A new phenomenon at this year's Canton Fair: Foreign trade merchants use AI to simultaneously open online exhibitions

On April 15, the Canton Fair opened. Reporters learned that this year's Canton Fair reached a record high on the first day, with more than 60,000 overseas buyers attending the fair.

From the perspective of participating enterprises, the number of national high-tech enterprises, manufacturing champions, and specialized "little giants" has increased by 20% compared with the previous session. Reporters on the scene found that this year, more applications of AI foreign trade and new digital technologies have aroused the enthusiasm of overseas buyers: many exhibitors set up stabilizers and mobile phones, fiddled with computers at the exhibition site, and simultaneously opened online exhibitions through cross-border live broadcasts and AI foreign trade tools.

(The 135th China Import and Export Fair)

Xu Zhiqun, the overseas sales director of Yao Ming Ribbon , a foreign trade company participating in the second session, told reporters: "The biggest change in this year's Canton Fair is the free time for offline entertaining customers. We want to use Alibaba International Station's AI foreign trade tools to directly release new products online. After the optimization of the AI ​​assistant, the online exposure of new products can also be greatly improved , which is equivalent to an online press conference . "

In fact, at the Canton Fair last year, cross-border live streaming also brought new business opportunities to merchants, and many merchants received orders from all over the world through live streaming of the Canton Fair. This year's live streaming has more new features with the addition of AI foreign trade applications.

The reporter learned from Alibaba International Station that starting from April 22 this year , Alibaba International Station will also launch the 2024 Online Internet Trade Fair. The biggest highlight of this online trade fair is to provide every merchant who has the ability to participate in offline exhibitions with the ability to quickly hold an " online launch conference " for new products on the platform using AI technology .

It is understood that this will not only not affect the merchants' offline negotiations and product explanations with customers, but also restore the offline scenes to the online through live broadcast, which will also become the material for online order taking and customer acquisition. Moreover, customer service can be hosted on the " AI Assistant " on Alibaba International Station , so there is no need to worry about being too busy.

"During the New Trade Festival in March this year, we tested the effectiveness of the online press conference. The data showed that the product click-through rate in the online press conference scenario reached 84 % , far exceeding our expectations . " The person in charge also said that the launch during the Canton Fair was to give Chinese foreign trade merchants more exposure opportunities during the peak foreign trade season and get more orders.

With the application of AI in the field of foreign trade, the threshold for Chinese merchants to start overseas business has gradually decreased , which can also improve order conversion .

In March this year , Zhang Kuo, president of Alibaba International Station, posted a report card on AI foreign trade . Only half a year after the product was launched, 12,000 foreign trade companies have already ordered and used it. The number of products released by AI has reached one million, and the overseas search volume of these products has increased by 37 % through AI optimization .

As a window, epitome and symbol of China's opening up to the outside world, the Canton Fair is often regarded by foreign trade companies as an important platform for finding new business opportunities and exploring new markets. Moreover, B2B is still the main track of foreign trade, and merchants participating in the Canton Fair also hope to get more business cards on site and show their strength online.

"Using AI to launch an online press conference is really killing two birds with one stone for us. For example, this product is a new product we developed this year, and it is also launched for the first time at the exhibition. On the one hand, it is to show the capabilities of our new products to old customers, and on the other hand, it is also to attract new customers." Li Qihu, general manager of Shenzhen Peicheng Technology Co., Ltd., introduced at the exhibition site, "Although the online trade fair has not yet started, we have already started testing the fluency of the online press conference of Alibaba International Station."

Alibaba International Station

Canton Fair

AI