How to sell products on alibaba
How to Sell and Succeed on Alibaba.com
good afternoon everyone and welcome to
our webinar how to sell and succeed on
Alibaba calm this live webinar is
designed for small and medium-sized
businesses looking for ways to grow
their business we're going to provide an
overview of Alibaba comm which is one of
the world's largest b2b platforms and
outline how it helps sellers target are
10 million active business buyers just a
few housekeeping items before we get
started all of you all the attendees are
a mute if you have a question during the
presentation you can submit it in the
question box within GoToWebinar and we
will answer these questions at the end
of the presentation if you have a
technical question you can also put it
into chat and we will answer it via chat
the webinar will be recorded and we will
email out everyone the recording of the
email of the recording of the webinar
excuse me and it will also be available
for viewing on shipstation comm let me
introduce our speakers today we have
Jonah Mandel who is the head of customer
growth for Alibaba comm North America
and Krish Iyer who's from shipstation
he's the director of strategic
partnerships and then I'll just do a
quick overview of the agenda we're gonna
be showing you a piece of chip station
the efficient domestic and international
fulfillment solution we're gonna be
providing an overview of the b2b market
opportunity Jonah is going to provide an
overview of how you can start selling on
Alibaba comm and then we'll have some
Q&A at the end so Chris why don't you
start wonderful thank you and thank you
to our attendees for being on the call
and joining us over the lunch hour first
off what we want to say is a shipstation
we are very excited about our
partnership with Alibaba as the world's
law
just b2b platform for selling and the
b2b environment and the business the
mission here of course is to grow
business business transactions for us
merchants and make global b2b easier
what's the case
for selling online particularly in
multiple channels I think we all know
from our personal lives that searches we
go to market places now and consumers
purchase from merchants on marketplaces
particularly ones they trust and the
proofs in the pudding for sellers out
there as you add channels you see a
major uptick in the orders you simply
put your product is more visible to more
people well we feel on the ship station
side and certainly our friends at
Alibaba as well that shipping should not
be an afterthought to you as a merchant
it is an extension of your brand your
customer experience and can give you a
competitive advantage now how does ship
station work ship station works as the
tool to import manage and ultimately
ship your online orders from multiple
channels and marketplaces receive your
orders manage them inside ship station
print your shipping labels and automate
that process and emails and improve your
customer experience and use of course
powerful industry tools you see some of
the names that are on the screen here
whether that's tools and platforms in
the warehouse management space order
management EDI Europe ease helping to
organize the data and processes to
create a better shipment flow and
ultimately a better experience for your
customer on customizing that workflow to
fit your
NEADS and finally shipstation
one integration and more than 40 plus
global carriers certainly around the
globe here it's not just the US anymore
certainly a lot of buyers and a lot of
new channels that are opening up
globally and with that I want to turn
this over to my good friend Kate to talk
about our first poll here so we wanted
to pull the audience to get an idea of
the level of adoption of b2b sales so
please everyone let us know on
have you considered selling b2b are you
thinking of getting started or you
haven't considered it but are interested
in learning and that's why you're
attending the webinar today so we'll
give everyone about 30 seconds to answer
the poll
[Applause]
all right the results are in and it
looks like the majority of attendees
today are not selling b2b but are
interested in getting started so I think
that's a great segue into the next part
of our presentation where joan is going
to provide an overview of the b2b
e-commerce opportunity yeah great so I
think it's it's interesting to see that
a lot of businesses you know today are
selling b2c and one important note so
myself my team the Alibaba Sales Account
management customer support team which
is all based out of New York we speak
with hundreds of US businesses on a
daily basis and a common misconception
that we hear so moving on to the the
next slide there we go a common
misconception that we hear is that
ecommerce is is just for
direct-to-consumer businesses in reality
the b2b market is actually six times
greater than the b2c market and a few
stats that I do want to share with the
audience today the in the US market
alone in 2018 the b2b market actually
eclipsed one trillion dollars and 60
percent of US manufacturers so us many
60% of US manufacturers do not have a
dedicated ecommerce channel so I spend
the better part of the last two years as
I touched on before speaking with
businesses on a daily basis really
trying to better understand their
strategy and how ecommerce plays a role
in their revenue goals you know pretty
much every day I like to hear from
customers they had no idea ecommerce was
used for business the business trade the
common belief is that ecommerce is
strictly for b2c businesses great and
the next point that I want to make here
as well so speaking with US businesses
on a daily basis Alibaba
it's very much a buzzword here in the
States a lot of business owners have no
idea you know how can we help
what is Alibaba actually do you know we
often hear Alibaba is the Amazon of
China Alibaba is Chacma we even
sometimes hear Alibaba is is taking over
