I.

INTRODUCE
- Alibaba Group Holding Limited, also known as Alibaba with the slogan "Global
Trade starts here..." is an e-commerce and online auction group founded by Jack Ma
in 1999, headquartered in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China. The company's name came
from the character Ali Baba from the Middle Eastern folk-tale collection One
Thousand and One Nights because of its universal appeal.
- Watching video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gk69hV6LEgI

II. ELEMENTS OF MARKETING MACROENVIRONMENT

1. DEMOGRAPHIC:
Demographic environment refers to the demographic characteristics of a local or national
community that have an impact on the market for a business's business.
Includes factors such as:
Geographical location and Population
Customer analysis in Alibaba's Marketing strategy: Alibaba customers are new, tech-
savvy, Gen Y and Z customers whose time, convenience of buying and selling, maintaining
their lifestyle is more important than ever.
2. ECONOMIC:
The economic environment in marketing includes elements of economic indicators such as:
Economic growth rate (GDP), Import and export turnover, Inflation Index,
Unemployment, Bank interest rate, Investment speed, Spending structure,Income
breakdown
Business performance of Alibaba group in recent years and its effectiveness
- As of 2015, Alibaba had a market share of 58% in China and its closest competitor
was 22%. One of China's main strengths is this market share dominance that comes
about thanks to the backing of solid manufacturers that are capable of mass
production and supply worldwide.
- According to eMarketer data (2016), the total amount of online shoppers in China
spent an estimated $672 billion in 2015. This figure is predicted to surpass the $1
trillion mark in 2017. Some other statistics about Alibaba's business results are:
+ Alibaba's total revenue reached $5.33 billion in Q4, up 32 percent year-on-year.
+ Profit for the quarter came in at $1.98 billion, up 108% year-on-year.
+ Revenue from mobile transactions increased to $2.89 billion, up 192% year-on-year.
+ Revenue per active user was $27.98 in the last quarter of the year compared with
$25.55 last year.
+ Mobile revenue per monthly active user doubled in the same period, from $7.91 to
$16.42.
The company was honored to receive the award "Best of the Web: B2B" (Best
Business Website) voted by Forbes magazine and was voted by readers of Far
Eastern Economic Review magazine as the best business website. Most popular B2B
website.
With its strong business performance, Alibaba's stock price has doubled since the beginning
of the year, increasing the company's market value by $250 billion, more than any other
company in the world. except Apple Inc.
Figure 2.1
3. POLITICAL:
In 2015, Alibaba's sales reached 12.3 billion USD with a profit of 3.7 billion USD, 1
billion USD higher than Amazon's profit even though the US corporation's sales were
10 times larger than Alibaba's.
If you look at Alibaba's profit margin over the past year, you'll see something quite
interesting. Why does a company that makes money mainly in China (more than 83%)
have a larger total profit than international retailers like Amazon, eBay or Walmart?
FIGURE 2.11
FIGURE 2.12
A market as large as China makes many large enterprises in the world crave. Initially,
Taobao completely defeated and blew eBay's ambitions in the Chinese market. The
company receives great support from the Government of this country, most Chinese
consumers now only know Alibaba's Taobao but do not know Amazon, eBay.
Customers also cannot search for Taobao products on Google or Baidu - China's largest
search site, but can only search on Taobao. This is something that Amazon cannot do with
its core market, the US.
In the process of global expansion, it would be remiss not to mention the Chinese
government's support for Alibaba. With the goal of bringing a local company into the ranks of
world-class technology companies, the government has given a lot of support to the giant
Alibaba.
However, in addition to eBay, a number of other names including Amazon and Walmart have
not backed down.
In 2004, Amazon bought Joyo.com - an online retailer co-founded by Lei Jun - CEO of
Xiaomi. Meanwhile, Walmart in 2012 took control of Yihaodian - an online retailer.
In addition to the factors that are said to be "favorable times, favorable conditions, people's
harmony" and know how to seize opportunities, Alibaba Group has built trust with Chinese
leaders that Alibaba is doing "safely". Although it does not ban these retailers from
operating, the Chinese government makes these companies "sweat". While Walmart has
repeatedly been fined for "violating regulations", Amazon has shown "flat" business results in
the Chinese market. Both the Chinese government and Alibaba want the economy to move
in a good direction and create jobs. We all want every Chinese family to be happy. So we
need to come together to do even better, right?
