General

What is customs data?

Customs data refers to various import and export statistical data generated by the customs in performing the import and export trade statistics function. It refers to the most authentic customs transaction records of the buyer and seller in various countries. Many people also call it customs bill of lading. The data fields include: commodity name, detailed commodity description, brand, variety, quantity, amount, unit price, unit of measurement, port, customs clearance date, transportation mode, trade mode, payment method, etc, Of course, different countries have different announcements.

Historical source of customs data

Speaking of customs statistics, it has a long history. As early as the late Qing Dynasty, the Customs had established a systematic and complete statistical agency, the Shanghai Bookkeeping Office of the General Administration of Taxation, to carry out trade statistics and prepare and print a batch of trade reports. In the 20th year of the Republic of China (1931), he also purchased the first domestic and then the most advanced statistical machine in the world from abroad.

After the founding of the People's Republic of China, the General Administration of Customs set up a statistics office of 74 people out of 240. The director was Lin Daqi, an underground member of the former customs and one of the organizers of the Kowloon Customs Uprising. In 1950, Zhou Enlai, the Prime Minister of the Government Council, also wrote a title for Customs Statistics, which shows that the country attaches great importance to customs statistics

In 1953, the General Administration of Customs took the lead in using complete sets of statistical machines to compile customs statistics

In 1956, the General Administration of Customs formulated the Customs Statistics System of the People's Republic of China for Foreign Trade, which was approved by the National Bureau of Statistics for implementation. So far, the customs statistical work has embarked on the institutionalized track.

During this period, customs statistics became the only foreign trade import and export data of China, providing comprehensive and timely statistical information for the development and planning of the national economy.

After the completion of the socialist transformation, foreign trade has changed from public and private operation to the exclusive operation of state-owned foreign trade companies, and the central mandatory foreign trade plan has been implemented. At the same time, due to the economic blockade of western countries, China's foreign trade is single and the volume of trade is shrinking. The State formulates foreign trade policies based on the business statistics prepared by the foreign trade department. The role of customs statistics has been reduced. The monthly and quarterly reports of customs statistics have been suspended one after another, and only the annual reports and journals are reserved for the government departments as the data for the preparation of long-term planning and scientific research.

In May 1979, the Customs Administration established the "Preparatory Group for the Restoration of Customs Statistics". In November of the same year, the Customs Statistics System of the People's Republic of China and its implementation rules were adopted and implemented as of January 1, 1980. So far, the customs statistical work that has been interrupted for 13 years has been fully resumed, and its working policy is "seeking truth from facts, scientific and practical, accurate and timely, concise and complete".

In 1981, with the approval of the State Council, China used customs statistics for import and export trade. Since the same year, customs statistics have been regularly provided to the International Monetary Fund as statistical data of China's foreign trade imports and exports.

In 1986, the General Administration of Customs established the Comprehensive Statistics Department to guide the national customs statistics work. The Customs Law of the People's Republic of China, implemented in July 1987, lists the compilation of customs statistics as one of the four basic functions of the customs.

Application of customs data:

1. The customs data can be used to analyze these purchasers, analyze their purchase volume, purchase cycle, product specifications, etc., and see if they match their own supply capacity. Focus on the development of relatively matched buyers, which can save time and improve the success rate.

2. Don't use the contact information of customs data. First, filter out the freight forwarders, and then check whether the mailbox is available and accessible. Because some mailboxes may have been cancelled, you can avoid doing useless work.

3. Use customs data in combination with Google search and foreign social platforms. You can search the enterprise names of the selected buyers in Google, Facebook, and Linkedin to find more contact information and enterprise related information, which will help improve the success rate of the development letter.

4. The export data of competitors in the same industry can be seen in the customs data, and they can be monitored. Every year, there are closed foreign trade enterprises or factories that can take advantage of the opportunity to enter and receive their customers, with a high success rate.

5. If you have an old customer who has been cooperating with you, you can also monitor it with data, and you will find that you can see how many goods he has purchased from others, how much he has purchased, specifications, packaging, etc. As long as you analyze it carefully, you can find some breakthroughs and let him actively add orders.

6. Customs data can also be used to develop new markets. You can use the data to query and compare which countries import more of your products. In order to change the new market, everything should start from scratch. The customs data can quickly help you find buyers in the new market, which is very useful.

