a holiday sales campaign called Oversea Direct Mail Shopping Day, to coincide with Black Friday, the day after the Thanksgiving holiday in the United States and the traditional kickoff for U.S. consumers’ holiday shopping. The 12 retailers that participated offered free shipping and discounts to encourage Chinese consumers to do their holiday shopping on that day. Compared to a typical day, sales more than doubled on that day and those sites attracted 116% more new shoppers than usual.

For instance, Bodyguard Apotheke, a German e-retailer that works with Azoya and participated in the holiday campaign, grew its fan base roughly 180% by sending coupons to Chinese consumers via an interactive game on Chinese social media platform WeChat.

Chinese consumers are increasingly focused on the service they receive from e-retailers and also how fast they receive their orders. Many retailers and brands on the marketplace started to prepare for Singles’ Day six months before the event. 90% of the overseas merchandise sold through Tmall Global is dispatched from a duty-free zone in China, while the rest is shipped directly from the retailers. Starting preparations early will allow online merchants hoping to impress Chinese shoppers the time to prepare the right offers, stock the products consumers will want to buy and understand Chinese customs and policies. Under current customs policies, warehousing best-sellers in the free trade zones is still a good option for retailers to save shipping time, while the drop-ship model is an ideal solution for long-tail products.

“Our priority is to enable Chinese consumers to shop overseas brands directly online and to be reassured that they will receive authentic products from the brand,” Zhao says. “Our e-commerce services enable overseas retailers to exploit the China market with little operational risks and make faster progress.”


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