The rise of marketplaces in Brazil

Cropped image of woman inputting card information and key on phone or laptop while shopping online.

When you make a purchase via e-commerce, what is the means to access the desired product? If the answer is via marketplace (Magazine Luiza, Amazon, Shopee, Mercado Livre or others) know that you are part of the 86% of Brazilians who find these platforms the most convenient way to consume nowadays.

This is what showed a survery called “Online Markeplace Adoption Scenario”, a global study carried out by Mirakl, a SaaS platform for the corporate marketplace. The high percentage also reflects the success of these platforms at the national level: nine out of 10 people said they prefer e-commerces that have marketplaces. The rise of the marketplaces in Brazil is solid and continuous, and just from market leading terms, many are still emerging with a vast choice of products, and others with more specific products.

The marketplaces era

According to the study, the presence of buying and selling on marketplaces around here has grown over the years, with a greater emphasis on the years of the pandemic — and accompanying the significant growth of e-commerce —: 41% of Brazilian respondents said they bought exclusively on marketplaces in 2019, a percentage that jumped to 68% in 2020 and 71% in 2021. In global comparison, the increase was more than double the average for the rest of the world.

In an analysis of national e-commerce numbers, Mirakl found that almost half (48%) of online purchases take place in marketplaces and 71% of consumers reported an increase in the frequency of consumption in these spaces in the last 12 months. Among respondents 58% expect to use these platforms even more in the future.

The survey is a great reflection of giant marketplace companies that have gained a lot of prominence in the country. To get an idea, in the third quarter of 2021 alone, Magazine Luiza earned a profit of R$ 22.6 million, with purchases in e-commerce reaching a total of R$ 10 billion. And this is not the only corporation in the sector that is growing, the same is true of other different marketplaces, thanks to the success of Natura, Casas Bahia, Ponto Frio, among others.

With 58% of Brazilians expecting to increase their use of marketplaces in 2022 and beyond, the number of retailers launching marketplaces will continue to grow, driven by popularity with both consumers and merchants. Every retailer in Brazil needs to be exploring this innovative business model if they want to be successful in the future.

For retailers, one of the most attractive factors of the marketplace is being costless to announce and sell your products through the platform. This makes entrepreneurs start to resell their products on various platforms, having commission only when there are sales, and this reduces the cost of maintaining a standard e-commerce (platform, stock, etc).

For customers, there are a number of reasons why Brazilians end up preferring to consume through marketplaces rather than traditional e-commerce. But the main ones are the security of reimbursement in case of problems with the delivery or the product, the esteem of the company and more reviews from other users.

The study points out that Brazilian power shoppers — those who shop online at least once a week or more — on marketplaces are also more voluminous compared to the global average: 60% in Brazil, 48% for the average consumer and 42% for the global average.

And it is worth noting that 90% of Brazilian power shoppers also want more of their favorite retailers to sell on marketplaces, a strong market indicator.

The big question is: how easy is it to sell on the marketplace?

Generally, the people start alone or with a structure a little bit small. So, the marketplace is a very interesting solution to start and insert your name in the market and help attract customers without having to create an e-commerce structure right from the start of the business. However, it is important to be aware of how this process works so as not to have surprises.

Although it is easy to enter a marketplace, in Brazil, you must have a CNPJ (company registration) and be able to issue an Invoice (tax note). If you don’t, it is recommended you find a local partner to help you entering in the market. At Novatrade, we can help you with that.

Many marketplaces currently already include freight costs in their commissions, enabling the issuance of a label for private freight services or via the Post Office. If you have an ERP, or even a management system, there are several companies on the market that combine marketplaces to be used in a single integration, and this generally makes the team’s time management much easier.

See below the ranking of the biggest in Brazil and their marketshares: