With the popularity of cross-border e-commerce, the Middle East e-commerce market has attracted much attention from sellers. As a veteran e-commerce giant in the Middle East, Souq platform has become one of the focuses of sellers. This article will comprehensively introduce the Souq platform, hoping to provide some reference and help for sellers.
Overview of Souq
Souq was founded in 2005, and its official website is www.Souq.com. At present, Souq has established 4 sites in the Middle East, including the Dubai site headquartered in Dubai, as well as Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Kuwait. Considering the political and financial sensitivity of the Middle East, Souq chose to operate each site separately, and currently cannot realize the function of one site in multiple countries.
Foundation of Souq
Souq was founded in 2006 by Ronaldo Mouchawar, a local entrepreneur in the Middle East. At that time, Amazon and eBay had limited market share in the Middle East, and Souq seized this business opportunity. In addition, due to some challenges in doing business in the Middle East, Souq chose to set up its headquarters in Dubai, which has a good business atmosphere.
Souq was initially launched as an auction website, and its framework, content and services were in line with the habits of Middle Eastern users. The website interface was relatively simple in color, the content was relatively rigid, and the operation was relatively simple. In the early days of Souq, the Internet penetration rate in the Middle East was only 20%, but in the following years, as more and more people began to use mobile phones and access the Internet, Souq’s business took off rapidly.
Souq’s Growth
In March 2014, South African media giant Naspers (a multinational media group and the largest shareholder of Tencent) invested $75 million to support Souq. In the same year, Souq also founded the promotional festival “White Friday”.
In addition, Souq has attracted a number of other strategic investments, including Tiger Global, Standard Chartered Private Equity, IFC (a subsidiary of the World Bank) and Baillie Gifford (the second largest shareholder of Baidu).
In February 2016, Souq received a $275 million investment from New York-based Tiger Global Management and South Africa’s Naspers to strengthen technology development and expand product lines.
The Rise of Souq
Souq’s real rise occurred on March 17, 2017, when Amazon officially acquired Souq. After Amazon took over, the Souq brand remained independent, and sellers did not have to worry about regional restrictions like the Amazon platform when using the Souq platform. At the end of 2017, Amazon opened an Amazon direct store on Souq and placed the logo of Amazon’s subsidiary in the Souq logo position.
In addition, Souq’s buyer side also integrated Facebook and Amazon membership data, thereby achieving a significant increase in platform traffic. At present, the monthly fixed visits to the Souq platform have exceeded 45 million, and the annual user visits are increasing at a rate of 30%. It is expected that the visits will reach 130 million in the next three years.
In September 2017, Amazon and Souq also acquired the logistics service platform Wing.ae to maintain their logistics advantages in traditional areas in the Middle East. Wing.ae’s fast delivery service also helps Amazon expand its Prime membership service to the Middle East.
In recent years, Souq has developed rapidly, established its own logistics system QExpress and payment system PayFort, and assumed the “last mile” delivery service. With the support of the Belt and Road national policy, it has become easier to achieve logistics trade. In addition, Souq has also launched its own brand of tablets and plans to launch more electronic products under its own brand. In order to shape its own e-commerce culture, Souq launched the Middle East version of the White Friday promotion, which achieved good results.
Like most online retail platforms, the Souq platform is also open to third-party sellers. Sellers can enter the Souq platform and sell a variety of goods in it, covering more than 31 categories such as electronics, clothing, household goods, watches and perfumes, totaling more than 8.4 million products.
In summary, there are many advantages for sellers to enter the Souq platform. Sellers do not need to spend a lot of time taking a lot of product photos or providing customer service. Compared with domestic e-commerce platforms, sellers can save a lot of tedious operations on Souq. In addition, sellers do not need to invest money to obtain the traffic provided by the platform. They only need to continuously launch new SKUs to obtain continuous income. This is very beneficial for sellers and can maximize their benefits. It is hoped that sellers can achieve high sales through sales on the Souq platform.