eBay

momcqueen · ‎03-10-2017

http://www.ecommercebytes.com/cab/abn/y17/m03/i10/s03

How to Boost Sales by Reaching Canadian Shoppers

Canada Post published the following post to its blog last month:

Are you a US-based merchant looking to grow? Just north of the border, a tremendous opportunity awaits in Canada.

Canada boasts a prosperous economy and a sizeable population of 36 million people, the bulk of whom live within 100 miles of their American neighbors. Canadians are shopping online more than ever before: statistics show ecommerce spending is surging by 15% each year, and, according to eMarketer, is expected to reach almost $50 billion by 2019.

Canada Post delivers two of every three parcels in the country and has the vital insights you need on the purchasing preferences of Canadian online shoppers. Our exclusive research can put your business on a path to prosperity.....

Original post from Canada Post can be found here.... https://www.canadapost.ca/web/en/blogs/business/details.page?article=2017%2F02%2F15%2Funderstanding_...

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Now, let me try to put into words the reason this annoys me so.

I'm a Canadian seller. As such, I am pretty much stuck with Canada Post. We are married, it may be a marriage of convenience but it is a marriage nonetheless. I am faithful, I am loyal. I don't step out on the national postal system, and although it certainly does stuff I don't agree with that affects me in negative ways (such as the threat of a mail strike-/lockout through all of the summer of 2016 killing my sales performance) I have stuck with it. I don't ship my stuff to a third-party carrier to deliver to USPS across the border to access the cheaper postage, although I could do that. It is within my grasp. There is a company I could call that would do that for me.

So, I am making do with my husband Mr. Canada Post. Maybe I'm not happy but I'm in it for the sake of the kids, whatever. It's certainly isn't because he treats me well and it's not like I'm living large in the lap of luxury thanks to him. If anything, he's kind of an albatross I've got to contend with. But whatever. I'm a hard-working businesswoman.

So I get home from a long, cold winter night shift working the salt mines of my online business to discover he's found himself a mail order bride in the USA. It doesn't matter that she doesn't care about him, or even know he exists, but he's horn-dogging after her anyway. What am I? Chopped liver.

Thanks for nothing, Canada Post. I stick loyally by your side while you're off chasing tanned Beach Body Blondes from the USA. Because American sellers are my competitors, more so than Canadian sellers. There is a level playing field at least with my fellow Canadians and it does not exist with the Americans against whom I am at a disadvantage.

It's not as if trying to cozy up to American sellers even makes sense for a Canadian mail carrier. American sellers cannot ship directly through Canada Post, the best they can do is ship with USPS who delivers it to Canada Post, and you can be sure any smart USA seller won't be making that choice based on Canada Post's roses and candy hearts, and offerings of sweet nothings in her ear.

Ugh.

momcqueen · ‎03-10-2017

Case in point:

Am I wrong in seeing this as a huge insult to Canadian sellers which comprise virtually ALL of Canada Post's business?!? Like, thanks for that kick in the pants. I cannot believe the gall of this. Seriously.

ricarmic · ‎03-10-2017

I think I look at it a different way around.

The people who buy things that arrive in parcels are the ones that generate the business for Canada post.

They'll buy from sellers here in Canada or anywhere else. CP still makes money on packages purchased in USA but delivered here via the reciprocal agreement (or whatever it is called).

So us Canadian sellers probably aren't the vast majority of the parcel business for CP all things considered. (I don't know the relation of Canadian sourced packages as compared to outside Canadian sourced)

I too am interested as to why they're wooing the US sellers, one would think that they'd be better served to "woo more" Canadian sellers. This is sort of like the reason behind the efforts ebay made to try to woo US sellers to sell more outside the country....

I wonder if they sent something similar to China???

pjcdn2005 · ‎03-10-2017

I wonder if they sent something similar to China???

My guess is no. I don't think Chinese merchants need encouragement to ship to North America but many US merchants may need a push.

dutchman48 · ‎03-10-2017

If Canada Post would give us reasonable shipping within our own country with tracking, maybe we would buy more locally

momcqueen · ‎03-10-2017

And selling.

I, however, do 85 per cent of my buying within Canada.

rose-dee · ‎03-10-2017

@ricarmic wrote:
The people who buy things that arrive in parcels are the ones that generate the business for Canada post.
They'll buy from sellers here in Canada or anywhere else. CP still makes money on packages purchased in USA but delivered here via the reciprocal agreement (or whatever it is called).

Yes, that was exactly my thought too when I saw this. CPC no doubt understands where their biggest revenue streams (and potential areas for growth) are. It likely isn't with Canadian businesses selling online, but with the millions of Canadians purchasing online from the U.S.

