While Hong Kongers love to shop all year round, the start of November marks the beginning of a peak sales period in other parts of the world, particularly North America, Europe and Australia.
Increased overseas demand creates a huge opportunity for merchants in Hong Kong as savvy global buyers go online to source unique Christmas gifts and grab bargains.
During Cyber Monday, the busy online shopping period after Thanksgiving, celebrated in North America, PayPal recorded 120 transactions per minute in Hong Kong last year, amounting to over 174,000 transactions.
James Mirfin, country manager of PayPal Hong Kong and Taiwan urges Hong Kong merchants to tap into the business opportunities brought by the festive season and offers top tips to sellers.
"Cyber Monday was the busiest selling period in Hong Kong in both 2011 and 2012, and we are expecting it to be a hit with overseas buyers again this year. While the US economy struggles to overcome weak growth and low customer confidence, demand from consumers in growing markets such as Australia (16 percent) and Russia (14 percent) appears to pick up in Q4, with Germany coming third (9 percent), according to our Q4 2012 data," he said.
"Looking at these figures, Hong Kong merchants need to embrace cross-border trade to identify new growth corridors and re-think their international sales strategy to appeal to customers in those markets,” he added.
In Q4 2012 the top categories were fashion (22 percent), toys (13 percent), cameras (12 percent), cellphones (11 percent) and electronics (11 percent).