Alibaba eCommerce expo outlines ANZ export potential in China
Alibaba's eCommerce Expo wrapped up over the weekend in Sydney with plenty of opportunities to connect Australian and New Zealand businesses to the lucrative China market.
The expo, which ran from August 30-31, attracted more than 150 ANZ brands and more than 900 attendees, who participated in conference streams about eCommerce, tourism, retail, and cloud computing.
According to Alibaba, 2018 marked a successful year for Australian products, as they ranked third by gross merchandise volume on Alibaba's Tmall and Tmall Global marketplaces. There are more than 2000 brands listed on the platforms.
"With China's growing middle class and increasing demand for high quality Australian products, we see the number one barrier for local businesses wanting to enter the market and engage with Chinese consumers is their capability to do so," comments Alibaba ANZ managing director Maggie Zhou.
"For that reason, we are excited to bring the Alibaba eCommerce Expo to Sydney for the second year giving local businesses the tools and networks they need to succeed into the future.
Leading Australian retailers, tourism operators and payment providers, including Westfield, Tourism and Events Queensland and Tyro, will meet to discuss how they can improve their offer to the Chinese visitor market using Alipay's ecosystem.
Australian brands Nulax, Life-Space, MitoQ and Nutrition Care announced product lines to be exclusively distributed on Tmall. Available product includes NC Ulti-digest 66, a natural fermented medication designed to improve gut health from Nutrition Care, Everyday Prebiotic Fruit Block from Nulax and a Life-Space Immune Support Probiotic designed to support healthy immunity.
The event also showcased 60 products from ANZ brands, thanks to influential Chinese key opinion leader (KOL) Lia Baby.
The KOL was ranked in the top five Taobao live-streamers in 2018 with 2.2 million followers on the Alibaba Group marketplace. Lia Baby's highest number of views received for one single livestream session is 3.2 million, reaching a transaction volume of over AU$16 million.
The event also included Alibaba Cloud customers and partners who shared their success stories.
In addition, business and technology leaders from Alibaba Cloud shared the latest entry strategy to do business in China, and the most current trends in artificial intelligence and cloud computing to facilitate Australian companies' business growth overseas.
Alibaba Group says its mission is to make it easy to do business anywhere. The company aims to build the future infrastructure of commerce. It envisions that its customers will meet, work and live at Alibaba, and that it will be a company that lasts at least 102 years.
