Gmarket (Qoo10) enters Malaysia

Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Gmarket, the Korea #1 e-commerce marketplace has step foot Malaysia. 

Actually, they were here since early April 2011. (follow ck's tweet), but not only until recently they were getting charged up. Start by sending out frequent newsletter promoting merchandises by their sellers, recruiting new staffs (acquire more sellers) and had just undergone a major rebranding exercise - to Qoo10.com.my!

 

Ok, so what the heck is Qoo10 (pronounced as QTen) ? Doesn't Gmarket sound better?

According to what i understand so far... this is what it supposed to mean
Q = Quest aka Search
oo = Eyes (yes... don't ask me why, it means your eyeballs)
10 = SKY ( as in chinese - 天 !? Yes, 天 is pronounced as "TIEN"）

In short, it says "Everything you look for under the SKY - is available at Qoo10"

Sounds good? or WTF?

IMHO, not too bad, my only complaint is, I have a hard time distinguish "O" and zero (0), and i think most people can't pronounce it correctly too.

Similar rebranding exercise will span across Gmarket Singapore, Gmarket Indonesia and Gmarket Japan. The Global Hub will be Qoo10.com. One intersting note: we actually discovered that Qoo10.cn (Gmarket China) online just weeks ago, but now they have taken it offline again.

Gmarket claims they are the most buyer-centric site you can ever find. Well, how so? First of all, selling at Gmarket is totally FREE (Zero Upfront Fee, no subscription, no listing fee), Secondly, all payment are made directly to Gmarket first (yes, they keep the money first), You will only be entitled for the payment after the buyers confirmed the delivery (they need to update the status of the order as "received"). The settlement process is illustrated as below and your seller grading  (normal / good / power ) will actually determine how fast you get the $ and how much it will cost you too (Max is 12%)!

Gmarket / Qoo10 Settlement Process

Seriously, the flow chart a bit complicated and confusing, they have to do a better job at it as this flowchart has to just explain itself at first glance.




A quick overview of Gmarket International (Qoo10.com)
- Gmarket (Korea) is Korea's #1 online maketplace and founded by Young Bae Ku
- Gmarket International, is a new JV setup between ebay + Gmarket founder
- Ebay owns 49% while Young owns 51% initially, with USD $20 million as Start Up capital 
- Gmarket Int Goal is to become Pan-Asia no 1 emarketplace by 2015.
- Gmarket Int appear to have strong strategic tie-up with Yahoo
- Their banner ad / search box / shopping link appear on Prominent Placement on Yahoo Homepage


 - We are not surprised at such close ties between Gmarket and Yahoo, their relationship goes way back earlier when Yahoo sells Gmarket Korea shares to Ebay
- They are fashion and accessories focused (Ladies love it!)
- They have iphone apps
- They have android apps too!
- They have something called a QStore - 3M singapore is on it, and it seems like it can power up individual domain too as this site shows - http://eindrastore.com/
- They have aso something called Qsafe program for brand owners to counter infringement (necessary evil considering all C2C marketplace eg Taobao.com are flushed with pirated goods)
- They also have something for website owners to make money too - Q-Affiliates, 2% Commission for referral link turned into sales.
- Latest public move by the the Gmarket founder, is on product search engine in china.
- Last but not least, some sellers feedback to me that their user interface is very complicated (Are you a gmarket sellers? do you agree? What's your take?)


2012 will mark the dawn of E-commerce Marketplace Battle for Malaysia. Starring Lelong, Gmarket, Rakuten, Trosworld, Newegg, eBay and more! which I will cover in more details in coming post. 

Watch out for the dark horses too, with thousands of merchants already in hand, Groupon, Living Social (everyday.com.my), Mudah (classified driven now) or Zalora (Rocket Internet) might just launch yet-another marketplace or transform itself into a 3rd party marketplace too?

Any thoughts or juicy tips? I would love to hear from you, please leave a comment below!
Giosis gmarket profile 2012
Posted by adrian oh at 3/28/2012 1 comments
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