We shouldn't consider this as some sort of rebuff or betrayal. If we think it through, I believe CPC is being smart to look at all viable sources of income. If CPC taps into encouraging more U.S. online sellers to ship to Canada, thus making more money for its parcel operations, that can only help to keep CPC solvent and flexible (and may help keep our outgoing parcel rates in check). I have no problem with it.

Indeed, there's no time like the present for CPC to cash in on the phenomenon of higher U.S. interest in Canada, since so much attention has been turning northward lately from the States what with all the chaos going on there. It's a golden opportunity for Canada Post. Even CNN is talking about Canada. We've suddenly become noticed by the U.S. media, not to mention being seen as more than a little bit cool, thanks in part to our refugee-hugging PM, 50/50 male-female federal cabinet, universal health care, and on and on.

It appears CPC is also selling marketing solutions to U.S. sellers, which for CPC is an ancillary source of potential income from a very large market.

momcqueen · ‎03-10-2017

I'd think a smarter thing to do would be to support Canadian businesses looking to EXPORT to the billions of people in the world who live outside our borders.

rose-dee · ‎03-10-2017

@mjwl2006 wrote:
I'd think a smarter thing to do would be to support Canadian businesses looking to EXPORT to the billions of people in the world who live outside our borders.

I think this is perhaps a misperception on our part as sellers. We may believe we represent the biggest potential market for CPC, but clearly CPC doesn't see it that way. I doubt a few thousand Canadian sellers could ever offset the potential of millions of Canadians shopping online from the U.S., probably every month if not every week.

For one thing, most Canadian sellers ship primarily to the U.S. and Canada. Canada Post struggles to be profitable on a lot of domestic Canadian parcel shipments because of the low volume and vast distances involved. Considering the huge increases we've had on international shipping rates in the last couple of years, CPC is probably not making much money on overseas shipments either. These aren't areas they can best exploit for profitability.

On the other hand, the U.S. offers a high volume, lower-priced market in terms of shipping, where I can imagine CPC could make some profit inroads. It really isn't a bad idea at all, especially since the Americans are suddenly paying attention to us. It's an under-developed area for CPC to tap into, at a perfect time to get noticed.

Besides, it's not as if CPC is offering direct shipping services to American sellers. They just want to get a boost for the Canadian end of the bargain. I can only see this as a positive, in that if CPC makes more money on incoming parcel services, it may help us as Canadian sellers in terms of keeping our outgoing parcel rates under control. Canadians are going to shop from U.S. online sellers anyway, why not have CPC encourage it and benefit?

rose-dee · ‎03-10-2017

You know, it occurred to me that this could also be Canada Post's possible insurance policy against the likelihood of Trump re-writing NAFTA: appeal directly to U.S. sellers, and provide them with marketing to reach Canadian consumers now, ahead of the curve.

For example, if Trump slaps tariffs on products moving from Canada to the U.S., American buyers may balk at purchasing from us, and CPC's outgoing parcel operations will surely suffer. However, as long as our government doesn't slap on retaliatory tariffs, Canadians will be able to continue to buy freely from the U.S., giving CPC the income from that parcel volume.

Has Canada Post's management finally put their thinking caps on? Maybe so.

reallynicestamps · ‎03-10-2017

I wonder if they sent something similar to China???

Nope.

China is still underpaying its UPU partners for mail delivered by other postal services.

That , and fentanyl, are the reasons we are hearing about backlogs of parcels coming in from China and being stored by Canada Post as low importance shipments.

Canada may do well from US payments on parcels under UPU agreements. And Canada Post is definitely pushing the idea of using the postal service for small business shipping. There is a bottom of Page One ad almost every day in the Globe and Mail.

pjcdn2005 · ‎03-10-2017

@mjwl2006 wrote:
I'd think a smarter thing to do would be to support Canadian businesses looking to EXPORT to the billions of people in the world who live outside our borders.

They are doing that by offering discounts to Canadian businesses that have a large volume and to a lesser extent for smaller sellers who use their online shipping tool. Of course the savings aren't as much as we would like And yes they could do more but that has nothing to do with them promoting that US sellers ship here.

If more US stores ship to Canada more products become available online amd in turn, that could attract more Canadian buyers to buy online which could benefit us as well. It's similar to how the box stores congregate in one area...the more choices there are the more people gravitate to that area.

sylviebee · ‎03-10-2017

When I read this I saw it as a simple one time blog targeted at US sellers.

That is, it's not an intense expensive program targeting US sellers.

It's just a few paragraphs suggesting they might consider us as viable customers and it probably cost them nothing.

I thought that the best program CPC has had to generate business was when they offered free shipping one day (only) if the label was purchased from their website.

Problem is, that was a one time thing and not nearly enough to keep us coming back.

Most of their efforts with customers involve trying to tighten things up so they never give away more than they have to.

Bad Attitude!