The top ecommerce websites in Thailand are Lazada, Kaidee and 11street. Other top retail sites include Zalora, Shopee, Central.co.th, Agoda.com, Traveloka, Tarad.com and Ensogo. It's worth checking out those popular ecommerce sites/platforms to see which one(s) would be the best fit for your product in terms of traffic volume, competition and the type of ecommerce buyers they attract.
The top products/product categories for Thai online buyers include clothes & accessories, personal care, cosmetics, high-tech products and travel. Offering products from these categories can help you establish your presence on the Thai ecommerce market.
The top payment methods for digital purchases include cash on delivery, credit card and debit card. It's important to provide your (potential) customers with payment methods of their preference. In many cases, if online shoppers can't find their preferred or trusted methods of payment during checkout, they will abandon the shopping cart.
Mobile commerce is shaping the future of ecommerce in Thailand, but also around the world. Ecommerce sellers should bear this in mind when setting up their online stores and product listings. Mobile optimization and great mobile buying experience are a must for all growth-minded online sellers.
To drive Thai traffic to your website, local marketing & SEO will help you get it right. When you localize your online store for international markets, enable international search engines to index your content to improve your organic international traffic. You can also leverage services, such as Google Shopping and Facebook ads internationally.
To ship your products to Thailand in the most efficient and cost-effective way, use global shipping / parcel forwarding services. This way you can get competitive international shipping rates, on average 30% lower, and pass the lower cost on to your buyers, increasing your competitive advantage.
Selling on the Thai ecommerce market is a great option for growth-minded online sellers. When you launch your store in other countries, there are a few useful facts and data that you should consider.
There are 29,078,158 Internet users in Thailand and Internet penetration amounts to 42.70%. In terms of device usage, there are 27,628,000 smartphone users and smartphone penetration amounts to 40.50%. On a global scale, smartphones are being more and more widely used for digital purchases.
The total population of Thailand is 69,183,173. The median age is 38.1. The language spoken in Thailand is Thai and the currency is Baht. The country code top-level domain is .th and calling code +66.
According to the International Monetary Fund, GDP based on purchasing power parity (PPP) is 1,233,737 (millions of Current Int$) and nominal GDP is 455,378 (US$MM). GDP (PPP) per capita is 17,786 Int$ and GDP (nominal) per capita is 6,591 US$. Real GDP growth rate is 3.70%.
Selling in Thailand is worth considering for many international ecommerce sellers. A well thought out international sales strategy should help you overcome the initial burden of translating and localizing your online store.
If you're a global online merchant already exporting to Thailand, you may be happy with your sales figures. However, you may have noticed that your Thai, and your international traffic in general, converts at a much lower conversion rate than your domestic traffic, even in markets that share the same language. The likely reason being, many of the components of localization, beyond translation alone, have not been optimized.