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With the rules upgraded, can AliExpress enter the high-end brand market?

With the rules upgraded, can AliExpress enter the high-end brand market?

Image source @ Visual China

Text | Blue Ocean Billion official website

Jiang Fan, the great hero of Taobao and Tmall and the "traffic king", took over Alibaba's overseas business. Since then, AliExpress and Lazada have a stronger leader.

Almost at the same time, AliExpress quickly sounded the clarion call of "platform upgrade" and "elimination of redundancy".

AliExpress will conduct an "annual sales assessment" for new and old sellers and clear a group of sellers with low sales. At the same time, AliExpress will close the entrance of individual industrial and commercial households, and will also clear a number of sellers who shop goods, copy money, and change money, limit the number of goods released by sellers, and eliminate shops.

It can be said that AliExpress raised a big knife, made up its mind to cut the redundancy, and strived to get rid of the image of "cheapness" and change to the direction of "refinement", "branding" and "Tmall".

The heavy label of "cheap", AliExpress has been carrying for too long, but also let it falter, slowly moving forward.

A brand observer in the UK told Mr. Yiguan that in the eyes of many Europeans, whether it is Amazon, eBay, or AliExpress, it is basically a "grocery platform" for buying daily necessities rather than branded goods, and AliExpress is at the bottom of this "chain of contempt". It may be in a hurry to get rid of this image.

Reuters reported that AliExpress had invited local brands such as Mango, Benetton and Cortefiel to settle in, but these brands were rejected. The reason is that AliExpress sells too many cheap goods.

In 2016, Shen Difan, then general manager of AliExpress, said aliexpress was "still far from true branding." Five or six years later, AliExpress faces the same dilemma.

But now, AliExpress has ushered in a transformational opportunity point.

After Amazon's big ban, a group of Chinese sellers no longer put "eggs in one basket" and began to do AliExpress, especially the entry of a group of head sellers in Shenzhen, injecting fresh blood into AliExpress.

AliExpress has once again increased its upgrade efforts, in addition to the promotion of Jiang Fan's arrival, it is also possible that AliExpress has "eliminated" some of the capital of small sellers after holding more high-quality merchants, said a cross-border e-commerce observer in Shenzhen.

The person said that the description of the bird's full bow may not be accurate, but it can basically reflect some reality. At the beginning of the development of many platforms, a large number of sellers are attracted to settle in with relaxed conditions, and even for the sake of volume, they are more tolerant of some sellers who rub the edge and even violate the rules. After the platform matures, some "low-quality sellers" will be cleaned up, and the traffic and resources will be more centrally distributed to well-known brands and head sellers. ”

Under a series of new policies of AliExpress, in the future, sellers with low turnover will not have the opportunity to open stores on it, and shop-type sellers will also be cleaned up.

Is AliExpress going to be an "international version of Tmall"?

Will the living space of small and medium-sized sellers become smaller and smaller?

Can AliExpress be a high-end platform for brand gathering?

Offering the "Upgrade Combination Punch", the tiny seller is forced into a corner

Jiang Fan has implemented a series of "upgrades" on Tmall.

It can be roughly summarized as tightening the entrance to entry, raising the entry threshold, eliminating businesses with low operational capabilities, and ensuring that the stores on Tmall are boutique stores, while strictly controlling the entry of new users.

Then with a series of combination punches, a "couture version" of Tmall was played.

Nowadays, this series of combination punches seems to be hit on AliExpress.

Tighten the entrance and raise the threshold

In November 2021, AliExpress updated the announcement on the investment of new sellers in the "big apparel industry", and raised the requirements for new sellers.

Focus on recruiting four types of sellers, and make higher requirements for the annual turnover flow:

● Preferred sellers

Targeted recruitment of cross-border brands, or non-targeted recruitment of brands, with an annual turnover of more than 50 million yuan is preferred;

●Factory merchant (sole proprietorship or shareholding)

Annual turnover of more than 10 million yuan is preferred;

● Traders

Cross-border independent station sellers: annual transaction of more than 5 million yuan is preferred;

Cross-border large-scale sale: annual transaction of more than 10 million yuan is preferred;

Ordinary traders: annual transaction of more than 2 million yuan is preferred;

●Official shopper

Do not open to the public to attract investment, targeted recruitment (restricted on the shop).

