B2B SME e-commerce strategy in Germany (2)
Exporting products to Germany has always been a difficult nut for many Chinese companies. It seems that as long as a product can be accepted by German buyers, it is a high recognition of the product’s quality and technology, and it is equivalent to obtaining a license to export to other countries. Compared with the past, small and medium-sized enterprises now have more information methods such as e-commerce in addition to building agent networks and participating in international exhibitions, which have won them more opportunities to contact international buyers. But how to effectively use these new technologies? How can we obtain better prices and a more favorable position for our products internationally, especially among picky German buyers?
After the Second Industrial Revolution, Germany’s fledgling industry mainly imitated British product technology and was severely suppressed by the British manufacturing industry at that time. In order to show the inferiority of its products, the Germans, under the pressure of the British, had to Their products are marked with the Made in Germany mark, and now Made in Germany has become a symbol of quality and technology, and the pride of German industry. Today, although the euro continues to appreciate against the weakness of the US dollar, this does not pose a threat to the stable and sustained growth of German machinery exports. In 2007, Germany once again retained its title of export champion with an export volume of 969.1 billion euros. Among them, 8 of the top ten export products are electronic machinery products, and the remaining two categories are chemical products, both of which belong to the B2B industry. All this is attributed to one thing: German companies’ persistent research spirit in technology and their rigorous attitude towards work. This is what China’s small and medium-sized enterprises need to learn. What is particularly emphasized in this article is the rigorous attitude of small and medium-sized enterprises in the application of e-commerce.
When a company has more opportunities to be exposed in the media, it will have higher requirements for all business links, overall image, public relations capabilities, and sales skills of the company. The emergence of e-commerce has put forward such requirements for enterprises. The power of the Internet forces companies to show themselves naked once they enter it. If a company can control this power, it will naturally get rich rewards. Similarly, if a company is eager to use modern information methods to expose itself in online media, it has not actually adjusted itself in all details to be displayed. In this state, at least the company’s e-commerce activities will not yield any returns, and at worst, the company’s reputation will be seriously damaged.
Website building strategy
To win high-quality buyers, it is not enough to rely solely on membership websites of e-commerce platforms such as Alibaba. An independent corporate website represents an independent and confident corporate image. Different from Alibaba, many industrial supplier directories in Europe and the United States are in the form of yellow pages, and the directory is directly linked to the company’s own homepage. However, most buyers in Europe are accustomed to such supplier directories and are more willing to go through The supplier’s homepage provides more extensive information about the company, so building an independent company homepage has become the first step for companies to develop e-commerce. There are ten tips for building a website for German or European customers.
Tip, choose a domain name that is easy to remember and easily identifiable. A domain name is like the name of a company on the Internet. When a company decides to build a website, it is particularly important to choose a domain name that is easy for Europeans and Americans to remember. Try to choose the company’s product logo plus the English name of the main product instead of using Chinese pinyin. Not only is this not conducive to the natural ranking of the corporate website in search engines, but besides the Chinese, no one from other countries can understand the nature of the company from the domain name. For example, for “Jiangsu Fuxing Plastic Machinery Factory”, companies usually purchase domain names like www.jsfx.com. In fact, a good domain name can be http://www.fuxin-plastic.com/ or http://www.fuxincorp.com/, so that buyers can learn from the domain name that the factory is called Fuxin and produces products related to the plastics industry.
The second step is to control the time limit for opening the home page within 10 seconds. Statistics show that if the website has not been opened within 20 seconds, the vast majority of visitors will choose to give up. A good way to solve this problem is to try to control the size of the homepage file. When a company focuses on foreign trade, it should consider locating the server overseas as much as possible.
The third step, enables the website to be opened and used normally in all commonly used browsers. When you understand the statistics of April 2008, Firefox’s average market share in the European and American markets is close to 40%, then I think no company should ignore browsing its website in Firefox when it accepts its own website. Fully tested in the device.
