Yesterday, an old friend called me out for a dinner. The purpose is to get into the eCommerce in Sibu, and probably Malaysia.
I personally monitoring Sibu eCommerce closely. I wanted to see how it grow and how it works currently.
Forum as a starter
A lot of Sibuan like to start off with a forum, or selling in a forum instead. Having their own eCommerce store is time consuming and waste of money. After starting off a forum, they will offer a very competitive and affordable banner advertisement in forum, to get themselves going longer.
I can easily name more than 5 Sibu forums which all have above all points, banner advertisement, selling products on (specialized) thread and they are still young.
Well, look closely, each of those forum actually linking each other or buying advertisement with each other, spliting visitors all around the web and hardly get royalty and ended up not much sale on forum.
In short, those forums does not actually provide a platform for the seller (or themselves), but are looking for a profit themselves through the forum. That is the problem with forum as eCommerce.
Unfriendly user interface
Majority, if not all eCommerce store are using the same China made eCommerce script. I’m not saying it’s not good, it’s good and I did a test myself as well, function wise is great, but front-end interface is not.
Like most China website, crowded with images, big and small, and lots of text on the front page.
A while back, I spend a lot of time with my wife outside in malls, we find out that a lots of those stock are from Internet. Those eCommerce stores are actually more protifting as a wholesaler than a retailer. (You can check into forum too).
The key-point to actually winning in eCommerce store, is to get to know more retailers instead.
Login before paying is so yesterday. It is now against the concept of eCommerce nowadays, the convenient become not so convenient. Let me tell you more about the so-called, payment.
Payment gateway
There is absolutely no payment gateway on those eCommerce stores I visited. Don’t mind those Maybank2u or Credit Card logos on the footer.
Forget it, I ended up a message telling me “Our representative will contact you within next 24 hours.” Some even ask me to made the payment first and contact them about the payment and item I needed, right! What is the whole point of having a product clicked and added to cart?
So far, the best thing about eCommerce in Sibu is that I don’t get cheated. I am ensured with the location. With population of 25,000 only, basically to get to know a person and location is easier than flipping yellowpage.
Do I continue shopping online? Yes! The hassle are all away after I know the price is competitive compare to retail 
