
Porter Erisman‘s new book Six Billion Shoppers tackles e-commerce in the developing world and provides insights on shortcomings and opportunities for the future.
Porter takes his wisdom from his years working at Alibaba and combines it with views from a tour/survey of digital retailers from Asia, Latin America and Africa to come up with a broader perspective on what it means to win at the “global e-commerce boom”. The book describes Porter’s insights from meeting with industry leaders and key executives, details trends and predictions, discusses challenges in providing services to a diverse population, and so much more.
Here is a quick look at what Mike Cormack has to say in his book review, featured in the SCMP:
Throughout Six Billion Shoppers , in fact, Erisman’s knowledge of and passion for the industry is clear, and he wants e-commerce to succeed. He argues that trust is the basis of commerce and points out what digital companies must implement to ensure its advancement, from escrow payment systems to online chatting between buyers and sellers (prohibited by eBay and Amazon).
E-commerce’s success in emerging regions, Erisman argues, is partly due to the fact that it does not impair traditional retail, as it does in mature markets. Rather, by giving more people access to the global economic ecosystem, it furthers trade not only in cities, but also in the most isolated of villages. Erisman relates how a man making leather jackets in India started to sell them online, and then saw his sales increase from US$230 to US$23,000 a month.
Porter Erisman is an entrepreneur, e-commerce consultant and award-winning filmmaker with more than 20 years of experience in China.
From 2000-2008, Erisman served as Vice-President at Alibaba Group as the company grew from founder Jack Ma’s apartment into the world’s largest e-commerce company. Based in China, Erisman at various times headed Alibaba’s international marketing, website operations and corporate affairs.
After leaving Alibaba, Erisman produced and directed “Crocodile in the Yangtze”, an independent documentary film about his experience inside the company. The film screened at twenty film festivals worldwide garnering several awards including “Best Documentary” at the San Francisco United Film Festival and “Best Film on Entrepreneurship” at the Silicon Valley Film Festival. From 2012 to 2014, Erisman traveled with the film to sixty screenings on six continents before selling the film to Bloomberg Television, which broadcast Crocodile in the Yangtze throughout the fall of 2014.
Erisman has spoken at conferences around the world and has been featured in leading media including The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, CNBC, Bloomberg, NPR and the BBC. He is also the author of “Alibaba’s World: How a Remarkable Chinese Company is Changing the Face of Global Business” (Palgrave Macmillan, 2015) and “Six Billion Shoppers: The Companies Winning the Global E-Commerce Boom” (St. Martin’s Press, 2017).
Since leaving Alibaba, Erisman has remained involved in startups in developing countries by consulting to e-commerce companies in India, Nigeria, China and Vietnam.
- Global E-commerce Boom
- China Business
- Capturing the China Opportunity
- The Alibaba Story
Contact us if you would like to engage Porter Erisman to speak at your next business event.