In general, AliExpress should be piloted in the "big clothing industry" and begin to strictly review the qualifications of new sellers.

After this "punch", the "follow-up punch" is then added.

Close the entrance to individual industrial and commercial households

That is, from December 15, AliExpress will close the entrance to the platform for individual industrial and commercial households.

With the rules upgraded, can AliExpress enter the high-end brand market?

"Two punches" down, almost locked the seller's entry conditions. New sellers without volume or strength are basically unlikely to apply to the store.

After locking the "inlet", the next step is to "remove the silt".

Clear sellers with lower sales

In December, AliExpress passed an annual sales assessment standard for merchants, and cleared sellers whose operational ability was not good and who were not "attentive" to the platform.

With the rules upgraded, can AliExpress enter the high-end brand market?

In terms of assessment standards, taking the "big clothing category" as an example, the old seller who has opened a store for more than 2 years has an annual turnover of more than 10,000 US dollars; for sellers in 1-2 years, the turnover should be more than 5,000 US dollars.

If you don't meet the standard, you will be refunded the store and will not be able to rejoin the platform for 90 days.

If the product link is not shipped for 180 days, the link will be removed from the shelves.

Some of the dismissed sellers are miserable, struggling to find a bill of "2 million flowing water" and trying to re-enter AliExpress as a "new seller who meets the new conditions".

With the rules upgraded, can AliExpress enter the high-end brand market?

These sellers are eager to find "2 million yuan of turnover" because AliExpress's "new seller investment ability certification announcement" in November determined that the lowest first-class "ordinary traders" need 2 million sales to "give priority".

Less than 2 million flow, although there is no explicit rejection, but in fact, the subtext is obvious, 2 million is a hurdle, can not go up, want to apply for settlement is very difficult.

In this context, many service providers have acted quickly to launch the service of "opening stores on behalf of others" to provide 2 million flowing water information.

However, AliExpress saw this and wanted to "seal" the road.

At present, stores require "re-real-name authentication", and stores that buy stores and borrow other people's identity information are expected to encounter a wave of purge.

In addition to raising the requirements for new sellers to settle in and clearing a number of sellers with low sales, AliExpress has limited the number of products released in order to eliminate extensive shopping.

Suppress shops and limit the number of products released

Without categories or special regulations of the industry, the number of merchants' products is limited to less than 3,000. For the hair extension and hair-raising industry, AliExpress is more restrictive, with gold and silver stores being able to post 300 and ordinary stores at 200.

With the rules upgraded, can AliExpress enter the high-end brand market?

The intention of this move is obvious, that is, through strict control of the number of product releases, to prevent sellers from obtaining a large amount of turnover through the shop, ignoring the quality and operational capabilities of individual products.

A AliExpress "small two" feedback, at this stage AliExpress is more willing to accept sellers with strong professional cross-border supply, original development capabilities, supply chain advantages and higher service quality.

Although the above series of means does not clearly indicate whether it is Jiang Fan's "wrist", there are still relatively distinct "Jiang Fan characteristics".

At present, there is no news that AliExpress will also carry out "system upgrades", but it can be guessed that Jiang Fan may bring some changes to AliExpress next:

●Focus on the development of mobile terminals, improve the DAU (number of daily active users) of AliExpress APP;

● Heavy money to increase live streaming with goods, cultivate high-quality anchors, and even acquire high-quality overseas MCN institutions.

One is the same as the Taobao and Tmall routes under the auspices of Jiang Fan before.

For AliExpress' series of high-pressure punches, the majority of sellers have different feelings.

For some sellers who have already "hit the road", aliexpress clearance is not a high standard. Yingzi, a toy seller in Changsha, told "Blue Ocean Yiguan egainnews" that the $10,000 clearance standard for toy categories has a very low threshold and will not have any impact on her.

