The pandemic has created a paradoxical situation for cross-border e-commerce. While online demand surged with orders flooding in, platform rules tightened and traffic costs escalated, eroding profit margins. "After a year of hard work, all our profits go to the platforms," lamented one seller, voicing widespread industry frustration. Facing this "cost swamp," how can small and medium-sized cross-border sellers reduce platform dependency and achieve sustainable growth? The answer may lie in building independent websites centered on user assets.
Platform Predicament: Diminishing Returns and Lost User Assets
For years, cross-border sellers have relied on platforms like Amazon and eBay for traffic and orders. However, intensifying competition has driven up advertising costs while squeezing profit margins. More critically, under platform models, user data and relationships remain with the platform, preventing sellers from direct customer engagement and making brand loyalty difficult to cultivate. This means sellers' substantial customer acquisition investments ultimately enrich the platforms rather than building long-term value.
"Platforms operate like shopping malls where sellers are merely tenants," explained an industry insider. "While benefiting from foot traffic, they pay steep rents through commissions and ads, with customers remembering the mall rather than individual stores."
The Independent Solution: User Asset Compounding
Independent websites—seller-owned e-commerce platforms—offer complete control over user data and operations. This enables direct customer communication, personalized services, and brand loyalty development, creating sustainable user asset appreciation.
User assets represent more than follower counts or repeat buyers; they form a monetizable operational cycle comprising:
- Identifiable assets: Email addresses, phone numbers, and behavioral tags enabling targeted marketing.
- Operable assets: User pools segmented for customized engagement to boost activity and conversions.
- Monetizable assets: User portfolios generating sustained GMV across lifecycle stages.
By systematically capturing, cultivating, and accumulating users, independent sites transform transactions into appreciating assets.
Implementation Options: Matching Solutions to Needs
Current market offerings allow sellers to select website solutions aligned with their scale, objectives, and capabilities:
- Lightweight setups: SaaS-based platforms (Shopify, Ueeshop) offer simplicity and affordability for market testing.
- Mid-range customization: Open-source systems (WooCommerce) permit tailored development for technically proficient sellers.
- Integrated solutions: Combine marketing tools and analytics for omnichannel management, suited for established sellers.
New sellers should consider lightweight options before progressing to customized solutions.
Core Advantage: Regaining User Control
The fundamental distinction lies in data ownership: platforms control user information while sellers access it passively; independent sites enable proactive user value extraction.
Owning user assets means controlling pricing power, repeat purchases, and profitability. Independent websites represent the crucial step toward reclaiming this control.
Five Growth Levers of Independent Platforms
Beyond sales channels, independent sites function as integrated brand-building, user operations, and data-driven platforms offering compounding benefits:
- Brand visualization: Customizable interfaces showcase brand identity, enhancing trust and premium pricing capacity.
- Data-driven growth: Integrating CDP systems (Treasure Data, Segment) with marketing automation tools (Klaviyo, ActiveCampaign) enables behavior tracking, personalized recommendations, and automated outreach to boost conversions.
- Marketing flexibility: Implement dynamic discounts, A/B testing, and multi-channel campaigns (email/SMS/WhatsApp) for precision targeting.
- Short-video synergy: Emerging platforms like TikTok serve as vital traffic sources through KOL collaborations and affiliate programs.
- Global expansion: Multi-language content, multi-currency payments, and localized logistics facilitate international scaling.
Transition Challenges: Technical, Operational, and Regulatory
While promising, the shift presents practical obstacles:
- Technical complexity: Template systems may prove functionally limited without optimization expertise.
- Traffic acquisition: Initial advertising costs exceed platform organic traffic, requiring sustained investment.
- Compliance risks: Stricter EU regulations (notably the Digital Services Act) mandate user behavior traceability and transparent content management.
Mitigation strategies include:
- Skill development: Acquire website development expertise or secure technical support.
- Precision operations: Implement detailed marketing plans with continuous A/B testing and ad optimization.
- Regulatory preparedness: Deploy audit systems (OneTrust, DataGuard) to ensure compliance ahead of 2025 DSA implementation.
Strategic Considerations: Targeted Adoption
Independent websites particularly suit:
- Brand-conscious sellers seeking identity establishment.
- Operationally capable sellers able to execute sophisticated user management.
- Long-term planners prioritizing sustainable assets over temporary platform traffic.
Even sellers not fully transitioning should strategically experiment with independent sites to accumulate user data for future development.
Implementation Roadmap
Key development phases include:
- Requirements definition: Clarify product positioning, target audiences, and core metrics (conversion/repeat rates).
- Platform selection: Beginners opt for Shopify/Ueeshop; technically skilled choose WooCommerce/WordPress; mature teams consider Magento or custom CMS.
- Tool integration: Combine CDP, marketing automation, video distribution (UpPromote, Refersion), payment (Stripe, PayPal/Wise), and logistics (Dropi, EasyShip) solutions.
Emerging Trends and Best Practices
Critical considerations:
- Avoid plugin overload compromising site speed.
- Maintain daily full-site backups against system failures.
- Prioritize SEO and content to establish early credibility.
Future developments will emphasize:
- AI-generated content (AIGC) and personalized recommendations as competitive differentiators.
- Content traceability and user data authorization as 2025 regulatory priorities.
As platform traffic advantages fade and advertising returns diminish, cross-border sellers can no longer stake their futures on capricious platform policies. Independent websites represent not quick fixes but essential foundations for enduring brand equity.
Sustainable profitability emerges not from individual transactions but from the cumulative value of retained customers—their repeat purchases, referrals, and ongoing engagement. This virtuous cycle begins with reclaiming ownership of user assets.