Online marketplaces have been an absolute godsend for ex-porters in India and abroad. The new-age exporter no longer has to travel long hours in a cramped plane to meet prospective buyers and showcase his products. Nor does he have to spend precious dollars buying exhibition space in expensive trade fairs and carrying tonnes of samples and marketing collaterals, in the hope that business will materialise from the few genuinely interested buyers who turn up at the booth.
Online marketplaces have created the perfect virtual space where exporters can showcase their products and communicate with prospective buyers at a fraction of the cost that exporters would spend when the Internet had not become so all pervasive. And today there is no exporter worth his salt, and we lay a strong emphasis on the ‘no’ here, who does not have an online presence in one or more online marketplaces.
Exporters, big and small, have made a bee-line for online marketplaces, both business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-consumer (B2C). Take for instance, the big Indian brand Amul making its debut on the Amazon Global Selling Platform in November 2016. With the Global Selling programme, Amul and many other Indian exporters can now sell their products in nine countries, which include US, UK, Japan,France and Canada – it’s a total consumer base of 300 million, which includes a huge Indian diaspora that is nostalgic for all that is Indian. At present, the programme lists 25 million products from 18,000 sellers in India. These exporters include famous retail brands such as Fab India, Biba, Himalaya, Organic India and Liberty Shoes among others. And this is just the tip of the iceberg as this is just one of many B2C platforms.
The real opportunity for exporters however lie in the B2B international marketplaces. Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, as we all know, has played a pivotal role in promoting exports from Chinese SMEs, with great success. And the B2B marketplaces of today have evolved to not only listing and showcasing of products but to full-service platforms. Today, these B2B platforms provide services from credit rating and due diligence of buyers to facilitating export inspection and export credit financing to receivables recovery services, all under the same umbrella. There really is no conceivable reason why an exporter will not avail the services of an international marketplace.
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Denne historien er fra July 2017-utgaven av The Dollar Business.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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'We Are One Of India's Biggest Trade Partners'
References of a strong trade alliance between India and Netherlands can be traced back to the 17th century. Even today, the two nations boast of a robust relationship. In an interaction with The Dollar Business, H.E. Alphonsus Stoelinga, Ambassador of Netherlands to India, talks about the ways to further consolidate the strong bilateral relations and maximise opportunities for investors from both countries.
'India Is A Priority Market For Amul'
When one talks about dairy products in India, the first name that perhaps comes to mind is Amul. R. S. Sodhi, Managing Director of Gujarat Co-Operative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF which owns the brand) Ltd., spoke with The Dollar Business about the USP of the cooperative, the continued relevance of its business model and Amul’s expansion across overseas markets.
New-gen Newsmakers
The Dollar Business Celebrates the Success of Rising Stars of Indian Foreign Trade for Them the Sky Is No Limit, It’s Just a Direction!
We Will Be Exporting to 30 Markets From India by End of 2016
Daimler AG has been active in the commercial vehicle business in India since the 1950s. However, it only started manufacturing in the country in 2012 through its subsidiary Daimler India Commercial Vehicles (DICV). And since then there has been no looking back. The Dollar Business caught up with Erich Nesselhauf, MD & CEO, DICV, to know the secret to DICV's success.
Rcep Can Boost Business Across a Large Region
New Zealand and India have a lot in common – from their love for cricket to their Commonwealth heritage and much more. Despite this the bilateral trade between the two countries is yet to live up to its potential. In an exclusive interaction with The Dollar Business, Grahame Morton, High Commissioner of New Zealand to India, talks about various ways to improve social, political and trade ties between the two nations.
MEIS: When Change Is the Only Constant
The Merchandise Export from India Scheme (MEIS), which was introduced in FTP 2015-2020, has undergone several changes. Recently again, while 2,901 tarifflines were added to the MEIS schedule, reward rates across 575 tarifflines were altered. While just the word ‘added’ may sound good to some exporters, for the most, frequent changes and ambiguities in notifications are confusing many.
FTP Mid - Term Review : Will Exporters Woes Continue?
India's exporters got little from this year's Union Budget. The recently implemented Goods and Services Tax (GST) further left them confused. They now can't wait to learn what 'happy surprises' the mid-term review of the Foreign Trade Policy has in store for them. And not to say, their expectations from the mid-term review have changed in the past weeks. [It's just getting bigger!] The Dollar Business reaches out to India's EXIM community to learn what it desires from the FTP revision and how GST has impacted its wishlist.
Exporters Find It Tough To Honour High Volume Commitments
Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA), established in 1985, has been instrumental in identifying new markets and providing better support systems to exporters of agricultural and processed food products. In a tête-à-tête with The Dollar Business, Devendra Kumar Singh, Chairman of APEDA, throws light on the various initiatives that APEDA is taking up to give exports a boost.
Can India's Outsourcing Industry Survive The Trump Attack?
Uncertainty has descended upon the $150-billion Indian outsourcing industry in anticipation of the protectionist regime under President Trump. Protectionism has been a popular election rhetoric across nations, and more so in recent times. And the voting masses seem to like it. Will Trump’s campaign cry for protectionism cross the boundaries of poetic drama and come alive as laws? There is no doubt that US being the largest consumer nation in the world, governments across the globe will keep a close watch on Trump’s policies. India will be no exception. The hot-button topic for India – ‘outsourcing’, has surfaced again and the impact of Trump’s announcements, be it restrictions on H-1B visas or penal taxes on US companies for outsourcing jobs, is being felt already in India. And this, coming during times when India's outsourcing industry has been experiencing a rough patch isn't an encouraging development. How hard will an avalanche of protectionist measures from the Trump regime hit India's outsourcing industry?
Our Sourcing From India Will Double In The Next Few Years
It's a known fact that the Indian government is working hard to increase defence and aerospace procurement from indigenous sources – from the current 40% to 70%, in the next 10 years. The Dollar Business recently caught up with Pratyush Kumar, President, Boeing India, to understand how manufacturers in India can leverage growth opportunities and what makes India a preferred sourcing destination for the American aircraft-maker.
