\"Black Friday\" Overseas Shopping is Gaining Power in China

November is in the severe winter， butshopaholics are highly enthusiastic.

The 11.11 0nline shopping carnival was just ended， and the US traditional November 27th \"Black Friday\" shopping festival has just nudged into China.

The cross-border e-commerce providers and platforms like ymatou， Amazon China， Jingdong global， HIGO， Tmall global and Xiaohongshu greatly publicize Black Friday， which helps to stimulate overseas online shoppers.

According to the 2nd generation report on global cross-border trade issued by PayPal and the research firm Ipsos on November 18th， 35% of the Chinese online consumers have tried overseas online shopping in 2015， whereas the ratio was 26% one year ago. The report published by Analysys International on November 25th shows that cross-bordere-commerce will see a growth of 60% in 2015 with a possible scale of RMB 762.06 billion.

Cross-border e-commere websites are racking their brains

In 2014， the \"Black Friday\" shopping carnival and the cross-border e-commerce were not as popular as this year. This year， such cross-border e-commerce providers and platforms as Amazon China， ymatou， mia.com， kaola，com， smzdm.com， Xiaohongshu and kjt.com are all fully prepared for the \"Black Friday\" shopping carnival.

Ymtou specially launched an overseas online shopping promotion activity- the \"2015 global Black Friday shopping carniva\". During the week of Black Friday， the overseas direct mailed \"commodities\" accounted for over 80% in the total sales volume and the commodities covered nearly 400，000 overseas high-quality categories. According to Zeng Bibo， CEO of ymtou， xlobo would finish the customs clearance for the overseas direct mailed commodities normally in five days during the \"Black Friday\" week. In this big sale week， ymatou charted about 40 direct mailing airplanes and upgraded 11 international logistics centers and bonded warehouses to ensure timely delivery.

Based on the big data analysis of consumers' purchase behaviors and channels during the 11.11 online shop-ping carnival， kaola.com elaborately selected the high-quality commodities from the source countries and particularly promoted the popular high-quality commodities such as home furnishing personal care， branded cosmetics and clothing bags during the \"Black Friday\" shopping carnival. Before the \"Black Friday\"， kaola.com fully upgraded and adjusted its storage， logistics and after-sale mechanism.

During the Black Friday， Tmall global focused on the wellknown overseas flagship shops， which is different from the \"purchasing agent\" launched by other cross-border e-commerce platforms. Many new top overseas brands on Tmall global such as Macy's， bcbgm axazria， RUNWAY channel， the Japanese drug store supature， chemist warehouse and Olive Young also joined the Black Friday promotion.

Momoso launched two themes for this year's \"Black Friday\"-\"live broadcast of overseas- low price\" and \"direct purchase on overseas official website\" to introduce more commodity categories. Momoso tried big data for the first time to guide commodity operation， which enabled users to find their favorites among the huge SKU. This was also the most severe challenge for momoso during this year's Black Friday.

According to the survey conducted by Nielsen on the Chinese overseas shoppers in 2015， China's overseas shopping market is expected to achieve a scale of RMB l，000 billion in 2018 with 36 million Chinese overseas shoppers and the overseas shopping market will account for a market share of 16% in the entire e-commerce market. As the domestic e-commerce market is saturating， the overseas shopping market is undoubtedly promising， which not only attracts overseas shopping startups but also the e-commerce giants.

According to Zhang Lei， although the domestic 11.11 0nline shopping carnival has consumed some purchase power of the consumers who like stocking up commodities， kaola.com is still confident to reap a considerable sales volume. This conforms to the original purpose of the \"Black Friday\" in the foreign countries and \"Black Friday\" will become a fashion and continues for a long time in China.

Black Friday overseas shopping shows new characteristics

The \"Black Friday\" this year shows some new characteristics: The special feature of overseas shopping multiplies the psychological cost and consumers become more generous in spending; sales volume in the mobile terminal is much higher than that of the PC terminal; overseas shopping has become a shopping mode with increasingly greater recognition among the domestic middle class.

The 2nd generation global cross-border trade report of 2015 published not long ago shows that the cost to purchase overseas commodities is the key factor for making purchase decision.

More and more overseas e-commerce providers have begun to launch Chinese version websites and add direct mailing services to China. For instance， Amazon initiated direct mailing last year and this year more branded e-commerce websites will start direct mailing; and the overseas e-commerce providers will offer more speaal services to the Chinese consumers， said Meng Jian， overseas commerce director of smzdm.com， when accepting the interview with China's Foreign Trade. When recommending commodities， smzdm.com tends to recommend the merchants that offer direct mailing services， which accounts for 40%-50%.

Statistics from ymatou shows that unlike the Black Friday oflast year when over 50% sales volume was contributed by the PC terminal， this year more than 95% sales volume is contributed by the mobile terminals; On November 20th， the first promotion day， the sales volume from the mobile terminals hit an all-time high， over 10 times of the normal daily sales volume; then November 27th， namely the US Black Friday， saw another round of peak; during the peak times， the user base was surging and pushed the ymatou app to the second position on the App Store list and the first position among the shopping related applications.

\"In the leisure time， we watch the live broadcast of buyers' crazy shopping on our cellphones and 'chat' with the buyers. Then we place orders，\" this is the true portrait of most consumers' shopping behavior on ymatou.com during the Black Friday shopping carnival.

Featuring with more flexible and convenient operations， the mobile terminal saves much time for consumers and serves as an interface for consumers to learn about the overseas commodities. Consumers may become fans and interact with the certificated buyers on ymatou.com， and also they are able to learn more overseas commodities via the community.

