We are no strangers to the domain of Online Shopping, and it got a sharp rise during the Pandemic due to no-contact protocols, and people ended up being too lazy to go out and buy stuff even when the ban was lifted. Buying stuff online has always been seen with an eye of suspicion, and I am pretty sure many of your elders have advised you to be careful whenever you buy anything online.
Aliexpress is no exception. In the list of the rumoured shadiest online marketplaces, people do have a stigma when they talk about this.
Well, we are here to break that stereotype and prove to you that this is a safe place to buy your stuff, and you can land more sweet deals over here than any other online store.
So, let’s get to it.
What is Aliexpress?
AliExpress is a famous online store for purchasing products at much-reduced prices than what you would find in Amazon or any other online store for that matter. The store was founded way back in 2010 and is owned by Jack Ma’s Alibaba.
This Multi-Billion Dollar Chinese company focuses on e-commerce and computing and is one of the pioneers in bringing innovation among Internet companies. AliExpress is positioned as an online consumer marketplace for international buyers (while TaoBao is for domestic purposes), which gives Alibaba a chance to intervene in the Global Online Transaction.
It gives all small businesses in China an opportunity to sell to customers all over the globe, which makes Aliexpress an ideal platform in China and for International customers.
To give you an idea of just how giant Alibaba is, they have reported over $75 billion in sales during a single event period in 2020. The annual revenue of Alibaba Group reached a whopping 717.2 billion yuan (approximately 109 billion U.S. dollars) in F.Y. 2020.
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AliExpress has always been an online trading platform for ordinary consumers, just like any other. The platform sells quality products with speedy delivery. It integrates everything like order, payment and logistics into a simple user interface.
The service can be availed anywhere outside of China, and it possesses most of the international payment methods. ( including Online ones)
The estimated delivery time for all products on the product page is usually 20 to 60 days when you order for shipping outside China, which is a drag for people who want to order things for urgent matters.
But the Indian Govt has banned popular e-commerce app AliExpress from functioning in India, along with 42 other apps. This is why it isn’t that known among many Indians.
So if you try to buy something from AliExpress, you won’t get delivery here in India, which is a major bummer.
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How is the stuff so cheap?
Now, you might be wondering why the products come so cheap over here. This is primarily because AliExpress is based in China, where the cost of labor is so low, which makes products on AliExpress significantly cheaper than anywhere else in the world, including India and the U.S.
Alibaba is more or less a directory of Chinese manufacturers, which is why you can go for bulk orders, but whatever way you look at it, the unit price is much lower than what you would find in other E-commerce domains.
Moreover, Alibaba is a platform built for wholesale sales. That means that you can not order single unit quantities of any product. Every user of an Alibaba customer places bulk orders directly from the factory or the service provider linked to it.
By placing orders with the factory directly, one can customize or personalize products for your private label selling, which allows you to create a unique product that no one else can sell or even find online !.
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What are the Pros of buying from Aliexpress?
Now to sum up all the plus points of buying from Aliexpress-
- Affordability. You can find no sweeter deals for stuff anywhere else, probably because you are buying in bulk from the Chinese Manufacturer.
- No minimum order quantity requirements. Hence there is the less initial cost.
- An Excellent buyer protection program, which leads to decreased chances of getting scammed, which we will discuss in the next section
Is Aliexpress Legit & Safe?
The main reason why AliExpress products are seen in a bad light is unrealistic expectations regarding the price and quality. When you buy anything from a retail store in the U.S. or Europe, every product goes through a meticulous quality control process before the product is even placed on the shelf of any store.
When you are on AliExpress, you often buy directly from the factory and have very little quality control. As a result, it can sometimes be a faker or something that doesn’t resemble anything you saw when you ordered it.
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 This is why AliExpress Drop shipping is not a stable long-term business model. This ugly combination of quality control malfunctions, longer shipping time, and lagged customer support make this an unattractive business to run. Still, they do make amends with an excellent Buyer protection program.
Aliexpress offers two important guarantees:
- If you don’t receive your order, a full refund: i.e., if the item does not show up, or even if it does not arrive within the scheduled time scale the seller guaranteed, you can apply for a full refund, which you will receive in 2 weeks.
- A full or partial refund if the item is not as the seller portrayed: if your purchase differs drastically from what you had expected, you have two options to choose from. You can either return the item for a full refund or keep the item and receive a partial refund, and the second option seems more reasonable if the item is used.
Some rules restrict sellers’ illegal operations and protect those sellers who get into trouble due to infringement within the platform.
How to protect yourself from Bad deals?
- Try to buy from trusted sellers: Go through the reviews and ratings to check out how genuine the seller and the product are. Many positive reviews from satisfied customers and an excellent rating is a good sign.
- A number of orders: Look out for sellers who’ve already shipped many orders successfully. The more sales they have completed, the less likely problems are to occur.
- The seller guarantees: Check whether the seller commits to a buyer-friendly approach. Some notable features include offers like on-time delivery, returns, refunds, and authenticity.
Final Take By Tecvalue
Now that you might have read the whole article and understood that Aliexpress is a great place to buy, you have to be careful when going through the product, which is part and parcel of the Online Shopping Experience.
You might have become convinced, and we hope that the stereotype of the Shady Chinese Buyers-stop has been done away with.
Chinese products are often depicted to have an unfair reputation for being cheap and possessing poor quality. But many of the products on AliExpress are of good quality and available for the fraction of the cost of what you would pay for the same stuff you find in any shop in the U.S. or Europe
The e-commerce sector had already been growing at a steady pace even before the Pandemic ravaged the global marketplace, but widespread lockdowns only caused it to soar in popularity.
In 2020 alone, retail e-commerce sales worldwide reached a whopping $4.28 trillion.
By 2022, it is estimated that e-retail revenue is projected to grow up to an impressive $5.4 trillion in revenue. The convenience of E-commerce has lulled the consumer community to the comfort of their homes.
It is only a matter of time when all Offline marketplaces may shift to the E-commerce sector to cater to their consumer populace.
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