More foreign importers seek Vietnamese goods on online trading floors

In the past, big importers always sought supplies from familiar markets such as India and China. However, they seem to have changed their mind, beginning to look for supplies in new markets, which they believe would have more reasonable costs. Vincent Wong, a senior executive of Alibaba.com, said nowadays , in the big difficulties which force businesses to cut down expenses, importers have been looking for the sources which can supply good products at reasonable prices in some new markets.

Even China and India, the two biggest suppliers in the world, are also seeking products from Vietnam. China, for example, has the percentage of searching for Vietnamese goods on Alibaba.com increasing by two percent per annum.

A recent survey by Nielsen, a market survey firm, has also shown that the buyers on online trading floors now want to make deals directly with manufacturers without intermediaries.

The executive from Alibaba.com also said that Alibaba.com recently received a lot of orders from big groups in the world on seeking Vietnamese suppliers. These include the leading retail groups in the world like Kmart, Carrefour, OfficeMax and Walmart.

"This shows that Vietnamese products have caught higher attention from big enterprises in the world,” the executive said, adding that Vietnamese businesses should take full advantage of the opportunity to expand its export markets.

Tran Dinh Toan, Deputy Director of OSB Vietnam, has also said Vietnam has listed itself among the top 10 markets in the world which have products most looked for. Therefore, it is now the right time for Vietnam to make a breakthrough in exporting goods.

According to Pho Nam Phuong, Director of the HCM City Center for Trade and Investment Promotion Center, amid the technical barriers installed by import countries and the current difficulties caused by the export market narrowing,

Vietnamese enterprises have been trying to seek solutions with e-commerce, especially B2B floors. They well understand that this would help them optimize the business effects, save time and costs, while allowing more opportunities to popularize their products in the world market.

A lot of Vietnamese enterprises have reported success when boosting sales via the channel. Nguyen Quoc Trung, Managing Director of Viet Ceramics, said since 2006, when becoming a member of the website, the company has found stable clients.

Though the export of fine arts and handicrafts has been slowing down recently due to the global economic crisis, Viet Ceramics still can receive stable orders and it does not worry about the outlets of the products.

To date, Alibaba.com has had 230,000 Vietnamese members.

A survey by Oracle conducted in late 2011 showed that nearly 85 percent of enterprises allocate budgets for the investments in the activities on online trading floors – the highest percentage among the investments in technologies in 2011.

Meanwhile, the investments in searching tools just accounted for 22 percent, and the investments in social networks 37 percent.

As such, e-commerce, especially B2B trading floors has become a trend for enterprises’ operation thanks to its great advantages in the costs and time, the business scale and the advertisement opportunities.

A recent survey by Nielsen also said 65 percent of buyers now tend to look supplies via Internet.