the world so I want to clarify for the
audience really what we do and how we
help US businesses so for today's
presentation we're gonna focus on
Alibaba calm Alibaba calm is actually
one of many business units that sits
under Alibaba Group our mission and
Alibaba Group is to make it easy to do
business anywhere and we do this by
giving Stellar's the sellers and buyers
the tools necessary to really expand
their business globally whether it be
sourcing or selling great so that leads
to our next poll question so we're
wondering of our audience today what
percentage of your business is global
are you doing zero percent of your
business globally less than a quarter
between 1/4 and 3/4 or is 75% of your
business global so we'll give everyone
about 30 seconds to answer this so it's
interesting
Alibaba com is a global platform with
buyers from around 190 countries and
regions so Jonah will talk a little bit
more about how users of the platform can
target those buyers from around the
world yeah normally our calls with US
sellers and businesses really kick off
people hear Alibaba they automatically
think international expanding their
sales all over the globe in reality
about 30 percent of our and we'll go
over this a little bit later in the
presentation and more in greater detail
but about 30 roughly 30% of our business
buyers are actually us-based
businesses also the results are in it
looks like the majority of folks are
doing a quarter or less of their
business globally okay so that's that's
interesting looks like the adoption
level of going
isn't super high so we'll talk a little
bit more about the platform and how we
help reach global buyers great so
everyone in the audience is probably
thinking those were some great
high-level stat but how can I leave AMA
actually help me in my business so I
want to dig in a bit on some of our
platform features prior to doing that
you know keep in mind alibaba.com our
platform has been around for for 20
years we just had our twentieth
anniversary in September until about six
months ago a lot of our our tools and in
platform features were not necessarily
optimized for US businesses so my team
which is based here on New York we
completely revamped the platform we now
provide local account management sales
and support I do want to dig in into a
few of the platform features listed in
front of you I'm not going to go over
all of them but a few that really stand
out to us businesses that we speak with
one of which is the RFQ dashboard so
this is the request for quote dashboard
essentially what we've heard from global
businesses global sellers they want to
be more proactive in actually reaching
out to prospective business buyers
rather than waiting for inquiries to
come in so the request for quote
dashboard allows sellers on our platform
to actually see a database of buyer
quote requests so if you are a u.s.
buyer you can actually post your
requirement saying hey I'm interested in
buying a thousand red iPhone cases that
have my logo on the back if you are a
seller in the RFQ dashboard any RFQ that
is applicable to you and your business
you have the ability to proactively
reach out to business buyers so that's
one platform feature that I want to
highlight the next is trade assurance so
trade assurance is actually protection
payment protection for both buyer and
seller that lives on alibaba.com so when
doing business with a global buyer
oftentimes you're not going to have the
opportunity to meet them face to face or
really build that trust that that
face-to-face interaction helps foster
what
trade assurance this is a totally free
service to buyers and sellers on the
platform what trade assurance does is
essentially allows the parties to
transact on Alibaba and all of the terms
of the contract are reviewed by both
buyer and seller if there's any issue in
the transaction process
Alibaba will step in review the terms of
the deal that were agreed upon between
the buyer and seller and they will
determine who was at fault and the
really important point here if you are a
first-time Alibaba comm buyer and you
want to place a transaction with a
seller trade assurance helps new buyers
not only trust this not only trust
alibaba.com but also trust placing an
order through an international seller
exposure for your products is is key so
I really want to touch on our search
marketing solutions and one important
note is by setting up to be a seller on
our platform you're actually assigned an
account manager an account manager at
various businesses can mean many
different things
our Account Managers which are based out
of New York our search marketing experts
so they understand the Alibaba comm
platform and really how to optimize the
the traffic that is coming in to your
Alibaba storefront so we actually see
that sellers that adopt our search
marketing solutions on average receive
86% were unique visitors which leads to
64% more clicks and results in 25% more
enquiries inquiries are essentially
order requests that live on Alibaba calm
with our keyword advertising comparable
to to Google with with search engine
optimization you will link individual
keywords to every SKU when buyers come
to alibaba.com and search for specific
keywords like wholesale iPhone cases if
you is if you list the word iPhone Inc
iPhone case and you connect it to one of
your SKUs you will appear in search so
the dashboard displayed in front of you
allows you to actively manage all of
your keyword advertising campaigns
everything from daily cost cost per
click and duration of promotion and the
really important point here you know as
a small medium-sized business owner
oftentimes you're not going to have the
time to log in to you every ecommerce
platform that you're selling on to track
your different advertising campaigns
with Alibaba you can set it and forget
it so essentially what I mean by
set-and-forget is you can actually set a
