The local e-commerce market, valued at NT$93.5 billion (US$2.9 billion) last year, should see a 10 percent growth to NT$185.5 billion this year, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (
The market will grow 37 percent to NT$254.7 billion next year, TAITRA official Liao Lung-ming (
E-business costs can be low with no space limitation, he said.
"Ninety-nine percent of products have the potential to be marketed," he said, adding that even average-sellers products have a chance to outperform hot-selling products
GROWING MARKET
Statistics show that 1.1 billion people worldwide went online last year, and there by July of this year were more than 125 million Web sites in the world, Liao said.
The potential for e-commerce is tremendous, and Taiwanese e-commerce market is estimated to reach NT$200 billion, he said.
Donald Lu (
SMEs not only need the right Internet marketing strategy, but also need to focus on long-term operation, he said.
Lu said that the content and style of Web sites are key to attracting potential shoppers. If a firm's online marketing lacks an organized approach, it was easy to fall into a trap by just trying to copy other sites, Lu said.
With the ever growing number of Web sites, "the question to ask is how to market your company and product precisely in this mass market," Lu said.
WORDS OF EXPERIENCE
TAITRA officials and a representative from Google said that businesses should take full advantage of the B2B e-commerce platforms, as these are the most cost-saving and efficient way.
Google's business operation manager Chang Ke (
The Internet penetration rate worldwide is around 16.6 percent and the penetration rates in developed countries such as the US, Japan, South Korea and Germany are over 60 percent, Liao said.
However, up-and-coming developed countries such as China only have a penetration rate of 10.2 percent, while India's penetration rate is only 2.3 percent, he said.
"These new markets are opportunities which Taiwanese SMEs can tap," Liao said.
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