With an average daily order of more than 200,000, this blue ocean platform has attracted more than 7,000 Chinese sellers

Chris Anderson, former editor-in-chief of Wired magazine, in his best-selling book "The Long Tail Theory", discusses the methodology for tapping the growth potential of blue ocean markets in the era of digital economy: "The digital economy can bring a large number of niche markets, and these markets can accumulate an incremental scale comparable to the mainstream market."

In the foreign trade and cross-border e-commerce industry, many countries along the "Belt and Road" are unleashing strong growth potential. According to data from the General Administration of Customs, China's imports and exports to Belt and Road countries will reach 19.47 trillion yuan in 2023. Among them, the export volume reached 10.73 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 6.9%, a record high.

In 2024, cross-border sellers will be more active in the layout of new markets and channels. According to Hugo Cross-border's "2024 Cross-border E-commerce Industry First Quarter Report", 14% of the surveyed mature sellers said that they have explored emerging markets through the blue ocean cross-border e-commerce platform.

Recently, the Joom platform has attracted the attention of many sellers. As a cross-border e-commerce platform established in 2016, Joom has covered many countries along the "Belt and Road". What growth potential will this blue ocean platform bring to sellers?

01 The average daily orders of the platform exceeded 200,000, and the growth potential energy was accelerated

On April 18, the "2024 Seller Launch Conference" of the Joom platform landed in Shenzhen, once again releasing a new platform strategy and growth signal.

After a strategic adjustment in 2023, the Joom platform is ushering in a new round of accelerated growth. According to Ilya Shirokov, Founder and CEO of Joom Group, "2023 is a crucial year, with a series of strategic decisions that have laid a solid foundation for growth in the coming years. ”

On the one hand, the growth expectation of the Joom platform comes from the explosion of consumer demand in key markets. According to Joom data, the platform currently covers 118 countries and markets around the world, including Europe, Canada, and some Middle East and African countries, and focuses on Central Europe, Eastern Europe, and CIS countries, such as Poland, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Kazakhstan, etc. Among them, the scale of e-commerce in some key countries covered by the Joom platform has grown rapidly. According to data from the research institute ecommerceDB, the size of the European e-commerce market will exceed $800 billion in 2023 and is expected to reach $1.1 trillion in 2026.

On the other hand, Joom continued to improve its shopping experience, maintaining a good user reputation and market share advantage in key markets, and the number of orders continued to grow. Taking Joom's second largest site, Moldovado, as an example, 60% of local users have used Joom to shop for products overseas.

Improving the payment experience is the epitome of platform innovation, and in 2023, Joom tried to introduce the "buy now, pay later" feature, which led to an increase in the average number of items spent on the platform from 2.5 to more than 4.

According to Felix Kagan, CEO of Joom's e-commerce platform, the previous innovation has been quite effective. Up to now, the average daily number of orders on the Joom platform has exceeded 200,000, and it has attracted more than 7,000 Chinese sellers to settle in, and the performance of high-quality sellers in vertical categories has grown rapidly.

02 Increase investment in Chinese market services and build a seller-friendly platform

As a long-established legend who has been in Joom for many years, the Joom operation team of Bluelans still remembers the days when they grew together with the platform. In a seller interview column on Joom, Yang Fan, general manager of Lens Network, recalled that in the early days, in order to handle the incremental orders brought by the Joom platform, the company had purchased a set of automated logistics sorters.

"At that time, it had been less than half a year since it was settled, and there were already thousands of orders per day. In Yang Fan's view, as a seller, the biggest perception of the Joom platform is the high production ratio, "The operation will not be very involuted, and the daily operation does not need to invest too much energy." ”

Logistics infrastructure is a long-term focus of the Joom platform, which can not only improve the shopping experience of consumers, but also effectively improve the operational efficiency of sellers.

Speeding up the delivery time of parcels will be an important goal for Joom in 2024 - the whole delivery time is 7-14 days. According to Felix Kagan's plan, the first-mile transit time for Chinese goods will be shortened to 4 days, and the international logistics and last-mile delivery time will be controlled within 10 days.

In order to achieve this goal, the pre-distribution warehouse (FBJ) set up by the Joom platform in Dongguan will be opened this year, and a special area will be built in the warehouse to improve the efficiency of distribution. It is understood that 360,000 goods will be transferred here this year, and most of the products will be exempt from storage fees. With the continuous improvement of the pre-distribution warehouse, more commodities will accelerate to overseas markets through the platform's logistics services.

