After more than ten years of development, cross-border e-commerce has gone through the exploration stage of early information release platforms, the operation stage of trading platforms, and the recent rise and rapid development stage of B2C. The cross-border e-commerce industry has shown different characteristics in each stage. In the past two years, with the increasing attention of the whole society to cross-border e-commerce and the joint promotion of the development of the industry by various participants in cross-border e-commerce, the entire cross-border e-commerce industry has begun to show some new characteristics, including the following aspects:
(1) Diversification of participants
Before 2012, the participants in cross-border e-commerce were mainly small and micro grassroots enterprises, individual merchants and online merchants. Since 2013, mainstream participants in traditional trade such as foreign trade enterprises, factories and brand merchants have begun to enter this field and gradually move towards large-scale operations.
(2) The industry chain is gradually improving
In response to the problems in marketing, customs clearance, commodity inspection, logistics, payment and other links that affect the development of cross-border e-commerce, cross-border e-commerce companies and service companies continue to extend to other links in the industry chain, integrating resources from multiple parties to provide integrated services. New service providers are also constantly emerging, and the service chain of the entire industry is becoming clearer and more complete.
(3) Branded operation mode
In the early days, cross-border e-commerce took advantage of China’s advantages as a manufacturing power and mainly sold high-quality and low-priced products and OEM. In the past two years, a large number of companies have begun to consider taking the path of branded operation, especially some larger companies have begun to consider scale, establish their own platforms, introduce brands to overseas markets, and enhance their value in cross-border e-commerce through brands.