The fourth tip, accurate text and clear pictures. When the website is opened successfully, what visitors pay attention to is not how flashy the Flash is or how complete the company’s qualification certificates are, but whether the content and text of the website are smooth and whether its English can be understood by people from English-speaking countries. , whether its product pictures can reflect the best aspects of the product. When a company uses a website to introduce itself and its products to visitors, the text content on the website represents the overall quality of the company’s sales staff. The quality of product pictures also represents the credibility of the product’s technology and quality. The quality of website text and pictures reflects a company’s commitment toIn terms of both technical ability and respect for potential visitors, if a picture can only reflect 50% of the quality of your product, then the customer who first learns about you by visiting the website will only be willing to believe that only this 50% of your product is. As for the quality, I am only willing to pay 50% of the original price for such a product. It should also be pointed out that in the English versions of many websites, Chinese and English texts are extremely mixed, and the translations are completely disorganized, which seriously damages the status of corporate products in the minds of German and other European and American buyers.
The fifth tip, choose instant messaging software carefully. When choosing instant messaging software, you should avoid software with cartoon character avatars and signatures such as “xx Baby”. Not only German buyers, but even most European buyers will not use it. Even these graphic words will cause the other party to question the seriousness of the company’s work, and then deny the company’s products.
The sixth tip, use an encrypted online message system. First of all, the network security of online message systems must be extremely strictly controlled, especially those message systems where customer messages will be displayed directly on the website. First of all, such a message system itself is not advisable because it involves corporate secrets. At the same time, if the company lacks management of its content, it will also cause a large amount of pornographic and violent content to flood corporate customer message boards. What will happen when a visitor suddenly discovers a pornographic photo on your company’s website?
The seventh step, carefully consider the necessity of setting up a forum. Whether it is necessary to establish a forum on the corporate website depends on the audience of the company. If the audience is the company’s existing or potential customers, there is no need to set up a forum. Because a customer will never openly talk about the problem he wants the company to solve for him on the company’s website. Second, if an enterprise hopes to provide its peers with a platform for technical exchanges and therefore establishes a technical forum, it must have at least 20 valid visits per day and refuse to flood the forum, and have professional product technicians within the enterprise to maintain its content. , whose network technology is maintained by specialized computer technicians, is a necessary prerequisite for a valuable forum.
The eighth move, In addition to updating, it is still updating. The update of the website is one of the details that is easily overlooked, because it seems to have little to do with the sales of corporate products. But this is not the case. A website that is updated all the time is a living website and also represents a living enterprise. German buyers will visit the website several times before sending inquiries to new suppliers. At this time, as As a business salesperson, you must take all possible actions to attract visitors and tell them what changes the company has recently made, any product updates, and whether there are any exhibition activities. If you are willing, you will be rewarded.
The ninth tip, create a re-online inquiry form that can be sent successfully. Online inquiry can collect a lot of useful information for the company. A buyer who is truly interested in the company’s products will be willing to leave as much contact information as possible, so when designing the inquiry form, it must be left to the other party. More possibilities, and tell him which contents are required. If the other party misses or adds the wrong form, he must be reminded by the system. What should be noted here is that the English version of the system reminder text must also be in English. In addition, it is also very important to send a confirmation letter directly copied to the sender’s mailbox after the inquiry is sent. Such a small detail can have a profound impact on the German purchaser’s thoughtfulness and attentiveness to the company.
The tenth tip, Enterprise registration information may seem small, but it is very important. If you pay attention to European corporate websites, you will find a feature. Their top or bottom navigation bar usually contains tags such as imprint/impressum/Mentions légales. Click on it and you will find that all the company’s information is listed there. Office registration information, including registration place, business tax number, website copyright information, etc. Most websites will also include a privacy section to declare the confidentiality of customer information. Some people may find it strange, what does these things have to do with buyers purchasing my products? In fact, this just proves that European companies attach great importance to corporate qualifications and legal operations. It exists because it is needed. These two columns and a few small paragraphs of text are enough to replace a bunch of product quality certificates with blurry pictures.
Details are everything, This is especially true in the B2B industry. Germans have strict requirements for their own work, and will also use this requirement to evaluate the outside world they come into contact with, which naturally includes the buyers they choose. At this time, whoever can grasp the overall situation from the details will stand out.
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