Everybody knows how big Amazon is and the opportunity it provides for businesses to expand their customer reach internationally and really ramp up the sales. eBay is another marketplace which is well known and well documented. However, has your business seriously considered Alibaba? Well if not, then it might just want to when you see some of these staggering stats about China’s biggest e-commerce marketplace.
There are now over 300 million people shopping on the Amazon marketplace, which compared with eBay’s 171 million may seem huge, yet when you consider that Alibaba has over 515 million shoppers (that’s 170% the size of Amazon!) it suddenly doesn’t look as big. Unsurprisingly given the larger number of shoppers, the Gross Merchandise Volume (GMV) for Alibaba is bigger than both Amazon and eBay, however, the difference between them may be a little surprising. The GMV for Amazon in 2017 was $145bn and eBay’s was $88bn, yet Alibaba’s was a staggering $758bn! This stat alone shows just how much is being sold on the Alibaba marketplace that you may never have even considered!
If you are looking to crack China then Alibaba makes perfect sense. Alibaba claims 80% of all online sales in China, whereas Amazon only claims 44% of online sales in the USA. This highlights the opportunity that Alibaba provides in the Chinese market, not being on Alibaba could be a big mistake. Perhaps one of the most eye-opening stats that really shows the huge growth opportunity for China and Alibaba is that the internet penetration rate in the country is only 56% (versus 89% in USA & 90% in the UK). If Alibaba has only reached just over half of the population of China, then imagine the possibilities when internet access becomes more widely available in the country and your products can be seen by even more people!
Click on our infographic below to take a look at even more insightful facts and stats that could well help you make the decision to pursue China and Alibaba for your business. Of course, should you need any help along your journey then do feel free to get in contact with us to find out how we can help you!
