Foreign trade and cross-border e-commerce have both differences and connections.

Foreign trade covers a wide range. In the process of trading, its products are not limited to physical objects, and most foreign trade orders are in the form of wholesale, and the tax declaration process is relatively complicated.

Cross-border e-commerce is a new industry in recent years and has not existed for a long time. It mainly serves consumers and is a commodity sales platform. Amazon and AliExpress are the most common cross-border e-commerce platforms we usually come into contact with.

Foreign trade and cross-border e-commerce have certain differences in terms of the subject. In the process of expanding overseas markets, foreign trade companies mainly promote and market their own products, hoping to attract foreign customers to cooperate with them.

Merchants doing cross-border e-commerce use a platform to communicate with domestic and foreign customers to directly publish their product information. The main purpose is to sell goods. Secondly, there are differences in the links. The commodities traded by foreign trade companies are bulk goods with a large quantity, so it will take more time in the process of import and export. The final transaction amount of cross-border e-commerce and the company's profit are directly linked to the transportation time, so merchants will pay special attention to the cost investment in the transportation link, try to improve transportation efficiency and reduce capital loss.

In addition, foreign trade and cross-border e-commerce are also different in transaction methods. In the process of foreign trade transactions, buyers and sellers generally choose to conduct offline transactions, or the transaction amount will not be circulated through a third party.

However, cross-border e-commerce is different. Their transaction activities are carried out on a third-party platform, so the payment for the goods also needs to be paid to the third-party platform and then to the seller. Most of the foreign trade transactions are bulk goods, so both customs review and tax declaration processes are relatively cumbersome, involving many types of taxes. However, cross-border e-commerce is a transaction facing individuals, so the tax is less, and it may only involve postal tax, so the tax and customs links are relatively simple.

The advantage of traditional foreign trade is that after years of development and precipitation, the entire transaction process is very mature. At present, China already has very mature foreign trade factories and foreign trade staff, and the fields involved in the global market are very wide. However, traditional foreign trade also has certain development bottlenecks. For example, the grades of foreign trade products are mostly concentrated in low-end and medium-end products. Moreover, as the labor price in my country continues to rise, it has caused certain obstacles to the development of foreign trade enterprises.

Many foreign trade enterprises in China now ignore brand publicity and product promotion. They do not have their own products. Most factories are still doing OEM business, so the development is relatively sluggish.

The advantage of cross-border e-commerce is that it breaks through the geographical restrictions of traditional foreign trade and can carry out trade activities on a global scale. Customers purchase goods online through the platform, and sellers can communicate with consumers face to face, so many unnecessary links are omitted.

1. Different subject directions.

2. Different import and export links

3. Different online and offline transactions:

(I) Definition of the concepts of cross-border e-commerce and traditional foreign trade

Cross-border e-commerce refers to a new type of international business activity in which different trading objects in different countries or regions conduct transactions through e-commerce platforms, complete payment settlement on the platform, and deliver goods to buyers through international logistics, thereby realizing cross-border retail transactions.

In short, cross-border e-commerce is the spatial extension of local e-commerce in various regions. Transactions between provinces and cities have become transactions between countries and regions around the world.

So the most significant difference between cross-border e-commerce and local e-commerce is that cross-border e-commerce involves customs clearance and sales in the destination country.

(II) The current situation of cross-border e-commerce and traditional foreign trade

At present, China's cross-border e-commerce industry is developing rapidly. As of 2018, there are more than 6,000 registered e-commerce platforms.

The number of companies engaged in cross-border e-commerce export retail business through various cross-border e-commerce platforms such as Amazon, eBay, and AliExpress exceeds 500,000. In recent years, the retail trade volume of cross-border e-commerce has continued to grow rapidly.