What is Alibaba?

Author: Unknown Source: Unknown Network Marketing Manual www.tomx.com joined on March 9, 2006.

The goal of Alibaba's website is to establish the largest and most active online trade market in the world, so that there is no difficult business in the world. It has a clear business model from the beginning, which is different from the early Internet companies and mainly driven by technology. The founders are all talents or enthusiasts in computer or communication technology, from entertaining themselves to creating distinctive websites to exploring possible network service modes.

The experience of Jack Ma, the founder of Alibaba, gave his website a clear positioning. He founded China Yellow Pages, the first Internet business information publishing station in China, with 1995- 1997, and joined the China International Electronic Commerce Center of the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation with1999, successfully operating Guofutong Information Technology Development Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of the center. In less than a year, we have developed a series of websites, such as the official website of MOFTEC, online China Commodity Exchange Market, online China Technology Export Fair, China Investment Promotion Association, online Canton Fair, and China Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation. 1999 set up a research and development center in Hangzhou and an Alibaba website with Hong Kong as its headquarters.

Starting from a pure business model, Alibaba is associated with a large number of venture capital and business partners, forming an online trade market. The success of its operation mode is mainly due to the following reasons:

First of all, we specialize in information flow and collect a lot of market supply and demand information. I participated in the e-commerce seminar hosted by Alibaba during the Canton Fair this year. Ma Yun expounded the following viewpoint at the meeting, that is, e-commerce in China will go through three stages: information flow, capital flow and logistics. At present, it is still in the information flow stage. Although the trading platform is not technically difficult, no one uses it, and enterprises basically have no demand for online trading, so it is of little significance to do online trading. This is the biggest feature of Alibaba, which is to do what can be done today and develop e-commerce step by step.

On the basis of fully investigating the needs of enterprises, Alibaba integrates and classifies the information collected by enterprises to form a unique column of the website, so that enterprise users can obtain effective information and services. Alibaba's main information service columns include: ① business opportunities, with more than 700 product categories in 27 industries for reference, usually providing about 500,000 pieces of supply and demand information; ② Product display: display various illustrated product information databases of Alibaba members by product category; (3) Company Treasurer: Encyclopedia of company websites, which brings together more than 40,000 company webpages. Users can search for trading partners and learn more about the company. Members can also apply for their own company to join Alibaba's "company treasury" for free, and link to the relevant categories of the company treasury, so that members have the opportunity to understand the whole company. ④ Industry information: each industry publishes the latest dynamic information, and members can also subscribe to the latest information by category and receive it directly by mail. ⑤ Price quotation: Provide the latest quotation of enterprises and dynamic information of market price by industry ⑤ Chamber of Commerce Friends: Businessmen Club. Here members exchange industry views and talk about everything. Among them, tea breaks provide new topics for members every day, and analyze how to do online marketing and other topics for members. Business services: shipping, foreign currency exchange, credit investigation, insurance, taxation, trade agency and other consulting services. These columns provide users with rich and practical information full of modern business atmosphere, which constitutes the main body of the online trading market.

Second, Alibaba adopts a localized website construction method, and adopts local languages for different countries to make it easy to read. This convenience and affinity organically integrate the markets of various countries. Alibaba has established and operated four interrelated websites: English International Website () provides professional services for businessmen all over the world; Simplified Chinese China website () mainly serves the Chinese mainland market; Global traditional Chinese websites

() Serving Chinese businessmen in Taiwan Province Province, Hongkong, Southeast Asia and other parts of the world; Korean website () provides services for Korean users. In addition, Japanese, European languages and South American websites for the local market will also be launched soon. These websites are linked with each other, and their contents blend with each other, providing members with an integrated international trading platform, which brings together business information and personalized merchant communities from all over the world 178 countries (regions).

