At the Rakuten Play.com Expo the new Rakuten Marketplace model was unveiled. Coming to Play.com are Rakuten Marketplace storefronts and a ton of support to help Play.com merchants succeed.
Launching the Rakuten Marketplace shops will give retailers their own home on Play.com. Listings in a merchants store will be searchable on Play.com, but retailers are free to brand their store and promote it using a merchant tool box to customers on Play.com
What’s interesting with Play.com is the support they have in place, Adam Stewart, Director of Marketing emphasised today at the Rakuten Play.com Expo that they’re looking for a “merchant centric partnership” with a “win, win, win” relationship. If merchants are getting sales and consumers are getting great deals then Rakuten will also win.
Play.com won’t leave you to open an account and cross your fingers that the sales will roll in. They have a team of ECCs (Ecommerce Consultants) ready to not only to help you set your business up, but also to help you grow. They’re eager to look at your metrics and make suggestions as to how you can be more successful on Play.com.
Mikitani Hiroshi, the CEO of Rakuten, having grown Rakuten to the number one marketplace in Japan has long been eyeing up Europe for expansion. He’s been looking at building a global network for ecommerce and to that end has for many years has mandated that English is used for all internal communications.
Tradoria, an acquisition in Germany is now fully branded as Rakuten.de, and it wouldn’t surprise me to see the Play.com brand name disappear in a few years. Rakuten are serious about partnering with UK retailers to build a world class marketplace for the UK and the announcements today are just the start.
If you’re interested in getting started on the Rakuten Marketplace on Play.com then email them at [email protected]. They promise to be in touch within one working day to help you get started.
12 Responses
RT @tamebay: New Rakuten Marketplace on https://t.co/RiP6m9gX: https://t.co/jpaRTff6
I wondered when this was coming 🙂
Gosh they would be mad to move away from the play.com domain name in favour of rakuten, i mean it hardly rolls off the tongue does it?
play a more universal name? Very subjective, sure a 4 letter domain is ‘sticky’ but I think its myopic to say Rakuten wont be embraced when you consider how many brands on first glance aren’t based on a western language, eg. Toshiba, Hyundai to name just two conglomerates.
The days of England having an empire on which the sun never sets is well gone, we are fortunate that english is the language of business worldwide but we should not be complacent. Mini-rant over.
Rakuten sounds OK in Japanese with good meaning but in English it is just a name. Play is a lot easier.
Mitsubishi, Bandai, Kawasaki, Fujitsu, Hitachi, Daihatsu, Konica Minolta, Sanyo, Yamaha, Toshiba….
…anyone think that these Japanese companies will fail unless they have Anglicised names?
You can say it how it is written rak-u-ten. If you happen to talk about it to a Japanese person they might say rak-ten as they will quicken the u.
However, in the grand scheme of things, an easy name.
@Joger
Well I don’t think its such a big deal. Nothing a snazzy TV advert, featuring a Boney M Cover of ‘Rasputin’, can’t solve.
😉
If I was them, I’d be re-branding every site “play”, which is surely a far better domain than “Rakuten”
However, if they don’t want “Play.com”, I’ll have it!
And I have to say I can’t understand Craig’s comments on the British Empire. We are talking about “.com” domain names, I fail to see the connection.