Taobao Rising As The Number One E-commerce Platform in Hong Kong?

If you’re looking for something to buy online in hong kong ecommerce, you’d likely look at websites like Amazon and eBay for your products. Moreover, if you’re an online business, services like Alibaba will likely be able to get you your needed stocks wholesale. If you’re looking for an alternative to any of these, you may find some degree of satisfaction in Taobao. In fact, this Chinese marketplace is poised to be a direct competition to Amazon.

And if there’s anything its sheer market presence and performance can prove, it’s that it’s more than capable of competing against the global online marketplace giant. However, for the curious – just what is Taobao, and how did it get to its current place?

What is Taobao?

Taobao: The Powerhouse to Rival Amazon

• A rising but efficient giant
• A familiar system in a familiar market
• Accessibility works in the economy

Success Starts With Humble Beginnings

Taobao isn’t just your typical online store, though. It rose into the powerhouse it is today not out of sheer luck. Rather, it had its humble beginnings.

Taobao shouldn’t be underestimated, though. It’s actually considered the biggest e-commerce website in the world, and one of the most-visited sites out there. It didn’t start this big, though.

• The Alibaba Group founded Taobao Marketplace back in 2003, when it originally catered to consumer-to-consumer retail. This allowed entrepreneurs and smaller businesses to have a means to open online stores for Chinese-speaking places, and also abroad. This made Taiwan, Macau, Hong Kong, and Mainland China their primary audiences.
• In 2008, Taobao amped up the game by introducing its “Big Taobao” strategy, which made it push to provide much more powerful e-commerce infrastructure tools for all of its e-commerce participants. This allowed customers and clients to create more dynamic and efficient marketplaces for their own products.
• Taobao didn’t stop there, though. In 2010, Taobao launched its own search engine, eTao. This allowed users to search and check out information on merchants and products across different e-commerce websites in China. A year later, Alibaba split Taobao into Tmall.com which is a business-to-consumer platform, eTao the search engine, and Taobao Marketplace that kept its consumer-to-consumer focus.

This rich history has allowed Taobao to grow to such an extent that its presence within the Chinese market is something to both marvel and to be reckoned with. Its careful strategy and prioritization of customer satisfaction has allowed it to reach the peak of its success that it very well deserves.

Today, Taobao remains as one of the most popular e-commerce websites out there, and for good reason. Alibaba’s thrust to make Taobao a reliable means of selling their own products has changed the face of online marketplaces today.

Taobao: The Powerhouse to Rival Amazon

Given the above in mind, one cannot underestimate just how Taobao gets to connect with its customers. In fact, one can say it’s through their approach to customer relationships that made Taobao into what it is today. Here are some of the ways Taobao makes a mark in its industry:

A rising but efficient giant: One of the main appeals of Taobao is the ingenuity of the marketplace. Taobao doesn’t make its presence immediately known to those who were fans of competitors like Amazon and eBay. However, Taobao makes up for this in the kind of services it offers to its customers. Efficient shipping and payment methods make it extremely convenient to shop in Taobao, and it offers a level or customer protection that rivals the competition. As a seller, you’d find it easy to set up shop and profit from the system as well.

• Since its inception, Taobao has successfully established its foothold on the Chinese market – something eBay has always tried getting into in its early years. Taobao has won the Chinese market in huge part of its competitive cost strategies.
• Some of its first strategies included free listings for its sellers during their first few years in existence.
• The marketplace also doesn’t require additional charges between buyers and sellers, which boosted interest in setting up shop in Taobao.
• The marketplace also provided easy access to special services to its many stores. These included customer drainage, industry analysis, customer service, and website design for various costs.

A familiar system in a familiar market: Taobao exhibits genius in two things. Firstly, it’s an online marketplace. This means it’s an extremely accessible means of getting products for a better fee without the hassle of going to a mall. Second, it’s in the Hong Kong market. Taobao approached its competitive nature not by competing with Amazon directly, but by going for the market it couldn’t easily attach itself to, which is its huge audience in China. By offering a similar service in a familiar setup, Taobao instantly gained the hearts of many.

• Taobao is no stranger to different and flexible markets, and much more so in its home territory. Taobao easily establishes itself as a premier seller of attractive and quality Chinese goods amongst both its Chinese and foreign customers.
• Taobao established Tmall.com, a web domain geared towards product quality, variety, and overseeing overall structural efficiency by then.
• The marketplace has no shortage of marketing materials, strategies, and partners. Taobao had partnered with popular internet portals in China such as MSN, Sohu, and 21 CN.
• Taobao had invested as much as USD 586-million in microblogging website Sina Weibo, further boosting Taobao’s presence across more influencers.

Accessibility works in the economy: Another advantage Taobao has established for itself is its capacity to provide products in a market where it’s normally unavailable elsewhere. Whereas marketplaces such as Alibaba offers products wholesale, Taobao offers products built and configured specifically for the Chinese market. This is a handy way of ensuring an audience, as it penetrated the Chinese market with its offering of products not normally in other marketplaces.

• Ease of access is something Taobao can brag about, because its focus on customer service has always permeated through its services. These came in the form of various tools and services accessible to customers.
• An instant messaging tool allowed conversations between buyers and sellers without much hassle. Taobao also guarantees both speed and security with the usage of this system.
• Taobao’s online administrators used nicknames based on popular names in Chinese culture, boosting its appeal to the populace.
• The marketplace has no shortage of marketing materials, strategies, and partners. Taobao had partnered with popular internet portals in China such as MSN, Sohu, and 21 CN.
• Taobao had invested as much as USD 586-million in microblogging website Sina Weibo, further boosting Taobao’s presence across more influencers.

Success Starts With The Right Help

It’s important to look at Taobao not just as a company to rival Amazon, but rather a company built on a foundation of hard work, perseverance, and a firm vision. Not a lot of companies survive as startups not simply because of lack of profit, but perhaps also due to a lack of drive to take risks and rise above the challenge. This isn’t to say Taobao is immediately the best there is, but it’s worth learning that Taobao is where it is today not just because of how much it earns, but also because of how much effort is built into its stability. If there’s anything to learn from such a company, it’s to never lose sight of your vision, and to make sure you slowly build the tools you need to provide the best kind of offerings to your audiences.

If you’re interested in growing your own business the way Taobao did, you can start by equipping yourself with the right knowledge and tools to run a more efficient and effective business. This can start with finding resources on eCommerce, digital marketing, product management, and even content creation. If you need a helping hand on your business development plans, Pnetform Web Development can give you the assistance you need.

Our team is one of the fastest growing web development and eCommerce support business in Hong Kong. We specialize not just in SEO, but also in various services that can prove helpful to your business, especially if you’re hoping to capture a market in Hong Kong.