Hallyu boosts online shopping malls

English online shopping site for Stylenanda, a women’s street-wear maker, shows pictures of K-pop stars wearing their brand. / Courtesy of G-market

By Park Jin-hai

Cathy, a 30-something Manila-based business editor, likes to scroll Korean online shopping sites at home.

“I buy clothes mostly. And some accessories. There are a lot of choices at Korean online shopping sites,” said the editor who asked to be identified only by her first name. She has purchased several times over the past three years through G-market’s English website.

Shay, 19, an art student and K-pop fan in North Carolina, received an oversized pink cardigan through online market place OKDGG and left a review on her blog.

Once the key phrase “Korean style” is typed in on China’s eBay equivalent Tao Bao, over 40 million items are shown on screen, whilst “Korean fashion” will turn up some 9 million products.

Riding on the popularity of Korean dramas and K-pop, online shopping malls are experiencing increasing sales to people from all over the world.

Unlike local websites, which require the downloading of program after program for payment, these malls have simple payment systems.

Local e-commerce marketplace G-market’s English website has actress Lee Yeon-hee and her spring look on its first page. / Courtesy of G-market

Established online shopping malls like G-market and 11ST started English websites, while IT firms like Cafe 24 and KOREA.COM provide solutions and platforms for local firms to run multi-lingual shopping websites.

G-market’s overseas sales grew more than 50 percent from 2012 and 11ST saw its sales up 75 percent in one year after it opened its English website, with its foreign customers increasing more than 10 percent a month.

Boosted by the reviving “hallyu” or Korean wave, e-bay Korea, operator of e-commerce sites G-market and Auction, expects to bring in some 300 billion won ($289 million) from overseas sales this year.

IT solution company KOREA.COM’s online mall OKDGG posted its overseas sales figure at $1.5 million last year, up threefold from the previous year. Its overseas shipments through its logistics center in Seoul also grew five times, to 16,000 orders in 2013.

Cafe 24 facilitates local firms selling products on global e-commerce sites through its partners, like Amazon. As of March, it listed over 12,000 products on those sites in China, the U.K. and Japan, three times January’s 4,000.

Shopping, entertainment

For these online malls, when credit card numbers are typed in, the price is calculated into the local currency. And then the cryptic code, transmitted to the person by the credit card company, closes the payment.

“Along with price competitiveness, local websites give double pleasure of shopping and entertainment,” said an official of Cafe 24.

For instance, online shopping mall for Stylenanda, a women’s clothing and accessories maker, not only attracts overseas customers with free shipment or special deals, but also posts photos, where K-pop stars wear their products, or video clips that teaches the latest makeup trends.

“High-quality pictures taken from professional photographers, styling and detailed product descriptions make them more attractive,” the official added.

Stlylenanda expanded its business in China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, and opened an off-line store in Hong Kong. Another street-wear online shop Chuu, which also runs its own Chinese language website, sees its overseas business booming.

Language barriers, missing items

Language barriers still remain as the biggest hurdle for local online shopping sites in finding more customers overseas.

Even if front pages of online shopping malls are translated into English, whether at G-market or 11ST or any other site, the moment a customer clicks on the product photo to see the details, not so much English can be seen — except each item’s serial codes. Otherwise, they post lots of product photos and a couple of simple English words beneath them.

“I like G-market’s English website, but unfortunately even though the instructions are in English, there are still a lot of Korean letters ,” said Eva Lui, 25, from Hong Kong.

“I can read and understand Korean, so it’s easy for me. But I know some of my friends who would like to buy from G-market but can’t because of the language barrier. And sometimes, some of the instructions are Konglish,” she said.

She added that another downside is that some sellers don’t let customers know if their orders were processed.

What’s worse is when customers have problems. Annoyed customers make phone calls about their purchases and, in G-market’s case, they cannot understand the Korean-language announcement to reach the right department for their complaint.

Cathy, the Manila-based consumer said that when one of her items didn’t arrive, she wanted to lodge a complaint but there was no way to ask anyone about it at G-market.

Asked about her case, a G-market operator working in call center said, “Individual sellers, in some cases, are tight on budget as well as English-speaking staff. Thus, except for refunds, it might be difficult for them to explain in detail the reasons for a failed delivery in English.”

She said that the company however write down the number of foreign customers and return the call in an hour.