One of the big talking points of ecommerce 2014 is overseas trading and getting whatever action it is you want from selling to customers elsewhere on the planet. It’s a massive opportunity and also potentially mired with pitfalls.
And one article caught my eye on Channel Advisor, not least because it punted out an idea which I haven’t seen promoted elsewhere. What about selling in and to New Zealand?
And I was reminded that NZ is an interesting ecommerce anomaly in that it’s one of few places where eBay tried to compete at the beginning of the 21st Century but ended up getting beaten squarely by local start-up TradeMe.
Anyway, it’s good to see that TradeMe is still fighting the good fight down in NZ and in the CA article, the Kiwi opportunity for ecommerce sellers is explored. Well worth a quick read with a morning coffee.
22 Responses
The CA integration is pretty seamless – another place to push the same inventory which we’re already stocking.
there are more people in Scotland than NZ
cant see this making anyone rich, other than tamebay for the plug
There may be (less than 1 million) more peeps in Scotland but then they may have more of a choice of sellers to choose from than NZ
😉
I am confused. Surely its not New Zealand instead of Scotland but New Zealand as well as Scotland. I must admit that I am happy to sell to anybody, anywhere. Its just that I do not get enough orders from anywhere.
Many items are either unavailable or very expensive in NZ so even with shipping they are happy to order. We ofton sell to NZ but they frequently have some issue using eBay checkout – postage does not show so order won’t send. As a result most NZ orders are placed direct with us. I would estimate that our sales to NZ and Scotland are about the same but Australia is amuch bigger (huge) market for us.
We have great sales to New Zealand. As has been pointed out above, the buyers selection is more limited and, like Australia, they are used to buying from overseas (and therefore paying higher delivery costs and waiting longer).
my point is that for a business in the UK a special focus on the Northern isles Outer Hebrides or the Shetlands would be just as effective as NZ
Selling to NZ on TradeMe.co.nz (providing you can set it up easily) is a great supplemental income.
Most people in NZ don’t like or want to use eBay, let alone an eBay site which is in a different currency (ebay.com.au). Almost 3/4 of the NZ population are actively using TradeMe.
TradeMe teamed with ChannelAdvisor to get more selection on their site. Because there isn’t much selection on there, its way easier to get your stuff seen that it is on eBay – and visibility is the biggest hurdle most sellers have to overcome.
People in NZ are very happy to wait for items to arrive, they’re used to waiting.
I wonder if UK sellers will now become as popular In NZ as Chinese sellers are here LOL