Australia is a highly developed capitalist country, with agricultural products and a variety of minerals as its main exports. It has a population of about 24 million, mainly concentrated in coastal cities. Australia’s Internet penetration rate is as high as 85%. In addition, Australia is a typical immigrant country and a potential e-commerce consumer market. The following are some characteristics of the Australian consumer market.
(1) High Internet penetration rate and strong customer purchasing power
Australia has a high Internet penetration rate. Among its approximately 24 million population, there are 21 million online customers. Mobile use has become the first choice for many Australians. According to statistics from eMarketer, a world-renowned market research organization, in 2016, 73% of Australian customers connected to the Internet from their mobile phones, and more than 90% of people under the age of 49 used mobile phones to access the Internet.
Relevant data show that Australia’s economy grew by 2.4% in 2016, and the overall retail industry grew by 3%. In 2015, e-commerce operating income reached US$19 billion, up 9% year-on-year. According to the National Australia Bank’s Online Retail Index, Australians spent US$20.1 billion online between June 2015 and June 2016, an increase of US$2.4 billion and 13.6% year-on-year. The country’s purchasing potential should not be underestimated.
(2) Combining cross-border e-commerce platforms with localized e-commerce platforms
With the development of the Internet, cross-border e-commerce has also shown a rapid development trend in Australia. About 69% of online customers choose to purchase on cross-border e-commerce platforms because of the rich variety of goods and favorable prices, and the United States (40%), China (32%) and the United Kingdom (22%) are the main sources of purchases. Bronto Software conducted a survey on 800 Australian customers on their overseas shopping intentions. The results showed that cross-border goods from the United States, China and the United Kingdom are the most popular among Australian customers.
Online cross-border purchases are not unfamiliar to Australians. Their mainstream online shopping platforms are mainly local retail websites and overseas retail websites, such as eBay Australia, Amazon, Bunnings Warehouse, GumtreeAustralia, etc.
(3) Focus on product quality and brand, mainly toys and clothing
According to a report by New World Wealth, a wealth research organization, Australia was one of the top 10 countries in the world in terms of total wealth in 2016, and ranked in the top 5 in terms of per capita wealth, indicating strong purchasing power for customers. In addition, the Australian government’s global debt level is lower than that of other developed countries. Therefore, Australians are not particularly sensitive to prices, pay special attention to product quality, are willing to pay for high-quality goods and services, and pay more attention to brand and value.
In addition, from the perspective of product categories, toys and clothing are the main types of goods purchased by Australian netizens across borders. As of 2016, these two categories accounted for 10.3% and 28.5% of the total cross-border retail sales, respectively. Compared with 2015, overseas purchases of clothing categories have maintained a growth trend; while overseas purchases of toys have declined compared with the previous year, but the proportion of overseas purchases is still higher than that of domestic purchases.
In addition, Australian customers are also increasingly fond of cross-border purchases of household goods and personal care products. Compared with 2015, the growth trend of overseas purchases of household goods is very obvious, with an increase of 52.8%, ranking first among all commodity categories; followed by personal care products, with an increase of 17.4%. The market prospects of these two categories of goods are very promising.
(4) High social platform activity
Social media is increasingly relevant to the development of online shopping. People engaged in cross-border e-commerce should also strive to use social media for product marketing. In Australia, social media activity is very high. According to data from Australian marketing company Sensis, nearly 20% of customers use social platforms for shopping, and 58% of customers say that they use social tools for shopping. The social platforms they use are mainly American social media. The following is the data as of April 2017.
YouTube: 15.2 million active customers per month.
Instagram: 5 million active customers per month.
Snapchat: 4 million active customers per day.
LinkedIn: 4 million active customers per month.
WhatsApp: 3.1 million active customers per month.
Twitter: 3 million active customers per month.
When entering Australia, cross-border e-commerce companies can use the above social platforms to conduct product marketing and brand promotion, as well as provide customer service, to increase the visibility of their products in Australia and establish a good corporate image.
(5) Obvious holiday consumption
For merchants, every holiday is a good marketing opportunity, and this is also true in Australia. In 2015, sales on Christmas and Boxing Day alone exceeded US$2.5 billion in Australia. In addition to traditional Western festivals, Australia also has an e-commerce shopping festival similar to China’s “Double 11” – “Click Frenzy”, which was first launched in 2012 and generated sales of up to A$10 million on the day of the event. Click Frenzy is different from “Double 11” in that Click Frenzy is divided into several discount activity themes. The dates of discount activities for different categories of goods are different. The main themes include Click Frenzy MAYHEM, Click Frenzy TRAVEL FRENZY, Click Frenzy CLICK FRENZY JUNIOR, etc.
(6) Payment methods
In Australia, online shopping is mainly based on traditional payment methods. About 85% of Australians use credit cards and debit cards when shopping online.