Let's talk about Taobao

For the previous blog post, we didn't mention about Taobao and 1688 because it is not English-friendly. It's all in Chinese. If you do not know any word of Chinese, then it is pretty to shop in both Taobao and 1688. 

Shopping directly at Taobao and 1688 are an intriguing experience. Products in 1688 is more cheaper than Taobao but it is more like selling bulk products which means usually they set an amount to let customer to buy for it. Sometime you will need to buy at leat 10 pieces, but sometimes one is just fine. You will need to discuss with them about the purchase amount. Before we talk about 1688, we would like to introduce Taobao. Because people usually use Taobao rather than 1688. 

Shopping on merchants such as Taobao.com and 1688.com can be tricky as they are not based in your hometown and the language you might not understand. 

Why Should I Shop on Taobao?

Firstly, shopping on Taobao can save you loads of money! To compare with other merchants, the product price in Taobao is very low but in high quality ( have to view the comments and reviews before you take action). 

In the example above, you’ll be saving 72% on a brush storage box that you bought from Taobao instead of Amazon. But please be careful, Taobao have a lot of products which have the same pictures. Therefore, you will need to look for the reviews and see how many buyer bought the products before. Sometime Google Translate is a useful tool. When you have any questions, you can go to customer service and chat with them. The bad thing is they usually do not understand English so you may need a translate tool. 

Translate Chinese Taobao to English Taobao

The one of the major difficulty you are facing to shop on taobao is the Chinese language. In order to solve this obstacle, you need the Google Chrome to get the single page or the whole website translated into your onw language. Get started now:

1) Install Google Chrome. This browser enables instant webpage translation into English, a prerequisite for comfortable Taobao.com shopping. (Unless, of course, you are fluent in reading Chinese.)

This method is far preferable to individual-word translating because you get the big picture. Sure, some of the text may look weird or seem poorly translated, but it’s sufficient to allow you to shop.

2) Open Google Chrome’s settings and search for “translate”. Make sure on the Language Input settings that Chinese (Simplified) is checked for “Offer to translate pages in this language”.

Now, any Taobao.com pages you open will automatically be translated into English.