For some multi-store operators and some part-time sellers, some low-sales stores will face a situation of withdrawal.

In addition, some sellers of large shops, sellers who copy money and follow the payment, will also be hit.

To a certain extent, this will purify the platform environment and help promote the development of refined operation sellers.

But then again, after aliexpress branding and Tmall, it will inevitably vigorously invite brand merchants to settle in, and tilt the traffic to these head sellers in a more concentrated way, which will lead to a fierce "stock fight" between small and medium-sized sellers and head sellers.

The living space of those small and medium-sized sellers who do not have product advantages and financial advantages will be further compressed.

This scene has really happened on Tmall in China.

As early as March 2015, Tmall implemented a stricter business access system, changing from the original application system to a targeted invitation. The entry standards of some categories of merchants have been raised to a registered capital of 5 million yuan, and must be general taxpayer qualifications.

In this way, weaker brands and small and medium-sized sellers are shut out. Subsequently, Tmall launched the "Tmall Strategic Partner" project, focusing on inviting well-known brands to settle in.

In order to "take care" of these brands, Tmall provides a series of preferential resources and traffic support, including providing marketing resources in multiple dimensions such as daily categories, juhuasuan, one brand a day, key showcases, memberships, and large-scale events.

At the same time, Tmall Xiao'er focuses on following up these brand owners and providing them with "intimate services", and these resources and services are not available to ordinary brands and small and medium-sized businesses.

There is no doubt that the upgrade of Tmall has inevitably made small and medium-sized brands and merchants a victim.

Even because Tmall takes too much care of the feelings of brand owners, it has triggered conflicts between small and medium-sized sellers on Taobao and the Tmall brand.

According to the news of the e-commerce veteran matador in the early years, due to dissatisfaction with measures such as "Tmall absorbs the traffic of Taobao C stores" and "deletes a large number of treasures", thousands of small and medium-sized sellers in Taobao have gathered in QT voice rooms to attack large sellers, including Handu Clothing House, Uniqlo, Shangpin Home Delivery and many other well-known Tmall sellers have been attacked, hot selling goods have been maliciously photographed, and shop through car advertisements have been attacked.

As early as 2011, Taobao small sellers also launched the "October Siege".

With the rules upgraded, can AliExpress enter the high-end brand market?

Although Taobao and Tmall Mall are ostensibly separated from each other, Tmall inevitably crosses the "boundary" and moves the cheese of Taobao small sellers in order to support the Tmall brand.

In view of the setbacks suffered by AliExpress in recent years of inviting international brands to settle in, it is not excluded that it will be like Tmall, "using the cheese of small and medium-sized sellers" to provide special "nutrition delivery" and "centralized traffic redistribution" for these head brands.

At that time, the living space of small and medium-sized sellers will be more or less affected.

Of course, then again, while introducing external brands, AliExpress will also vigorously support the native brands of "AliExpress", just as Tmall has fostered and cultivated native Tmall brands such as Handu Clothing House, Royal Mud Fang, Three Squirrels, HanHou, October Mommy, Afu, and Puppy Appliances.

As Changsha seller Yingzi believes, as long as it sells well, it will be supported by the platform.

Thorn Road: Can AliExpress be a branded high-end platform?

AliExpress 'Tmall', "quality" road is full of thorns, and has gone through a long time.

Copying Tmall's successful experience, the effect in the early practice of AliExpress was not ideal:

With the rules upgraded, can AliExpress enter the high-end brand market?

At the beginning of 2020, AliExpress encouraged more European SMEs to settle on the platform through the "reduction of commissions", but encountered certain setbacks.

According to Reuters, although a large number of small and medium-sized enterprises have chosen to settle in AliExpress, some large brands have retreated.

At that time, AliExpress was in contact with well-known brands including Mango, Benetton and Cortefiel's parent company Spanish fashion group Tendam, hoping that these big brands would be able to enter the platform.

However, the outcome of the engagement was not satisfactory.

