Doing cross-border business, where to start

Shopify is a relatively hot independent station platform in the past few years, Shopee is a very hot Southeast Asian e-commerce platform in the past few years, many cross-border shopkeepers logically compare the two, so what is the difference between Shopify and Shopee? Here we'll chatter.

Shopify

Shopify is a one-stop SaaS approach to e-commerce services platform, can provide e-commerce store owners with the technology and templates to build websites, manage omnichannel marketing, selling, payment, logistics and other aspects of the service. It is different from cross-border platforms such as Amazon, ebay, speed, Shopify is a separate e-commerce site, with built-in paypal, credit cards and other payment methods. It is currently one of the most powerful and popular platform for building websites overseas.

Shopify's optimization points.

Brand marketing: unlike cross-border platform storefronts, Shopify offers cross-border merchants come with a wide variety of website themes, and stores can also design website themes in accordance with their brand image.

Control: On Shopify, you can design your own customer feel steps, the scope of control over the site is broader.

Disadvantages.

Cost: Shopify can cost more. It starts at $29/month for the basic version and costs $2000/month for the Shopifyplus version. Also, each time a user purchases a product on the site, you'll need to pay Shopify at least 2%.

In addition, you may also need to pay other miscellaneous fees, although most of Shopify's themes and plugins are free, but there are still most of them need to pay before you can use them.

Marketing: Shopify is different from e-commerce platforms, if you want to get more traffic, more conversions, is necessary to attract traffic to your website through SEO, GoogleAds, Facebook ads and other forms, otherwise no one will browse your store.

Shopee

Shopee is an e-commerce platform in Southeast Asia and China-Taiwan region, since its creation in Singapore in 2015, Shopee's project quickly covered more than 10 markets such as Singapore, Malaysia and the Philippines, and is the fastest growing e-commerce platform in Southeast Asia.

In 2021, Shopee's GAAP revenue was $5.1 billion, up 136.4% year-over-year; total orders were 6.1 billion, up 116.5% year-over-year; and GMV was $62.5 billion, up 76.8% year-over-year.

Advantages.

Entry 0 threshold: to move into Shopee is not to deliver any deposit, as long as there is a business license, individual or company internet payment processing business license to move in.

Traffic: according to Shopee official information, Shopee has more than 40 million visitors each month, is the largest e-commerce platform in Southeast Asia.

Disadvantages

Competition: With tens of thousands of stores in Shopee, you will encounter merchants selling the same products, they may sell better because of the price tag, which will result in low-price competition and reduce profitability.

Spend. Shopee was offering zero fees when it was first launched in Malaysia to attract more stores. But after the platform was perfected and dominated the market, the expense also gradually rose.

No way to customize: Shopee cannot develop an exclusive store theme based on your brand image, which means the platform will have many similar stores.

ShopifyVsShopee to choose which?

After mastering the pros and cons of Shopee and Shopify, I think most merchants are until how to. In fact, no matter which platform you choose, it all depends on your goals.

If you just want to open a store, to create more than one side income, do not care about brand creation; and their own investment budget is limited, and sales of the target market is in Southeast Asia, then I suggest you apply Shopee is the most appropriate.

But if you are trying to settle down and create your own brand, and also have sufficient funds, then I suggest choosing Shopify. because he is more friendly to your branding.

However, now you can sync your Shopify store to Shopee, and Shopify has developed an application called 'EasyShopee' which integrates with Shopee and allows you to sell your products through Shopee's marketplace.

The syncing process is simple, you need to install the "EasyShopee" app and set up a Shopee merchant account.

Then connect it to the application and you can sell your products as usual.