In a blink of an eye, 2024 is almost halfway over. Looking back at the revenue situation in the first five months of this year, in the context of stable but still weak global economic growth, the overall growth momentum of the cross-border e-commerce industry has recovered, but its performance is still lower than the growth targets expected by many sellers. Survey data shows that in the first five months of this year, more than half of the 682 sellers surveyed had revenue and profits that were within expectations. At the same time, more than 60% of sellers saw a decline in revenue, and only 19% of sellers saw revenue growth of more than 30% year-on-year. Now that June is coming to an end, many cross-border sellers are still at a loss as to what to do with the fluctuating platform traffic. For Amazon sellers, June is undoubtedly a critical month as the prelude to the mid-year sales peak. However, judging from recent industry feedback, "roller coaster" sales seem to have become the main theme of this month . It was observed that in early June , in order to warm up for the upcoming Prime Day, the platform began to attract Prime member consumers through limited-time discounts. With the increase in traffic, many sellers said that the order volume has picked up and is no longer as low as last month. But this recovery in order volume did not last long. By mid- to-late June, a large number of sellers reported that Amazon's sales had fallen sharply: "This month, the order volume is dismal, and the sales are like a roller coaster, but the advertisement is steadily 'exploding'." "The sales of one of my products have been halved, and I still have thousands of stocks left. I don't know what to do." "This week's traffic is obviously not as good as last week..." One of the sellers even mentioned that the product ranking has basically not changed, but orders have plummeted by 30% in mid-June. ▲ The picture comes from the seller’s disclosure Sales curves posted by multiple sellers show that in June, which was full of uncertainty, Amazon sellers' sales were like a "roller coaster", fluctuating up and down. Especially after the 17th, many sellers found that Amazon's traffic had plummeted. In this regard, based on the feedback from sellers, the following reasons may have led to the decline in Amazon's order volume during this period: 1. The purchasing power of holiday consumers is low On the one hand, as in previous years, the purchasing power of Father's Day this year is still lower than that of Mother's Day . According to Momentum Commerce data, from 2022 to 2024, the average price of products in keywords related to Father's Day will be 74% lower than that of Mother's Day, at $22.87, while the average price of products related to Mother's Day will be $39.73. ▲ Image from Momentum Commerce On the other hand, the European Cup will officially start in Germany on June 15, 2024. Many sellers believe that during the competition, this large-scale event will attract some consumers to watch the game and have no intention of shopping. 2. Internal factors of Amazon platform On the one hand, since June, due to technical upgrades, Amazon's system has frequently made mistakes , which not only caused the "0 yuan purchase" phenomenon to appear unexpectedly in Amazon Turkey, the United Kingdom, Italy and other European sites, but also caused a large number of sellers to report coupon errors, resulting in a sharp drop in traffic; On the other hand, as Prime Day is approaching, Amazon's "must scan the account every time there is a big sale" routine is playing out again. Many sellers have recently received second-instance emails, and some sellers even have to undergo an abnormal second-instance review after filing a complaint. So far, there is still no appropriate solution to deal with it. 3. The silent period before the big sale Amazon has officially announced that it will hold the 2024 Prime Day event in July. Now as July approaches, overseas consumers have entered a "silent period" of consumption, that is, consumers are more inclined to temporarily stop shopping and wait for the big promotion to come to buy the desired products at a more favorable price. In addition, June is the mid-year promotion window period. According to industry sources, many e-commerce platforms have held promotional activities during this period and delivered impressive results, taking away some of the traffic from the Amazon platform. According to the activity schedule of major e-commerce platforms, the mid-year promotion of 2024 has gradually kicked off at the beginning of June. Although Amazon's position as the e-commerce overlord is still difficult to shake, the promotions held by multiple platforms have attracted a large number of consumers to shop. According to feedback from sellers and battle reports released by major e-commerce platforms, similar to last year's Black Friday, among the platforms rushing to launch mid-year sales, the most watched are still Chinese cross-border e-commerce platforms such as TikTok Shop and AliExpress. TikTok Shop sets new record in US summer sale It is learned that according to the latest US summer promotion report released by TikTok Shop, TikTok Shop US site broke three records during this period: single-day GMV, platform short video single-day GMV, and platform single-day live broadcast GMV. The overall GMV increased by 129%, and the peak exceeded last year's Black Friday . Among them, from June 4 to 8, the merchant order volume increased by 134% , and the number of active products also increased by 114%. In addition, TikTok Shop beauty brand anchor Stormi Steele also achieved sales of over 1 million US dollars, setting a new record for a single live broadcast on the platform in the United States. ▲ The picture comes from TikTok Shop AliExpress' overseas "618" promotion has a huge sales volume It is learned that AliExpress held two S-level promotions in June, namely the "Summer Carnival" and the overseas "618 Promotion". Among them, the warm-up period of the overseas "618 Promotion" was from June 14 to 17, and the official sales period was from June 17 to 23. After AliExpress won the title of the official partner of this year's "Euro Cup", many sellers on the platform have successfully achieved an increase in orders during the overseas "618 promotion" and have posted their impressive results on social platforms. According to one seller, the overall order volume in June increased by 20% to 30% compared to May. ▲ The picture comes from the seller’s disclosure In addition, e-commerce platforms such as Walmart, eBay and Shopee also held big promotions in June in an effort to attract the attention and purchasing power of global consumers before the mid-year sales peak. From this point of view, many sellers attributed the decline in Amazon's sales in June to other platforms snatching away traffic, and there are actually clues to this. However, as the saying goes: no result can be caused by a single isolated reason. Some sellers also believe that the increasingly fierce market competition is inevitable, but there are still sellers who make a lot of money during this period, which also shows that if you want to achieve order growth, you can't just rely on platform traffic. The key is that sellers need to improve their capabilities and adjust their strategies. In the coming July, e-commerce platforms such as Temu and TikTokShop have also launched a variety of promotional activities, such as TikTok Shop's mid-year promotion (July 1-July 11), Temu's "Three Promotions Carnival" (June 13-July 14) , etc. For sellers preparing for Amazon Prime Day, the mid-year peak season in July may be like last year's "many heroes divided" Black Friday, and the competition will be fierce and intensified. Have you prepared for the peak season in the second half of the year? Welcome to discuss in the comments section~
|
