Japan is the world’s fourth largest e-commerce market after China and United States. However, Japan has an unusually low cross-border purchase rate and an insular approach to online shopping. Thus, Japan is often overbooked by foreign online merchants. Thus, there is a big choice and rivalry in cross border e-commerce.
According to the statistics, only a fewer portion of Japanese people buy good on foreign websites. But, those people counts for 12.6 million people. So, there are a lot of consumer market in Japanese e-commerce market. And there are many possibilities that cross border e-commerce is going to be popular in the very near future.
These days are when people are afraid of too much contact with people because of the novel corona virus. Thus, e-commerce is very effective during these days. People are using much more time on the internet more than ever before. Researchers say that the Japanese e-commerce may be more than 100 billion USD. Moreover, the Japanese consumers would like to spend more on cross border e-commerce companies.
Japan is home to a rapidly aging population. But Japan is one of the countries where people with a high IQ live. So, the old people are smart and able to use internet like the youths. So, there are a lot of e-commerce consumptions in Japanese Market. Moreover, Japan is the world’s third largest economy after United States and China. Its GDP per capita is just under 40,000 USD according to GDP per capita. And that is four times the global average. The average Japanese consumer spends 1666 USD a year with e-commerce merchants. And the Japanese e-commerce market, already worth over 160 billion USD is growing by an impressive 9 percent a year according to internal PPRO research.
Thus, there are many Japanese cross border e-commerce companies. But, the three marketplace platforms, Rakuten, Amazon, and Yahoo Shopping accounts for one-third of online transactions in Japan. Among them, these are the most popular e-commerce companies.
Rakuten
Rakuten is a Japanese electronic commerce and online retailing company based in Tokyo founded in 1997 by Japanese businessman Hiroshi Mikitani. Its B2B2C e-commerce platform Rakuen Ichiba is the largest e-commerce site in Japan and among the world’s largest by sales. The company operates Japan’s biggest internet bank and number one credit company by transaction value. It also offers e-commerce, fintech, digital content and communications services to over one billion members around the world, and operates in 29 countries and regions. It is often referred to as “the Amazon of Japan”.
Rakuten is the largest marketplace in revenue. It is strongest in fashion and food. It has more than one billion members around the world. American brands that sell on Rakuten’s platform have their own storefront and product listings. They can also advertise via sponsored product listings and leverage other advertising features on Rakuten, such as coupons, newsletter ads, and banner ads. Rakuten has its own fulfillment service called Rakuten Super Logistics.
With Rakuten, you can still use coupons, promo codes, and discounts. They even find and apply available discounts to your offer. Rakuten has a Double Cash Back section with awesome deals. Companies are giving members bonus rewards. Rakuten Hot Deals provides you a list of stores offering the best deals. Rakuten has partnered with companies like Expedia and Travelocity for travel and vacation discounts.
Rakuten operates a digital marketplace platform where brands can sell their products directly in a wide range of categories, from electronics to clothes and accessories, from home equipment to cosmetics and many more. Capitalizing on its success, Rakuten has expanded to offer other digital services, including online payments, digital content, online marketing, and communications services. It has also expanded globally by acquiring e-commerce platforms in more than 29 nations and investing in various tech platforms.
Amazon
Amazon is an American multinational technology company based in Seattle that focuses on e-commerce, cloud computing, digital streaming and artificial intelligence. It is considered one of the Big Four technology companies, along with Google, Apple, and Microsoft. It has been referred to as “one of the most influential economic and cultural forces in the world”, as well as the world’s most valuable brand.
Amazon has many divided companies according to its region. Amazon Japan is also a branch company of amazon for cross border e-commerce consumers. And Amazon Japan design is the same as Amazon.com. Except that, at first, everything should be written in Japanese. But thankfully, you can switch the language to English or Chinese by clicking on the globe icon on the main menu. This will auto-translate the website in your selected language.
Amazon Japan ranks first in site visits and sales among cross border e-commerce companies. It provides a relatives easy way for foreign merchants with an Amazon’s seller’s account to market products directly to Japanese consumers. Amazon requires that all sellers provide customer support in Japanese. Amazon handles fulfillment from Japan, but companies must have a Japanese company as an importer of record to deal with customers.
Yahoo Japan Shopping
Yahoo Japan Shopping is a branch of Yahoo Japan Corporation. It is a Japanese internet company originally formed as a joint venture between the American internet company Yahoo and the Japanese company SoftBank. It is headquartered at Kioi Tower in the Tokyo Garden Terrace Kioicho complex in Kioicho, Chiyoda Tokyo. Yahoo Japan’s web portal is the most visited website in Japan and its internet services are mostly dominant in the country.
Yahoo Japan’s services include Yahoo Japan Mail, Yahoo Japan Auctions, Yahoo Shopping, Yahoo Travel, and Yahoo Roko. So, the Yahoo Japan Shopping is the ecommerce arm of the diversified web portal of Yahoo Japan. Yahoo Japan is owned by Softbank and Alibaba and therefore it is separates from its American parent. Yahoo Japan Shopping provides a wide range of products, including cosmetics, electronics, apparel and footwear, home equipment and furniture.