daily weekly or monthly budget that you
want to spend on a specific campaign and
rest assured that your spend will not go
above that allotted amount so buyer
demand this question is asked on on
every call with us sellers they want to
know a little bit more about who our
buyers are on Alibaba comm so it's
important to note that we are not a
category specific platform we have
individuals selling high-end sports cars
like Ferraris we have individuals
selling iPhone cases and as you see on
the left-hand side of the screen are our
top categories are actually food and
beverage agriculture and beauty and
personal care hold on one moment sorry
about that mm-hmm and I touched on this
also earlier in the presentation the
common misconception is that both buyers
and sellers in Alibaba kaam are all
global in reality the number one market
in terms of our buyer distribution on
Alibaba comm is actually us-based
businesses that are signing on to our
platform to find both domestic and
international supply every business
owner that signs on to Alibaba comm
wants to target or penetrate a specific
market with buyer targeting you actually
have the ability to target specific
buyers that are coming in from specific
locations the way we're able to do this
is through not only our our buyer
verification process but when a buyer
comes in we actually track the IP
address and where that buyer is located
so you can set up your skews your
Alibaba storefront and target specific
buyers that are coming in from specific
countries so here's an example of a
storefront on Alibaba comm Hiawatha log
home so what we actually do step number
one in the process is we will actually
build you an online storefront this is
your storefront to tell global buyers a
little bit more about your brand your
products and why they should purchase
from you so our graphic design team
actually goes to work and builds you out
a beautiful customized Alibaba
storefront to attract global buyers on
your end all you need to do is send us
copy contain SKUs and images and we
build the website on your behalf and
here's another example of a seller on
Alibaba calm so totally products they've
been on the platform for a couple years
here they are actually a health
supplements provider based out of Fort
Lauderdale Florida
in the past year in Alibaba comm they've
actually seen 1.7 million dollars in
annual sales a 50 percent increase in in
head count that's internal headcount
just to fulfill the number of orders
that are coming through on Alibaba comm
and it's important to note that that
Daniel who is the CEO of totally
products
actually signed up for our platform you
know three four years ago before our
platform was optimized for us-based
sellers so you know he put a lot of work
into making this profile a success a lot
of the tools and tricks that we've
recently implemented are based on his
feedback so Daniel and totally products
have actually used Alibaba comm to grow
their business and they have achieved
1.7 million dollars in annual sales one
last important note on totally products
whenever they release new products they
actually use Alibaba comm to test the
market so what they'll do is if they
have a a product and they want to test
the market in specific region it will
actually use Alibaba and our geo
targeting feature that I talked about in
a previous slide to test various
products in different markets before
they launch advertising campaigns in
those specific markets so in addition to
all the marketing services that we
discussed there are a lot of promotions
and opportunities throughout the year
one of which that we just finished is
actually 11:11 this occurs every year on
November on November 11th and we
actually achieved over 40 billion
dollars worth of revenue on Alibaba duck
I'm sorry not on Alibaba com 40 billion
dollars of revenue flowed through all of
our Alibaba Group platforms we see a
massive spike in traffic that comes to
Alibaba comm during this promotion
double 11 a few other promotions that we
offer that are specific to Alibaba comm
one of which is super September that we
just wrapped up and one that's coming up
here in a few months called March Expo
and essentially what these promotions
Intel we actually provide discounts to
buyers on the platform and these
discounts are are pulled out of the
Alibaba pocket not necessarily out of
the sellers pocket so an example of a
promotion that we might offer a buyer is
free shipping on an order free
inspection of your products these are
all promotions that we advertise across
various social platforms to drive more
traffic to Alibaba calm
so about eight months ago we actually
administered a survey of all of our top
buyers so these are buyers that on
average spend over five hundred thousand
dollars a year on alibaba.com and to our
surprise the number one request was our
top buyers are demanding more us supply
they're coming to alibaba.com
they're finding global supply but the
number one request was more was the
ability to work with us-based sellers so
in front of you here is actually what we
call our our US pavilion page where we
actually highlight US suppliers on our
platform you'll see a few food and
beverage examples in front of you here
this is actually a page that we're going
to highlight throughout the March Expo
promotion and finally selling your
products domestically is hard enough
selling your products internationally
can be even more difficult we want
everyone to be aware that we're here to
help we have a us-based sales support
and account management team that is here
24 hours a day 7 days a week to really
ensure that our us-based sellers are
finding success on our platform and
because of our partnership with
shipstation customers actually receive
$250 off membership services so
definitely please reach out to me
directly I'm going to play my contact
information here like I said our sales
support account management team we are
