EBay exporters beat slow growth with online platform

EBay's cross-border trading platform in China helped large domestic eBay sellers hit an annual sales growth of 93 percent in the 12 months through June 2012 despite weak exports in the country overall, eBay Greater China announced Thursday at a press conference in Beijing.

"Large" eBay sellers in China are those who "achieved over $100,000 in sales on eBay in the 12 months ending June 30, 2012," according to the cross-border e-commerce report issued at the conference.

EBay Inc, a leading global online marketplace, mainly runs an online export business in China. Its website on the mainland, ebay.cn, does not sell goods to Chinese consumers but assists domestic sellers in vending goods via eBay's websites around the world including the US, the UK and Australia.

The company will continue to promote its cross-border e-commerce in China, but has no intention of giving up the attractive domestic market, expecting sellers in China and abroad to sell goods via ebay.cn to Chinese buyers in the future, said Lin Yizhang, CEO of eBay Greater China and vice president of eBay Inc.

Forging a suitable B2C e-commerce strategy for the mainland market is an ongoing concern for the company, and a deal with China's online luxury shopping platform xiu.com, announced on November 12, will help them learn more about Chinese online shopping habits, said Lin.

Although eBay has done well in the Chinese online export business, it needs to stay alert as more and more e-commerce operators are entering the sector, Wei Guangju, an industry analyst from Adfaith Management Consulting, told the Global Times Thursday.

Amazon, a global e-commerce operator, has dipped a toe in the online export business via its new project Global Selling, which has been running in a test form for less than one year and enables Chinese sellers to trade across borders via Amazon's websites in eight countries, a spokesperson from Amazon China told the Global Times Thursday on condition of anonymity.

A staff member surnamed Chen from SKG, a growing household appliance seller in China, told the Global Times Thursday that they have been exporting goods via online e-commerce platforms like eBay and Amazon and have confidence in the online export business.

"We usually list our goods on Amazon's foreign websites through overseas agents, while eBay will support us in both planning and execution of online selling to global buyers," Chen from SKG said, adding that SKG has to pay listing fees in order to show products on eBay's platforms, which also get commissions from each sale.

Amazon said that their Global Selling only charges commissions on sales.