1. Product provision
The AliExpress platform, launched in April 2010, is dedicated to providing a convenient and efficient online trading service platform for Chinese suppliers and international small and medium-sized buyers.
For international buyers, they can purchase a full range of products made in China at a relatively low price on the AliExpress platform, and obtain safe, fast (similar to B2C transaction methods), and high-quality trade services; for Chinese suppliers, they can sell products directly through the AliExpress platform, thereby expanding into the international market and obtaining more benefits.
2. Target customers
The AliExpress platform mainly serves two types of people: buyers and sellers, but the platform only charges fees to sellers.
(1) Buyers
Buyers on the AliExpress platform include online and offline retailers. The former refers to retailers on platforms such as eBay and Amazon; the offline ones mainly refer to small and medium-sized retailers in physical stores.
(2) Sellers
Sellers on the AliExpress platform are mainly Chinese supplier members on the Alibaba platform, including foreign trade production enterprises, foreign trade companies, and foreign trade SOHOs. At the same time, these sellers are usually sellers on various C2C platforms such as eBay. On the AliExpress platform, there are more small and medium-sized foreign trade companies and foreign trade SOHOs, while the proportion of foreign trade production enterprises with strong strength and stable marketing channels is relatively small.
(3) Buyer expansion
As an online trading platform created by Alibaba for the global market, buyers on AliExpress naturally mainly come from the Alibaba platform; at the same time, the AliExpress platform also uses search engine optimization and paid promotion, website alliances, permission email marketing and other methods to attract global buyers.
(4) Seller expansion
To become a seller member on the AliExpress platform, you must first become an Alibaba Chinese supplier member; and Alibaba’s existing Chinese supplier members can enter the AliExpress platform for free. Therefore, the Chinese supplier members on the Alibaba platform are the main source of global AliExpress sellers; at the same time, the AliExpress platform also attracts domestic sellers by going deep into the competitors, online methods, and offline expansion.