Like a life-size game of Risk, the world can be seen as a global battlefield in which e-commerce empires slug it out for dominance. A recent analysis found the “Amazon Empire” comprises 58 countries and more than 1.2 billion people, making it the global leader in online reach.
Measured by online “population,” Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. is not far behind, with nearly 1.1 billion online users in 15 countries. But no other marketplace comes anywhere close to the reach of Amazon.com Inc. (No. 1 in the Internet Retailer 2018 Top 1000), according to the analysis by Website Builder Expert (WBE).
WBE gathered data from 174 countries and 8,700 websites. It then identified the most visited online marketplace in each country and ranked those against each other. Other large e-commerce empires, notably Walmart Inc. (No. 3), were not included or they did not emerge as the most popular online shopping site in any of the 174 countries WBE looked at. However, U.S.-based eBay Inc. made the list, despite being eclipsed at home by Amazon. WBE found eBay to be the most visited online marketplace in eight countries, including Australia.
Based on its findings, WBE created a world map of e-commerce marketplace empires (see below).
EBay Inc. CEO Devin Wenig has said he wants the marketplace to grow to 500 million active users, nearly three-times the 175 million on it today. He plans to rebrand eBay as the place online where consumers can find the exact item they’re looking for. The repositioning starts with plans to significantly boost its marketing spending in the second half of 2018 and into 2019.
But, even at that level, eBay’s empire would be small, compared with the leaders…To get immediate access to the rest of this article and thousands more, sign up for a free Strategy Membership using the Join for Free button below. If you’re already a member, please sign in.
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