Third, at the initial stage of the website, the entry threshold for members is lowered, and the registered users of enterprises are attracted to log on to the platform with the free membership system, thus gathering business traffic and activating the market. While browsing information, members also bring a steady stream of information and create unlimited business opportunities. By July of 20001year, the number of Alibaba members had reached 730,000, coming from 202 countries and regions, and more than 65,438+0,500 merchants registered as Alibaba members every day. Alibaba members are mostly small and medium-sized enterprises, and the free membership system is the most important factor to attract small and medium-sized enterprises. In the increasingly complex and fierce market competition, small and medium-sized enterprises certainly refuse to miss this low-cost opportunity and seize business opportunities by using the online market. Large and small enterprises are active in the online market, which in turn brings various supply and demand to Alibaba and expands the online trading platform. Alibaba has more than 45 million page views every month, and there are 500,000 business opportunities in the information inventory. More than 3,000 pieces of business information are added every day, and more than 300,000 pieces are queried every month. On average, each piece of business information will get four feedbacks.

Fourth, Alibaba provides quality market services for its members through value-added services. On the one hand, value-added service strengthens the service function of this online trading market, on the other hand, it enables the website to realize direct profit through various ways. Although Alibaba does not charge members at present, according to Ma Yun, Alibaba's website is profitable at present. Alibaba's profit columns mainly include: China suppliers, design company websites, online promotion projects, and integrity. Through Alibaba's trading information platform, China suppliers provide China businessmen with special inquiries from international buyers from various countries. Customers can entrust Alibaba with a one-time investment to build the company's website. This project is mainly aimed at Alibaba, helping enterprises to establish websites with independent domain names and link with Alibaba. Online promotion projects consist of mail advertisements, banner advertisements, text links and module advertisements. E-mail advertisements are inserted into the advertisements of merchants through the latest express mail sent to merchants every day on the website; Text Links Place advertisements in text links. The newly launched Cheng Xintong project can help users understand the credit status of potential customers and find real online trading partners. To carry out the certification of authoritative credit institutions and confirm the legality of member enterprises and the business identity of contacts; Show the company's certificates and honors, and use the praise of business partners to become the best proof of the company's strength.

Fifth, moderate but relatively successful market operations, such as Forbes Select, have enhanced Alibaba's brand value and financing ability. Alibaba formed an alliance with Softbank, a Japanese Internet investment company, and invited Masayoshi Son, CEO of Softbank and Asia's richest man, as Alibaba's chief consultant, and invited Peter, former director-general of the World Trade Organization and current chairman and president of Goldman Sachs International Group. Sutherland served as a special adviser to Alibaba. Through various successful publicity operations, Alibaba has been selected as one of the best B2B websites in the world for many times. On June 5438- 10, 2000, Alibaba was awarded the "Best Trade Network" by the first China Top 100 Brand Website of the 2nd1century.

With its feasible and convincing business model, Alibaba is in a leading position in the fast-growing e-commerce market and has successfully built a classic online trading market.

Problems, Strategic Direction and Measures of Developing China Electronic Market

The development of Alibaba's online trading market is not to copy the American business model, but to formulate its own development strategy according to the situation in Asia, especially in China. According to the current network development in China, Alibaba has concentrated on information flow to build an online trade market, which has avoided the problems that cannot be solved in the recent domestic e-commerce reality, such as capital flow and logistics. Generally speaking, e-commerce in China is still in its infancy, and there are still many problems to be solved. The development of e-commerce and online trading market cannot copy the American model. So what are the main problems in developing the electronic market in China at present? In view of the present situation in China, what strategies and measures should be taken to develop the electronic market in China?

First of all, the development of electronic market in China should be based on information intermediary, and a market platform should be established to provide rich and practical professional information. As e-commerce has just started in China, many enterprises' initial understanding of e-commerce is based on online information inquiry. Many enterprises, especially small and medium-sized enterprises, can't grasp the supply and demand information in time because of the information occlusion, so enterprises are eager to obtain practical information from the Internet. E-Marketplace should first become an information bridge between the supply and demand sides, so that product suppliers can quickly find buyers, and the demand side can choose according to their own needs, so as to win the trust of enterprises in the online trading market. At the same time, it is necessary to handle the information flow of the website in a localized way, such as using Chinese and foreign language interfaces to face the domestic and foreign markets respectively. We must continue our research, understand customer needs, update website information in time, and reflect modern business rhythm and culture.

