Where are the difficulties in agricultural product e-commerce? Understanding the core pain points in one article

According to reports, in 2015, of the 3,000 platform-based agricultural product e-commerce companies in China, only 1% were profitable. Among them, 90% of fresh produce e-commerce companies were operating at a loss. Agricultural products hitching a ride on the e-commerce bandwagon looks beautiful and fashionable, but it is very difficult to do. Where exactly do the difficulties lie? And how can they be overcome?

Agriculture and e-commerce development are out of sync; how to reverse the situation where farmers buy more than they sell

In the current development of rural e-commerce, many counties, especially those in western China, have many good things, but there is one thing that puzzles everyone doing rural e-commerce, including some experts who are now criticizing: e-commerce going to the countryside makes farmers forever buy more than they sell.

Is it because Alibaba and JD.com are unwilling to do it? No. Wei Yan'an, director of the Agriculture and Industry Department of the Communist Youth League Shaanxi Provincial Committee, believes that "our agriculture is still at the level of the 19th century, while our e-commerce has already entered the 21st century." The two currently cannot join hands. So when "Ben Xiansheng" sold 600,000 jin of pineapples but lost so much money it went under, one must not judge economic events from a moral standpoint. The fundamental reason is the lack of standardization of agricultural products, the lack of a traceability system for agricultural products, and the lack of quality trust in agricultural products, so they cannot gain the recognition of e-commerce consumers, which gives rise to these chaotic phenomena.

In response to these problems, Wei Yan'an believes it is necessary to start from the following three aspects:

One, create differentiation and build up regional brands

First, systematically develop agricultural product e-commerce, bring out your differentiated things, and build up your regional brand.

Industrial products have no concept of regional brands, but agricultural products definitely must have one. For example, with refrigerators, what is the difference between buying a refrigerator made in Qingdao and one made in Shenzhen? No difference. But when eating hairy crabs, you must eat those from Yangcheng Lake, and when drinking Longjing tea, it must be from West Lake. Region is differentiation; this is the special nature of agricultural products.

Therefore, to do agricultural product e-commerce, you must first bring out your own characteristics and show your regional brand. Without this brand differentiation, then sorry, consumers will not think of buying your things.

Two, cultivate market brands and avoid the "tragedy of the commons"

It is necessary to carefully and meticulously cultivate our market brands.

All regional brands will ultimately encounter a tragedy -- the "tragedy of the commons." Why? Public grassland will certainly have many people grazing on it, and they will graze as much as possible, causing the grassland to be destroyed. So when building a public brand, one must pay attention to market brands. For example, only a certain brand of Yangcheng Lake hairy crabs is genuine, and only a certain brand of Shaanxi apples is safe to eat. Therefore, above the regional public brand, there is also a market brand belonging to the enterprise itself. The dual-brand system is a phenomenon unique to agricultural product brands.

Three, transform the agricultural production mode and actively develop "Internet Plus" agriculture

It is necessary to vigorously promote the internetization of agriculture. To do agricultural product e-commerce now, one must carry out the internetization of agriculture, that is, "Internet Plus" agriculture.

The foundation of agriculture and agricultural products must be solid. If agriculture is not strong enough, your agricultural product e-commerce will definitely not pass. Building tall buildings on sand will certainly be unstable.

For "Internet Plus" agriculture, there is too much work that needs to be transformed. What is needed now is to work attentively and to comprehensively and systematically do the basic work of agricultural product e-commerce. This takes time, and it requires the participation of a large number of enterprises, platforms, entrepreneurs, and farmers together. On this issue, my view, to say something no one likes to hear, is that the problems of agricultural product e-commerce, I think, will be very difficult to thoroughly resolve within three to five years. It will certainly be a very long process, involving the transformation of the lifestyle and production methods of agricultural production formed over more than 2,000 years in our country. It will certainly be a long process.

Entrepreneurs must develop a sharp eye to identify agricultural products not suitable for e-commerce

Many young people return to their hometowns and find that everything at home is agricultural products. They want to sell them online, and even want to integrate all the local agricultural products. Is this easy to do?

On this issue, let me say two blunt things. Although the opportunities are very good, opportunities do not necessarily necessarily belong to you. Not all agricultural products can board the train of the internet.

One, not all agricultural products need to go outside the city, outside the province, or abroad

I want to tell everyone one point of view: more than 80% of agricultural products are consumed locally. Therefore, if you fantasize about putting all the agricultural products of every county on the internet and selling them to all of China and the whole world, this itself is a wrong way of thinking, and you will certainly not be able to do it. So when talking about agricultural product O2O now, it must be down-to-earth.

Two, agricultural products doing e-commerce, especially fresh produce, have their own insurmountable shortcomings

First, they are especially bulky, with terribly expensive logistics costs. Second, keeping them fresh is especially difficult. For example, the hardest thing to solve is keeping green leafy vegetables fresh; even SF Express cannot do it. They can be neither wilted nor yellowed, and solving this is very difficult. Third, standardization is very difficult. When the watermelons and melons from Zhang San's and Li Si's families are mixed together, it is very easy for this to happen: the first bite tastes much like what you advertised, as sweet as Yang Yuying, reminding people of a sweet-and-sour beautiful first love; the second bite, what flavor is this, you want to throw it away, a bad review. So fresh agricultural products have their own unique difficulties that are hard to overcome.

How should agricultural product e-commerce be done to sell good vegetables and good products?

One, do wholesale and retail together

Many things such as vegetables are not only for online retail; they can also be wholesaled. Wholesale is not only offline; it also exists online.

Two, create star products

When you start selling, do not think about integrating all your local agricultural products. When you cram so many agricultural products into one Taobao store or one online shop, when others look at your store it is called "not knowing what you are talking about," and instead your impression is blurred. People do not know what you do. The problem this brings is that after integrating many agricultural products, your supply chain and industrial chain control capabilities do not match and cannot keep up, so problems are very likely to arise. Therefore, my suggestion is, first, bring out one thing suitable for going online, try it first, test the waters, and proceed step by step.

Three, match the government's e-commerce planning policies

It is best to match the government's e-commerce planning policies. If Shouguang is heading east and you personally head west, you will certainly not get the sunshine of policy, so the government and enterprises must direct their efforts in the same direction.