here 24 hours a day 7 days a week to
ensure that our sellers are finding
success on alibaba.com great thanks
Jonah I see we have a few questions that
have come in okay this one is for Krish
what are some of the best practices
selling and shipping globally sure
certainly shipping and selling globally
I think the first thing is quite simply
to know whether or not your product has
an audience on and whether
or not it's something that people
globally will take to a lot of times in
electronics although the demand may be
there on issues like the electrical
current plugs things like that can
sometimes be a factor so really knowing
what the market is for your product
internationally is certainly very
important number one number two
starting out with selling your product
globally in like-minded markets I'm
probably not the best idea to start
selling your product in Russia Brazil or
India countries that are known for very
onerous regulations but with countries
that have similar like-minded tastes
like Canada the UK Australia and and of
course some other ones in Western Europe
so I'd say that those two things are
first are first and second and then I'd
say finally third on finding markets
that are high what we call de minimis
meaning an amount that can be brought in
a country that'll allow an importation
for a high amount traditionally on
Australia was known for a high de
minimis of about $1,000 or about $900 us
that since changed just a little bit but
there are plenty of other markets
certainly in Europe the UK other ones
where they allow a high de minimis and
relatively easy importation of goods and
similar buying habits in the u.s. got it
looks like this is a question for Jonah
what is the cost for a seller membership
on alibaba.com yes so today we have two
different membership packages premium
and basic so the premium package is four
thousand one hundred ninety nine dollars
what the premium package includes is our
graphic design team will build you an
Alibaba storefront that is the the
website that was displayed in the
presentation that also includes
two thousand dollars worth of
advertising credit so also displayed in
the presentation we went through some of
the advertising campaign
and search marketing solutions we
actually put $2,000 into your account
for you to spend on any further
advertising that you might be interested
in doing on Alibaba comm that also
includes an account manager which is
based out of New York and they work with
you on training you on all of the search
marketing tools that live on our
platform so that's the premium package
three bullet points under premium $41.99
includes two thousand dollars worth of
ad credits and an account manager the
basic package is two thousand three
hundred ninety nine dollars the primary
difference between the two is the basic
package does not receive an account
manager they have a local email and in
chat support and with the basic package
they receive $500 worth of ad credits to
spend on further advertising sort of a
follow up to that is the membership fee
per month yes so we we do not offer
monthly pricing it is an annual an
annual payment of either four thousand
one hundred ninety nine dollars or two
thousand three hundred ninety nine
dollars no matter what package you go
with year two the price drops to one
thousand three hundred ninety nine
dollars and both packages do include the
build out of your Alibaba website and a
one last follow-up question on pricing
there is no cost for buyers to shop on
the platform correct there is no cost
for buyers on Alibaba com
okay here's a question I think this
one's for Jonah as well how can US
sellers compete with the cheaper
manufacturers in China yes it's
expensive yes so you know historically
buyers would come to Alibaba calm to
find you know less expensive less
expensive products from China based on
the survey that we administered you know
eight months ago there's growing demand
in Alibaba calm for us supply I mean we
we dug a little bit deeper into why
these buyers want to purchase from us
suppliers and really the noteworthy
sponses that we received was they want
faster turnaround time so small business
owners that are purchasing through
Alibaba from Chinese based suppliers on
average are waiting you know 45 to 50
days for their products to arrive so
that's one another is quality control
specifically in you know food and
beverage agriculture health wellness and
beauty any on body in body product these
buyers are more comfortable buying from
us-based sellers and last but not least
there there's a large percentage of
orders that flow through Alibaba comm
that have some form of customization
these buyers want to negotiate or
explain the the product specs and what
they need in a prototype to someone who
speaks their native language so those
are a few reasons why our top buyers
want to purchase from us-based sellers
on Alibaba comm I think we have time for
one last question I think this one is
probably for Krrish many of our products
are considered hazardous because they
contain alcohol how do you handle hazmat
for international destinations for
international destinations
that's generally something that's
carrier specific so of what I'd
encourage is the specific policy that
the carrier themselves has as far as
hazmat would be the ones that you you
would have to look up and then see what
our supporting documentation based on
the carrier themselves is as a rule the
USPS typically does not handle hazardous
materials so you are typically having to
be inclined to work with direct
integrators like a FedEx and UPS got it
great so I think we're closing in on
1:30 so we'll we'll wrap it up here but
on behalf of the team thank you everyone
for attending and spending your lunch
hour or your afternoon with us
and we'll be sending out the recording
of the webinar for everyone and as well
as hosting it on shipstation comm thank
you thank you
Thanks
you
