While it’s true that the America and Chinese eCommerce markets are bringing in billions of dollars annually, Taiwan is becoming one of the top contenders in the race toward e-commerce market penetration in Asia. According to Practical Ecommerce, 62 percent of Taiwan’s 23.5 million residents have made a purchase online; that translates to roughly 14.6 million shoppers. Even more impressively, 11 percent of all purchases in Taiwan are made through e-commerce channels.
But why has eCommerce become such a booming trade in Taiwan?
One of the chief reasons behind the success of e-commerce in Taiwan lies in the proliferation of mobile users on this island. eMarketers reports that nearly 90% of Internet users in the country have a smartphone, which means consumers have an easy way to shop for deals, showroom and make purchases on the go.
eMarketer estimated that nearly 19 million Taiwan residents will access the internet at least once per month by the end of 2015, and while all of them won’t make e-commerce purchases, many of them will take advantage of the convenience that online shopping brings to the retail experience.
Source: SP Ecommerce
In fact, SP Ecommerce data shows that Taiwanese shoppers are more likely than residents in other leading e-commerce markets to use their smartphones in the purchasing process.
According to Practical Ecommerce, loyalty programs play a significant role in e-commerce’s rise in Taiwan. Many of the local websites give shoppers rewards points when they spend a certain amount of money or make a specific number of purchases. These points add up, driving customers back to the websites over and over again.
Additionally, many of the eCommerce websites dedicated to Taiwan residents feature highly dense web pages that might overload the senses for shoppers in other countries, but serve to invigorate the Taiwanese. The concept is similar to an end cap in a supermarket that features a wide variety of products on sale. It commands attention because of the sheer volume of merchandise.
As this market continues to grow, there is a lot to learn. The annual E-Commerce Expo Asia is held in Taipei, and last year hosted over 15,000 attendees, with booths from Asia’s e-commerce giants. The focus of this year’s expo is “big data, cross-border e-commerce, FinTech and startups”, according to Thailand news source The Nation.
Source: SP Ecommerce
The most popular Taiwanese marketplaces are both local sites, like PChome and other large Asian sites like Taobao. However, over a quarter of Taiwanese e-commerce shoppers shop for products from North America, through websites like Amazon US. This is fairly surprising, as the cross-border shopping scene is usually reversed. There’s plenty of room for market penetration here, as the country turns to online platforms for its shopping needs.