4. Social-cultural
Jack Ma uses the strategy of "Filling the market gap" through the B2B e-commerce model
with the role of "Helping small and medium businesses make transactions through
Alibaba.com". Not content with imitating the US in the style of building "China's Google" or
"China's Amazon", Jack Ma wishes to create a new online shopping site that is convenient,
safe, cheap, and supportive for customers. Chinese small and medium enterprises. This
commitment comes from Jack Ma's analysis and reality recognition:
- Along with a developing economy, a rapidly growing population and an ever-expanding
Internet, the online shopping needs of Chinese customers are increasing every day, and
Alibaba's boss has grasped this potential. Capture the growing number of internet users in
China's First-Class Cities: About three-quarters of the population in cities like Beijing,
Shanghai, Chongqing and Guangzhou use the Internet and online shopping.
5. Technological
- In China at the moment, there are very few companies interested in e-commerce because
of the mismatches of the B2B e-commerce models of American and European companies.
Transactional trade is mainly traditional trade.
Jack Ma said that the existing e-commerce models of foreign companies (such as eBay or
Amazon...) are mainly aimed at serving large companies with high transaction volume and
value. However, the trading needs of Asian companies, mostly small and medium-sized
companies (SMEs), do not fit these models.
- Jack Ma believes that Asian companies should not imitate the e-commerce business
models of American companies, but we can also learn a lot from them, such as their level of
expertise computers and technology of American companies. Moreover, the market for E-
commerce in the US is large and developed, unlike in Asia. In the US and other European
countries, a series of basic premises for e-commerce such as infrastructure, banking and
credit systems are available and convenient for the development of e-commerce, and Asia is
very poor. Therefore, in order to develop, Asian e-commerce companies need to build a lot
of support services.
So right from the start of the company, founder Jack Ma has determined, the business
strategy that Alibaba e-commerce group is aiming for is the ambition to make Alibaba
"become a global technology corporation". The reason Jack Ma named the company Alibaba
is also for the sake of globalization because almost all of us are like Alibaba characters with
the famous saying "Sesame, open".
With this strategy, Alibaba wants to facilitate China's 557 million Internet users to shop from
anywhere in the world. The company's efforts are in line with China's new policies to make it
easier for Chinese people to buy imported goods at cheaper prices.
The value of goods purchased online from abroad in China has increased from less than $2
billion in 2010 to more than $20 billion in 2014, of which the United States is currently the
leading market for clothing, care products, and more. Personal care and baby products are
the most purchased by China. In the next five years, China's e-commerce market is forecast
to grow twice as big as it is today, after displacing the US as the world's largest market in
2013.
Alibaba is currently competing with the world's online retailers to supply more Western
brands to Chinese customers, especially in direct competition with Amazon in its goal of
globalization. However, the models of these two companies are completely different.
Amazon sells goods directly to consumers and stores them online in its warehouses.
Whereas Alibaba's business model is more like an e-marketplace, both companies hold a
huge percentage of sales in their home country, specifically Alibaba holds more than 80% of
online sales in China. and Amazon accounts for 60% in the US. The next step for both big
corporations is to conquer the world.
To realize this strategic goal, Alibaba has built a branch in charge of relations with foreign
governments located in Washington, USA. In addition, the company is actively acquiring and
acquiring news and video content producers, offline services and global companies with the
goal of capturing the e-commerce market outside of China. Country.
6. Natural
- In addition to the B2B e-commerce market which has long been assessed as a very
potential market, China is known as the "world's factory", as a concentrated production place
for a single commodity. Small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises in China, which
are capable of supplying goods to the world, are lacking in output.
In April 1999, Jack Ma decided to establish Alibaba.com to target this potential market
segment. It can be seen that the strategy of "filling the market gap" was fully utilized and
promoted by him in building a business model for Alibaba at this time. Alibaba.com is the
first Chinese Dot.com company to set up a B2B e-commerce exchange. As a result,
Alibaba.com quickly became the market leader.
The strategic vision that Jack Ma set for Alibaba.com is "Helping small and medium
enterprises make transactions through Alibaba.com". To implement this strategy, Alibaba
takes steady steps based on market demand.
III. THE EFFECT OF MACRO FACTORS ON THE RECENT LAUNCH OF ALIBABA:
TAOBAO:
Taobao.com is a large online Chinese shopping site with a wide range of items such as
clothing, electronics, home appliances, flowers, chocolates, etc. In 2014, there were 760
million products from 7 million merchants, Small businesses are offered for sale on Taobao.
More and more reputable brands from abroad register to advertise products on this website:
Dell, Adidas, Zara, ..
Demographic
Taobao has announced that it will step up support for online stores as a way to boost
purchasing demand among young Chinese consumers, who are increasingly showing an
interest in differentiated products and services. new.
