Alibaba is quickly becoming a household name like Dawn or Kleenex. You’d be hard-pressed to find one entrepreneur who hasn’t heard of this worldwide company. Yes, Alibaba is the undisputed king of manufacturer sourcing. It is the largest, centralized source for finding a factory for your business. Alibaba’s website is streamlined, beautifully designed, easy to use, and includes ample customer protection built into its platform. There’s no better place to find a factory for your next product, especially if you try to find something based out of Asia.
But, here is a harsh reality. The vast majority of sellers are using Alibaba all wrong, especially the RFQ (request for quotes) process. For those of you who are a bit unfamiliar with Alibaba, let me cover some basics first.
The first option is doing it by hand. Let’s say you know the main keyword for your product. You’d simply use the search bar on Alibaba and start filtering out factories and reaching out to ones that stand out for your market. If you take this manual process, be prepared to spend countless hours hunting for a factory and never receiving a response. It’s a pain; I won’t sugar coat it. But, there’s a better way!
The RFQ sourcing method is what you want. But first, what is an RFQ? This acronym stands for “request for quotes.” This is no different than what construction companies do to attract bids from subcontractors for a big job. General requirements are laid out in an RFQ, and said subcontractors respond with their best pricing. It’s similar to Alibaba. Instead of manually hunting for a factory, let them come to you. In a nutshell, you are writing a formal RFQ letter which is then blasted out to the entire Alibaba factory network. This is where things get a bit crazy. Expect 25+ emails from factories and spam emails for years to come!
This is where most go wrong. It’s quite common and honestly natural to write as yourself and assume the best in others. Yeah, don’t do this on Alibaba. This is a business transaction and nothing more. Don’t treat your intro lightly. Treat it quite the opposite. Your mission here is to come across as an established organization with a widespread internal network. Don’t reference yourself as a “small, independent business owner.” Instead, reference yourself as the head of sourcing at ABC Enterprises. This company name should be fictitious. The factories are screening you as much as you are screening them. Treat your company name here as a DBA (doing business as).
Don’t use your actual LLC name, and don’t mention that you are sourcing for your Amazon store. Drive home the message that you are only looking for top factories and don’t have time to mess around. And no, I’m not encouraging you to lie about anything. Instead, I’m trying to get you to think outside the box. Assuming you are an Amazon seller, you are the CEO and the CFO, head of marketing, head of customer service, and head of logistics. Don’t feel unsure of using big labels. The moment you let on that you are a small seller on Amazon is the moment you will lose out on many top-notch factories. It’s all about messaging.
This is a hotly debated subject, and unfortunately, there’s no one size fits all. Instead of going into the weeds here, I’ll list out the best prices for your next RFQ. Don’t write an essay. Instead, keep it short and sweet. If you include the following basic items, you will receive a strong response from factories on Alibaba:
As you can see, writing a proper RFQ is not rocket science; however, there IS a RIGHT way to write one. The big takeaway is to write as if you are part of a large organization. Foreign factories are analyzing your text as much as you are analyzing their responses. I hope this guide points you in the right direction and brings some quality factories your way, and reduces your anxiety a bit for the sourcing process.
Jon runs Black Label Advisor, a dedicated one-on-one consulting firm specializing in helping sellers thrive on Amazon, Walmart, and beyond.
Whether it’s listing optimization or positioning your business for a multi-million-dollar exit, Jon is the industry expert you need in your back pocket.
Feel free to reach him via email at jonelder@blacklabeladvisor.com.
Jon Elder is a full-time consultant helping other Amazon sellers achieve the same success he had at Black Label Advisor. He has a passion for helping other Amazon sellers get over the inevitable bumps in the road. At Black Label Advisor, he hand-selects his clients and pours into them and shares all his knowledge he gained over the years selling on
Jon Elder is a full-time consultant helping other Amazon sellers achieve the same success he had at Black Label Advisor. He has a passion for helping other Amazon sellers get over the inevitable bumps in the road. At Black Label Advisor, he hand-selects his clients and pours into them and shares all his knowledge he gained over the years selling on
