418It is reported that the cross-border e-commerce platform AliExpress will launch five themed promotional events consecutively in July and August, forming a marketing matrix that spans two months. Contrary to conventional perception, these five major promotions are not traditional S-level events, but rather important nodes in the platform’s daily marketing, aimed at providing sellers with continuous opportunities for traffic growth.
Image source: Google
Specific Arrangements and Features of the Five Major Promotions
According to official information from AliExpress, these five major promotions can be divided into three types of activities, each lasting about a week, specifically including:
1. Choice Day (One event each in July & August)
July Choice Day: Already launched at the beginning of July, covering all categories and focusing on high cost-performance hot-selling products. It is suitable for sellers who wish to quickly clear inventory or test market response.
August Choice Day: Focuses on semi-managed products, mainly targeting merchants who have joined AliExpress’s semi-managed service, with the platform providing exclusive traffic support.
Image source: AliExpress
2. Getaway Deals (Mid-July)
This is a site-wide promotion, mainly targeting summer consumption scenarios such as travel gear, outdoor products, sun protection skincare, and other categories with strong seasonal demand. Sellers can adjust their product selection strategies based on summer consumption trends to seize the holiday economy dividend.
3. Seasonal Category Day (One event each in July & August)
Unlike site-wide promotions, Seasonal Category Day adopts a refined operational strategy, opening only to certain categories and specific national markets. For example, home goods may be heavily promoted in the European market, while fashion categories focus on Latin America. Sellers should pay attention to platform recruitment announcements to match their own advantageous categories and target markets.
Image source: AliExpress
Opportunities and Response Strategies for Cross-Border Sellers
Faced with intensive promotional nodes, sellers need to establish systematic operational plans and should first thoroughly study the characteristics of each event.
Site-wide promotions are suitable for comprehensive sellers with ample inventory to clear stock, while targeted category days are key battlegrounds for vertical merchants to build brand awareness. For merchants selected for the semi-managed special event, it is even more important to strictly control logistics timeliness and after-sales service to meet the platform’s high standards for products.
In terms of stocking strategy, it is recommended to use a “pyramid” inventory management method. Allocate 30% of main products for all-channel hot-selling creation, 50% regular products for targeted promotions, and reserve 20% flexible capacity to respond to sudden demand. At the same time, a dynamic pricing mechanism should be established, using platform data analysis tools to monitor competitors in real time, maintaining price competitiveness while ensuring profit.
Image source: AliExpress
Strategic Significance of Platform Ecosystem Development
This round of promotional arrangements reveals three key signals for the development of the AliExpress platform: First, the combination of Choice Day and semi-managed special events continuously strengthens the supply of quality products; second, the country-specific operation of Seasonal Category Day demonstrates the deepening of the platform’s localization strategy; third, inserting a series of marketing activities between the two S-level promotions (618 and 828) effectively fills the sales off-season and creates continuous market buzz.
In the long run, this high-frequency, diversified promotional system will accelerate the optimization of the platform’s traffic distribution mechanism. Data shows that merchants who can continuously participate in multiple events can increase their store weight by an average of 15% to 20%. This also indicates that future cross-border e-commerce competition will increasingly test merchants’ comprehensive capabilities in full-cycle operations.
Image source: Google
Conclusion
AliExpress’s meticulous layout of this mid-year promotion not only provides global consumers with diversified shopping scenarios, but also offers Chinese overseas enterprises a gradient growth path.
As cross-border e-commerce enters an era of intensive cultivation, the coordinated evolution of platforms and sellers is particularly important. This two-month marketing marathon may become the best touchstone to test merchants’ adaptability, and will further write a new footnote for Chinese manufacturing going global.