Second, online settlement, logistics distribution and other functional modules will be included in the future expansion plan, not as the current platform tasks. At present, China's e-commerce network payment, distribution system and security certification system are still far from perfect. Network security is not guaranteed, the level of logistics modernization is low, and electronic money is not popularized. It takes time to establish and improve direct transactions on the Internet and to pay and collect fees through the connection with the financial network in the course of trade. In China, a country that needs face-to-face transactions to feel more at ease, the trust of buyers and sellers and the security of payment methods are not high. Therefore, China electronic market can't focus on online settlement and logistics distribution now. You can use online inquiry and offline transaction to avoid unnecessary trouble.

Third, we should position market opportunities in small and medium-sized enterprises. China is a fast-growing market. Small and medium-sized enterprises are large in number, widely distributed, with great potential and rapid growth, and are an important force in the whole social and economic life. The total industrial output value created by small and medium-sized enterprises in China has accounted for 60% of the total industrial output value of the whole society, and profits have also accounted for 40%. Because there is not much red tape, small and medium-sized enterprises are quick to respond, sensitive to action and easy to accept new things. 85% of online merchants in China are small and medium-sized enterprises, which is different from that in the United States, where the mature market is dominated by large enterprises. In China, if you want to make a breakthrough in the field of e-commerce, you can't completely copy the practices of Europe and the United States, but should adjust measures to local conditions according to the actual situation. Grasp the small and medium-sized enterprises, and large enterprises will naturally come. Because large enterprises rely on small and medium-sized enterprises to feed! Just as Alibaba is positioned to provide services for small companies or small wholesalers. It is this strategy that makes Alibaba rapidly develop into a big market with thousands of businessmen from more than 190 countries and regions buying and selling all kinds of goods.

Fourth, we advocate making market access rules from low to high. At present, it is still appropriate to implement free membership system to attract business users to participate in the online trading market as much as possible. For the trading platform, in order to ensure the sincerity of both parties and the growth of the platform itself, members who access the network can be charged a certain membership fee. For most enterprises, it is unacceptable to pay without actual benefits. This made the trading platform website lose a game in popularity gathering. However, the key of online trading platform is customers and popularity. At present, B2B is not popular enough in China, and small and medium-sized enterprises have not joined the ranks of B2B because of financial problems or not realizing the great potential of e-commerce. If we establish an access mechanism with complicated rules and high technical requirements, such an electronic market is nothing more than rejecting customers. For small and medium-sized enterprises to participate in e-commerce, we must gradually guide them to realize that compared with the benefits that can be brought by participating in the online trading market, the investment in e-commerce between enterprises is negligible. At present, China's electronic market should still implement the free membership system and related services to attract corporate members to join. Free membership doesn't mean no profit. By providing virtual trading places and formulating norms and mechanisms for member users, market operators gradually become the makers of industry rules, greatly enhancing the influence of the industry and making profits by providing various value-added services.

On the other hand, in the initial stage, E-marketplace encourages small and medium-sized enterprises to join for free, which embodies the principle of openness and fair competition in the online trading market. In the future, with the popularization of e-commerce technology, E-marketplace will gradually raise its own technical barriers and require enterprises entering the online trading market to obtain certain qualifications. This qualification is that an enterprise must first have a qualified electronic production management system, and this system can seamlessly connect with external information flow, so as to realize the integration and informatization of the whole process of production, procurement and sales. The setting of market access rules for online transactions must follow the law from low to high, so as not to scare away customers.

Fifth, establish various auxiliary services to realize the value-added of the website and advertising revenue. The online trading market can provide consulting services such as policies and regulations, customs declaration, commodity inspection, shipping, insurance, import and export business and foreign exchange. , enrich the market intermediary function and realize the value-added benefits of the website.

In the process of information network globalization, B2B websites in China must grasp China's unique localized competitive advantage resources, so as to make the electronic market model combining information services with local characteristics more vital and have a better chance of winning the favor of overseas capital markets.