Connecting the World's Manufacturing Engine to Buyers Around the Globe

Keeping an Eye on Global Business

Not only is eBay the leading ecommerce market place with huge transaction volumes, outstanding coverage around the globe and millions of buyers, it also enables companies to engage with end consumers so they can understand their needs and develop customised products especially for them.

So says Degang Zeng, eCommerce Manager for China Security & Surveillance Technology (CSST), China’s largest manufacturer and seller of security and surveillance products.

CSST’s export department ran along traditional lines until it began receiving queries from overseas buyers interested in ordering products like those being sold on eBay. “That’s how we learned about eBay and cross-border ecommerce,” Degang says. “It drove the birth of our own ecommerce department. “

In late 2010, the company established a department to lead international ecommerce. Six months ago it set up its eBay stores to sell security products such as monitors, cameras and alarms direct to consumers.

As a listed company, CSST believes ecommerce will continue to impact hugely on traditional business models, as well as individuals’ lives. “We decided to catch the trend in this early phase so we can accumulate enough experience and build a solid competitive edge when ecommerce becomes the mainstream model,” Degang says.

The company is market leader in China, provides services to many Fortune 500 companies and sells through offline channels such as supermarkets and shopping malls in many countries. Despite this, it recognised it had limited experience in managing online retail, so sought experienced partners and hired trading assistants to manage its eBay stores. “By combining the trading assistants’ strengths in online retail and our advantages in design and manufacturing as well as capital investment, we expect sustainable growth of our business on eBay,” says Degang.

CSST now has 10 people working on its eBay stores and lists only on the US site, with American buyers representing the company’s largest market. However, many of its products are listed via partners on other websites as well.

Before establishing its eBay stores, the company spent time and resources seeking to better understand overseas consumers’ behaviour, which is very different from that of domestic buyers. For CSST, one of eBay’s real attractions is that it allows the company to test the waters in overseas markets with newly developed products – and capture consumers’ feedback on their shopping and user experience in a timely way.

“The eBay team has helped us a lot with account management, store operation and partner selection,” says Degang.

He would, though, like to see eBay ensuring it doesn’t change its policies too frequently, allowing large merchants more flexibility and offering them more express channels to differentiate their services from those provided by consumer sellers. Shipping, too, remains a challenge for exporters. But it also provides an opportunity. “It has always been our objective to ship products to our buyers in a better, faster manner.”

Read more in the eBay Asian Exporters' Index:

English version (PDF)

Chinese version (PDF)

Becomeus: Unforgettable Shoes from Bosnia to Botswana

Sang-geun Chang’s goal is to make shoes that people won’t forget, and will be popular forever.

Judging by recent performance, the young entrepreneur is well on his way to achieving his goal. His Alanalice shoe brand – shoes with ‘killer heels’ of 13 cm or higher – is bringing in monthly sales of US$60,000 through his eBay store becomeus.

Sang-geun opened his eBay store in 2003, three years after opening a local online shopping mall to sell his designer shoes, and around 35% of his sales now come from eBay. His listings on the US and UK sites, and occasionally on the Australian site, bring buyers primarily from those countries, but his export market is growing. Instead of being limited to the Korean market, he has expanded his network to the world thanks to eBay. He and his eight staff now send his quirky shoes to over 90 countries. Even Botswana orders 20 to 30 pairs on a regular basis.

“I think eBay sellers have a higher chance of success in countries with less developed retail channels because buyers there are more likely to depend on global online retailers, while customers in advanced economies have more online and offline alternatives,” Sang-guen said in a recent interview with a Korean daily newspaper.

His most memorable moment on eBay came when Aida Korman, a well-known Bosnian fashion designer, asked him to make shoes for her fashion show.

It’s the kind of high-profile publicity a young fashion entrepreneur dreams of. Now, having overcome early shipping problems by offering buyers a variety of delivery options, Sang-guen is expecting stellar growth of 250% in the coming year.

What’s the secret of his success? One ingredient is the “pickiness” of Korean buyers, Sang-geun says. It meant that trading new-and-in-season fashion items online flourished there earlier than in other countries. “They kind of trained us,” he says. “Now we can deliver what we have with better agility and accuracy.”

Read more in the eBay Asian Exporters' Index:

English version (PDF)

Chinese version (PDF)