Modern and active young people tend to spend more on clothes and accessories for
personal purposes- this is Taobao's biggest customer base.
During the annual Taobao conference in Hangzhou on Thursday, Alibaba Group laid out
additional plans to strengthen its position in the market for millions of young people willing to
spend. beyond the generation of its predecessors.
Topping the list of plans is to increase the number and develop independent stores from
100,000 to more than 500,000 on the application platform. At the same time, it encourages
and supports store owners to expand their businesses on Taobao as well as promotes a free
and creative working environment.
“ Taobao is seeing a clear change because the majority of Taobao users are young people.
This means that the platform also needs to become "rejuvenated" to serve potential
customers , "said Daniel Zhang, CEO of Alibaba Group in his annual conference speech.
Social-culture
Each member of the administration team must choose a nickname that comes from fictional
characters from Kim Dung's popular novels. The message the media wants to convey
through the titles from the novel is: Taobao is a Chinese platform. This message is very
important because the Chinese people are very nationalistic and have a sense of
community. They are always proud to be Chinese and think that China is a collective
country. The second meaning is that choosing “nickname” represents a friendly, cooperative
attitude, which is key for everyone to feel welcome as a member of the community.
Taobao's website has two distinctive colors, red and orange, symbolizing the festival and
prosperity of Chinese culture, a positive message sent to customers online. Symbolism is
very important in doing business in China, unlike in the West. Taobao's design reflects the
living environment familiar to the Chinese: a noisy, collective, moving and colorful
environment, information is everywhere, there seems to be no gap, in while Westerners
prefer minimalist websites like Google.
Political
China's infrastructure is well-developed, with the government subsidizing high-speed
Internet for Internet access on a par with developed countries. The rapid development of the
Internet in China has opened up new business opportunities, especially in the field of e-
commerce.
IV. Marketing strategy evaluation
Strengths:
Facing competitive pressure from competitors, Alibaba - an e-commerce group founded by
billionaire Jack Ma in 1999 still stands and still leads. That is thanks to an extremely effective
marketing strategy. So what has made this “e-commerce giant” so successful?
Scale of operation: China is the most populous country in the world and has a leading
economy, so such a leadership is extremely feat. That goes a long way in Alibaba's growth
trajectory scenario.
Market share: As of 2015, Alibaba has a market share of 58% in China.
Jack Ma - a visionary leader
Good relationship with partners: Alibaba provides an environment with many advantages for
all those who join them. Such as merchants, consumers, third party agents, etc. All have
access to financial programs. They have platform and extensible, cloud hosting.
Furthermore, real-time access to all information is possible. This increases the attractiveness
for more and more partners to join Alibaba.
Weakness
As a leading large brand in the world in terms of e-commerce platform, but Alibaba still has
some unavoidable disadvantages.
Alibaba has no limit on the number of sellers. Or the person who signed up to cooperate with
the company. This has resulted in a large number of sellers competing in the market. This
may be good for the buyer, but it may not be good for the seller. Many sellers will not be able
to succeed because too much competition will cause sellers to withdraw from the contract.
When Alibaba went public, there were just over 8.5 million active sellers. However, this
number has only increased since then. Because of this, many reputable brands have
withdrawn from products on Taobao and Tmall. Those are two Alibaba websites.
- Alibaba does not allow sellers to set fair and profitable prices. This is one of the weak
points in their marketing strategy. Alibaba generates most of its revenue by selling ad
space to sellers. Having to reduce prices deeply and have to buy sales space, sellers
are currently being suppressed and have no freedom. This is also an undeniable
weakness in Alibaba's strategy.
Opportunity
- Population continues to increase rapidly, the number of Internet users increases, Alibaba
has the opportunity to penetrate and master the e-commerce market in Southeast Asia.
- Great support from the Chinese government in creating a clear regulatory environment,
minimizing legal risks and transaction costs, and maximizing economic and social benefits.
- The growth of China's economic trade is likely to help Alibaba expand and become a
bridge between the Asian market and the European-American market.
Risk
- The problem of online fraud, unethical product quality of some suppliers is still increasing.
- Cultural barriers when Alibaba enters the world market.
- The risk of facing an increase in attacks on import and export members in the Alibaba
system of some major online companies in the world, or the jump of potential competitors
when doing business online increasing.
Conclusion
Most companies that operate on the e-commerce or technology-driven business side have
distinct strategies and goals including Alibaba. This is an e-commerce platform, a
product/service that is too familiar to consumers. These strategies are based on Alibaba's
use and pricing to drive revenue. It can be seen that Alibaba's marketing strategy is very
smart. However, there are certain disadvantages that cannot be avoided.