An executive at a major fashion company claimed that the fashion products sold on AliExpress included a $18 leather skirt and a $14 acrylic batwing sweater, and other categories included a $3 USB cable and a $2 crystal earring.

As a result, the executive was less receptive to the brand's presence in AliExpress, claiming that their brands needed a more "aspiring playing field." By implication, it seems that their branded products sold on the same platform as ordinary products will destroy the image and "positioning" of their brands.

An observer who has lived in Europe for many years told egainnews that not only AliExpress, but even Amazon, Europeans and Americans have never regarded them as a destination for buying branded goods. They only buy daily necessities or tools on these platforms, and do not care too much about the brand, and the channel for purchasing brand goods is generally offline brand stores or counters, and online, it is the brand's own independent website.

Even the billion-level sellers on Amazon cannot escape the fate of "making a trademark and not being able to make a real brand".

Tinuiti's survey data provides some corroboration. On Amazon, nearly seven in ten (69 percent) of search terms do not contain a specific brand name.

Nike, Louis Vuitton, IKEA and other well-known brands have been stationed in Amazon, but soon announced their withdrawal from Amazon and completely broke with it. Nike complained that traffic and orders flowed to many third-party sellers who "sold Nike goods" and that they could only get some "leftovers". The sellers who took away orders didn't even get authorization from Nike.

Similarly, AliExpress will still encounter this problem in the process of branding.

But then again, AliExpress may be more effective than Amazon in terms of Tmall and branding.

This is determined by their different platform genes.

Amazon is a decentralized platform, heavy products (listing), no heavy stores, no real "private domain concept and mechanism of the brand flagship store", will not allow the brand store to precipitate its own users, build its own private domain traffic pool, but let all merchants, whether ordinary sellers, or brand merchants, completely juxtaposed all goods together, the same stage PK, bidding, and by the shrewd algorithm robot to judge, who can better please the buyer (high conversion rate). For details, see Branded Osteochondrosis for Amazon Sellers.

Who is more popular with customers, who ranks high, who has more orders, and a brand's store will not be given preferential treatment because of its brand identity, and brand owners and ordinary sellers fight, not brands and stores, but a single, specific product link (listing).

With the rules upgraded, can AliExpress enter the high-end brand market?

(Amazon Decentralized Product Link)

This is also why brands such as Nike cannot sell small and medium-sized sellers after entering Amazon. It can be said that Amazon is inherently unfriendly to brand owners, it is only friendly to customers.

In contrast, AliExpress is a centralized platform, just like Tmall, it will give centralized support to well-known brand owners and brand stores it recognizes, including data, traffic and other aspects of intervention and support.

At the same time, AliExpress is different from Amazon, which allows the existence of real "brand stores", allows brands to precipitate their own users, build their own private domain traffic pool on the platform, and allows them to remarket to these users, including fan attention, old customer repurchase guidance, new product push and other mechanisms.

In this case, some customers who bought a year or two ago will also come back to buy.

This means that AliExpress allows sellers to build "on-site private domain traffic pools" and "brand ecosystems". A closed loop of private domain traffic is not only conducive to promoting repurchases and increasing customer stickiness, but more importantly, helping the seller's brand to truly grow.

With the rules upgraded, can AliExpress enter the high-end brand market?

(AliExpress centralized brand store)

In contrast, Amazon's amazon store is fundamentally different from AliExpress's brand store. It is essentially an advertising tool, rather than a "Flagship store" or "small ecological closed loop" that undertakes traffic to a seller's private domain.

With the rules upgraded, can AliExpress enter the high-end brand market?

In this way, AliExpress's centralized support for brand stores will be attractive to many brand owners.

As Wang Mingqiang, head of AliExpress, said, AliExpress needs time for these foreign brands to understand the platform, and at the same time, these big brands need to understand how to design stores on the platform that meet their tonality and taste.

Conclusion: Perhaps, under the impetus of Jiang Fan, the branding road of playing a series of combination punches and AliExpress can go further.

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