Zozotown
Zozotown is an offshoot of a mail-order company, Start Today. It is the largest specialized fashion and footwear ecommerce platform and it offers products from many local and international brand. Yahoo Japan acquired a majority stake in Zozotown in 2019.
In Zozotown, you can get 5 percent reduction on all Zozotown products. At Zozotown website, you can buy the products by searching by brand, searching from shop, searching by ranking, searching by coordination, searching from old clothes, or searching from discerning conditions. It also divides into many categories such as tops, jacket, pants, all-in-one, skirt, one piece, suit, accessories, etc.
You can also purchase the latest trend items such as toys, pants and dresses online. Zozo is a fashion mail order site that officially handles popular 8051 brand items. Like the popular cross border e-commerce companies such as Amazon Japan, Rakuten, Zozotown is also available on both IOS and Android.
Rakuma
Rakuma is an e-commerce flea marketplace, primarily operating through mobile commerce. Specialized in second-hand goods, Rakuma enables individuals to buy and sell their own items, clothes, electronics, toys, home equipment, and decoration. Rakuma also allows farmers and food producers to sell their products directly on the application. It is owned by Rakuten, which launched Rakuma in 2014 and merged it with its former competitor Fril, following the acquisition in 2018 of its mother company, Fablic.
So, Rakuma is formerly known as Fril is a Japanese C2C marketplace owned by Rakuten that is primarily accessed through a mobile application. Similar to its competitors, Mercari and Otamart, Rakuma is another marketplace that was quick to jump on the mobile shopping trend and now boasts over 10 million downloads.
Rakuma is a dynamic marketplace featuring a wide selection of second-hand merchandise sold by thousands of individuals. It is important to note that most sellers, on the Rakuma app, are not willing to ship their products abroad. Additionally, you should know that if you are outside of Japan, you likely would not be able to download or register the application at all. So, you would have to use a proxy buying service like White Rabbit Express, if you are buying from abroad.
White Rabbit Express is your ticket to affordable consumer to consumer deals. Instead of missing out on one of a kind Japanese products, we make it easy to place international orders through our simple, four-step, process. So, Rakuma and White Rabbit Express becomes a choice of Japanese e-commerce companies.
Mercari
Mercari is a marketplace application launched in 2013 allowing people to buy and sell their own products, as well as famous brand from fashion to toys, sporting goods to electronics, directly from their smartphone. The application notably owns its success to specific features including a live streaming e-commerce channel and the Mercari Now service, that allows users to receive cast instantly for their items. Thanks to its success in Japan, Mercari expanded to the United States in 2014 and the United Kingdom in 2016. Mercari has an estimated monthly traffic of 70.3 million visitors.
Mercari was founded in February 2013 and currently operating in Japan and the United States. Their main product, the Mercari marketplace application was first launched in Japan in July, 2013, and has since grown to become Japan’ largest community-powered marketplace with over 10 billion JPY in transactions carried out on the platform each month. Among these Japanese users utilizing one of the country’s many community marketplace applications, 94 percent were found to be using Mercari. Features such as Mercari Channel (live streaming e-cinnerce ) and the Mercari Now service, which allows users to instantly receive cash for their items, have contributed to the application’s widespread success. The Mercari application has been downloaded over 100 million times worldwide and the company is the first cross border e-commerce Company to reach unicorn status.
DMM.com
DMM.com is a Japan based electronic commerce and Internet Company with a diversified group of businesses that includes online shopping and video on demand service. The company manages DMM.com, an online entertainment site that allows users to purchase goods and services like e-books, games, mainstream DVD releases, and 3D printing. Its subsidiary DMM.com Securities is the world’s second largest forex company in terms of trading volume.
DMM.com’s core business areas include online shoping, rental service and video on demand service. It was founded in 1999. It is an e-commerce platform and internet company as mentioned above. It provides a range of products including digital content, such as e-books, games, mainstream DVD releases.
Wowma
Wowma is a popular online marketplace. With a constant turnover and a catalog of more than 20 million products, Wowma provides a wide choice from a range of categories including, cosmetics, home equipment, and decoration, clothing, electronics, as well as restaurant and personal care services. Founded by the mobile phone company KDDI, Wowma benefits from its mother company’s large share of mobile users in Japan. Wowma has 20.4 million visits.
Qoo10 Japan
Qoo10 is an online marketplace with a large portfolio of products in fashion, beauty, sports, digital, mobile, home living, life, food, baby, entertainment, books, and e-tickets. Operated bya joint venture with eBay, one of the leaders of e-commerce in the United States and the world, after acquisition of the South Korea site Gmarket, Qoo10 is present in other Asian markets, especially in Korea and Singapore, and aims at expanding to other Asian countries.
Lohaco
Lohaco, whose name derives from the phrase “Lots of Happy Communities”, is the product of a collaboration between Yahoo and office supply against Askul. Despite only having come onto the eCommerce scene in 2012, Lohaco has been quick to catch up to its competitors. In its second year of operation, it achieved more than 120 percent of its sales targets, with revenues of more than 100 million yen. Lohaco is focused on providing daily goods and office supplies, and currently offers more than 180,000 products to a growing consumer base.