The survey conducted by Nie-lsen on the Chinese overseas shoppers in 2015 happens to be similar to the users' attribute on the smzdm.com platform. 75% ofthe young parents with babies is the major force of the Chinese overseas shoppers. 60% of the Chinese overseas shoppers live in the first-tier cities like Shanghai， Beijing， Guangzhou and Shenzhen， who normally have a bachelor above education background and good English ability Among these 1980s' and 1990s' users who possess high purchase power and pursue high-quality consumption， authentic commodities， brand and product diversity are the main reasons for them to turn to overseas shopping.

\"The Black Friday shopping carn-ivallaunched this year aims to stimulate the Chinese consumers' enthusiasm about overseas shopping and to lay the foundation for cultivating overseas shopping habits. More new users and even the first time overseas shoppers joined the Black Friday shopping carnival， which signals that consumption globalization is gradually penetrating into the Chinese people's dailylife，\" said ymatou's CEO Zeng Bibo. During this year's Black Friday， the top sellers were no long the maternal child products， and bags clothing became the new favorites as consumers' true desire were motivated.

Ymatou's statistics shows that during the Black Friday 60% of the new users tried overseas shopping for the first time. In addition， all the cities across the countries saw high consumption enthusiasm. With mature market environment， faster overseas commodity circulation and sound online shopping logistics service， the first-tier cities have always been the major battlefield for overseas shopping. This year， such second-tier cities as Wuhan， Chengdu and Nanjing saw staggering growth at a higher rate than the first-tier cities like Beijing， Shanghai and Guangzhou.

According to kaola.com's CEO Zhang Lei at this year's WeMedia annual conference held not long ago， the cross-border e-commerce is changing the life style and \"Black Friday\" will become a landmark festival in China just like Christmas. More and more people will expect Black Friday， which will nibble some popularity of the 11.11 online shopping carnival. And Black Friday is expected to turn into an international 11.11 online shopping carnival.

Pain points of overseas shopping are to be tackled step by step

According to Nielsen's report， the absence of buyers' rights protection and the concern of fake products are the top reasons for hesitation about overseas shopping among l/3 users without overseas shopping experience. Moreover， language barrier， account creation， payment process and logistics reliability are also factors affecting overseas shopping experience.

In the aspect of difficult licensing milk powder， cosmetics， health care products， clothing， food， fresh products and junior luxury products are in great demand. These products need commodity inspection and many are involved with licenses according to the normal trade import. Kaola.com insists on 100% proprietary trading and over the past year this e-commerce provider has obtained direct licensing ofhundreds of brands， covering all the core product categories such as maternal child products， cosmetics， home furnishing personal care， food health care， digital electrical appliances， as well as clothing bags. Besides， kaola.com has jointly developed the two-dimension code system with China Customs and its guarantee of authentic products has been recognized by such top globalinvesting agencies as Goldman Sachs. On November 26th， Tmall global published a notice that all the merchants of the food and health care categories should obtain the brand's level one licensing， otherwise the products will be removed from the shelves.

As for product quality control although many cross-border e-commerce providers publicize the slogan of authentic products， there also exists fake products abroad. In order to pursue profits， it is also possible for the domestic agents and importers to sell fake products. According to the statistics about consumers' rights protection cases from CECRC， the complaints rights protection platform of China E-business Research Center， fake product problem accounts for around 10% in complaints about cross-border online shopping.

Therefore，stable commodity supply is crucial for overseas shopping. Cross-border e-commerce platforms need to directly cooperate with more brands so that it will better control the commodity supply.

In the past one year， kaola.com has penetrated into nearly 100 global top commodity supply sources across the four continents of Asia， Europe， America and Australia， and it has directly connected with the brand owners and factories， which helps to avoid fake products from the source.

In the aspect of logistics， Cross-border online shopping has to go through both the overseas and domestic logistics. And particularly for the overseas part， as the openness of borders varies in different countries， the parcels may encounter barriers in customs clearance during cross-border circulation. Unlike domestic online shopping， cross-border logistics have such problems as long-time delivery， no parcel tracking， difficult commodity change or refund as well as broken or lost parcels. Especially during the Black Friday with multiplied orders， problems of cross-border logistics become more prominent.

According to 2015 Cross-border Online Shopping Consumption Report published by the third-party data agency Nielsen， 41% of the consumers prefer direct mailing as the delivery mode for overseas shopping. The responsible officer of ymatou's logistics division said that direct overseas mailing is one feature of ymatou. Overseas direct mailing on one hand better adapts to the domestic fragmented and individualized overseas shopping demand， and on the other hand strictly controls the product quality due to the enclosed product delivery from the overseas part to the domestic part.

Yao Jianfang， assistant analyst of the Law Rights Division of China E-business Research Center reminded that one prominent problem for overseas purchasing agent lies in the difficult after-sales services such as commodity change and refund. As not all the commodities purchased abroad can be changed or refunded， consumers have to learn about the eligible commodities for refunding without reasons before placing orders. For instance， product change or refund has to be considered for food， health care product， milk powder， baby products， jewelry and underwear. In the mean time， it's better for consumers to consult the sellers about the commodity shelflife to avoid commodity expiration once the commodity is received. And it is not wise to buy some emergency commodities abroad during the \"Black Friday\". Due to the difficulty for obtaining evidence as well as high time logistics cost， consumers normally give up the chance for safeguarding their legitimate rights. It's learned that to meet consumers' demand for commodity change or refund， kaola.com promised that commodity can be refunded to the domestic warehouse during the Black Friday to fully ensure timely commodity change or refund.

In addition， industry insiders said that the logistics of cross-border e-commerce involves extremely complicated procedures including parcel collection， packaging， storage， overseas transportation， outbound customs clearance， transnational transportation， inbound customs clearance and domestic delivery. As for policies， specific measures are needed to be unveiled to differentiate the import tax on luggage parcel mailing which China levies at the current stage and to safeguard cross-border logistics and consumers.