Online companies like eBay and Amazon pioneered the development of global markets. Together they have hundreds of millions of active accounts for buyers and sellers, which generate billions of dollars of revenue. These marketplaces have also enabled more companies (and even individuals) to trade in foreign markets than ever before, and have fostered the development of other trading platforms, for example La Redoute (France), Rakuten (Japan) and Alibaba (China).

Amazon actively trades in 13 global marketplaces in the US, Europe, India and Asia, and takes a proactive role in encouraging and helping its sellers to trade around the world. While developing its global digital marketplace, it has accumulated knowledge about how to succeed in distance selling, especially when crossing national boundaries. Amazon now shares this information to help its own customers trade in foreign markets......

Questions:

1. Visit Amazon services at http://services.amazon.com/global-selling and then, using the information provided, select a region – a country-specific domain – and suggest a range of products you might sell to a new market in this region. 

2. Suggest what difficulties you might encounter when deciding which marketplace to enter. 

3. Based on your answers to questions 1 and 2, devise your own set of priorities that companies should consider when selecting and entering foreign markets.