Not only that, Joom will continue to increase its investment in the Chinese market and provide a more friendly environment for sellers to go overseas. According to Felix Kagan, the platform has opened a new office in Shenzhen in 2024 and will continue to expand its team serving Chinese sellers. At the same time, through a series of new platform strategies such as Joom select channels and official discount special events, it will bring more sustainable and healthy growth to sellers' overseas business.

03 The four vertical business lines are in strong demand, and refined operation is the key to growth

At Joom's "2024 Seller Kickoff Conference", official category experts and top sellers gave an in-depth analysis of the current consumption insights of Joom's key markets and the growth opportunities of various categories.

As the largest category on the Joom platform, the fashion category accounts for 42% of sales, covering multiple sub-categories such as clothing, shoes, bags, and accessories.

Two Sheep Network Technology (TOSP) has been on the Joom platform for less than a year, and has quickly grown into the second largest seller in the Joom clothing category with its unique selection and operation. Ge Jinpeng, director of operations of Two Sheep Network Technology, said that the key to mining popular models is to pay attention to product selection and market feedback, and at the same time flexibly use various marketing tools of the platform.

At present, the demand growth is particularly evident in market segments such as plus-size clothing and children's fashion on the Joom platform. According to the data of Joom's fashion category, young fast fashion style products are an important selection opportunity in 2024.

The electronics and home appliances category is in strong demand in the European market, especially in key markets such as the European Union, with Flipper Zero, electric scooters, portable projectors, smart sweepers and other products ranking among the top 10 best-selling products. Ye Qingfeng, key account manager of Joom, suggested that electronic sellers should optimize the description of product selling points and detail maps, and carry out on-site and off-site marketing and promotion in line with the promotion rhythm of the platform, so that these details of refined operation will effectively improve product exposure and sales.

Frank, head of cross-border e-commerce at Baseus, a major consumer electronics seller, said that Joom has obvious advantages in specific markets and is very friendly to brand sellers. "This year, we will continue to improve the category layout on the Joom platform. At the same time, we keep up with the rhythm of platform marketing and flexibly use operational tools such as Joom Selection, Joom VBJ, and off-site drainage.

The beauty and health category has grown rapidly, including beauty, health, hobbies, sports, toys and other sub-categories. Joom data shows that this category has maintained growth in the past three quarters, of which secondary categories such as skin care, hair care and styling, and oral care have achieved a quarter-on-quarter growth of 13%-25%. According to the analysis of Zhu Xiaotong, key account manager of Joom, the consumption potential of sub-products such as men's grooming, clean beauty and sustainable skin care will be further released.

After 8 years on the Joom platform, Bluelans has laid out a number of advantageous categories on Joom. Yao Haoming, head of operations at Lens Network, took the beauty and health category as an example to share the growth methodology for breaking through bottlenecks - formulating more targeted marketing strategies and tilting more operational energy towards top stores.

The large home furnishing category covers furniture and kitchen supplies, auto and motorcycle parts, pet supplies, gardening and other subdivided categories, among which dog supplies, landscape decoration, festival supplies and other single items continue to sell well. According to Yin Xiaoqing, the head of key accounts of the Joom team, in 2024, the platform will continue to expand the supply of bedding, pet supplies, lamps, accessories for European and American models/Chinese hot-selling models, industrial categories and novelty and trendy products around the large home category.

As a veteran seller who settled in Joom in the early days, TOMTOP has become one of the largest sellers on the platform from the pan-category to the large home furnishing category. Francis, head of the Joom platform of Tongtuo Technology, believes that the "distribution dividend" of the cross-border industry is gradually decreasing, and the refined operation of the home furnishing category needs to start from the optimization of supply chain prices, consumer shopping experience and product cost performance, and deepen the precipitation of vertical categories.

04 Conclusion

In 2023, Joom Group will move its headquarters to Lisbon, the capital of Portugal. Historically, the city served as a port hub on the "Maritime Silk Road", deeply connecting trade between Asia and Europe.

This year, a number of innovative initiatives on the Joom platform have paid off. Felix Kagan summed up the platform's current achievements in three key words: "Concentrate traffic on more trustworthy sellers, order growth, and new and efficient warehouses." But he believes that this is not enough.

Looking forward to 2024, Joom will continue to improve the logistics infrastructure ecosystem and seller services, and lead more sellers to tap the growth potential of the blue ocean market.