Countries with open customs data

United States, Mexico, Panama, Costa Rica, Honduras, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala

Argentina, Paraguay, Brazil, Peru, Bolivia, Hungodova, Venezuela, Uruguay, Chile

Russia, Ukraine, Britain, South Korea, India, Pakistan, Vietnam, Taiwan, China, Philippines, Kazakhstan

Kyrgyzstan, Sri Lanka, Uzbekistan, Indonesia, Ethiopia

The role of customs data

1、 Analyze target market

If your company has a new product just launched, or its existing business volume is not saturated, and is ready to open up new markets, you must want to know which country has more demand and business opportunities.

Through customs data, we can intuitively understand the number of buyers, transaction times and import quantity of many countries in the world, and then grasp the market demand and market trend of these countries, providing key information and valuable reference for foreign trade enterprises in market decision-making.

Generally, each product has its own customs code, which can be used for searching. In this way, we can search which countries will have more market for this product. It can also be found that an enterprise in a certain country is the largest purchaser. We can see their purchasing power, purchasing habits and purchasing cycle.

2、 Insight into industry changes

Taking LED as an example, through customs data, foreign trade enterprises can clearly grasp the global transaction times, purchaser data and supplier number of the product each month, so as to analyze the overall changes and trends in the export market of LED products, as well as the intensity of competition in the industry, which will help enterprises adjust market strategies in a timely manner and develop target markets in a planned way.

3、 Lock in competitors

Through the bill of lading information in the customs data, foreign trade enterprises can accurately understand their industry competitors and their transaction records.

Generally speaking, many products have industrial belts, such as the luggage industry belt in Baigou, Hebei, the auto parts industry belt in Taizhou, Zhejiang, the 3C consumer goods industry belt in Shenzhen, Guangdong, the wig industry belt in Xuchang, Henan, and the LED display industry belt in Shenzhen, Guangdong. So your peers or competitors are basically in the same province, city or even street as your company. After we find these competitors through customs data, we can use tools such as Skyeye and Enterprise Inspection to check the enterprise type, operation status and production scale of these competitors for analysis, so that we can know ourselves and the other, so as to better understand our position and advantages in the industry and facilitate enterprises to formulate targeted market strategies. If you want to know which ten countries have the most sales of your competitors' products in the world, which models have the most sales, the global market share, and the global market share of each country, this customs data dialysis table can also be realized.

4、 Monitoring peer customers

Through customs data, foreign trade enterprises can continuously track and analyze the transaction records of competitors and master the procurement rules of their purchasers.

For example, how often to purchase, how many times a year, and how much to purchase each time, so as to recommend the appropriate products to the purchaser at the appropriate time, improve the success rate of signing the order, and quickly seize the market of competitors.

How to call it good customs data

01. Is there an independently developed online query system

The independently developed query system is very important. The online query here is aimed at the customs data imported by foreign buyers from China, not the export customs data of China.

Because the customs data is constantly updated, if the customs data company does not have an independent system, it is difficult to ensure the continuity and reliability of the data, which is not conducive to the long-term development of customers and understanding of the latest market by foreign traders.

If the customs data query provided by a company is not an online system, but the customs data in EXCEL file format, to a large extent, the company does not have reliable data sources and professional technical capabilities.

Such customs data not only has incomplete information, but also has no guarantee of update speed.

02. Whether the data update time is timely

Shopping malls are like battlefields, and customs data are important information in the foreign trade battlefields.

Only by mastering the latest and fastest first-hand information can foreign trade enterprises take the lead and seize more opportunities in the market.

Professional customs data companies attach great importance to the timeliness of data.

For example, the customs data of XXX will be updated once a month. As of February 15, their data had been updated to January 31.

If the system data update speed of a company is generally slow or not updated, it is basically certain that the company cannot meet the value requirements of foreign trade enterprises for customs data.

03. Whether the customs data are true and accurate

Authenticity, accuracy and comprehensiveness are the core of data.

In order to verify the accuracy of customs data, you can contact the customer service personnel of customs data and ask them to help you demonstrate your keywords, peers, or customers you want to develop online to check whether the data is accurate.

After the online presentation, you will have an 80% probability of judging whether this data is true or not, and whether it can help you develop customers immediately, analyze the frequency of customer purchase, find out the contact information of customers, and prepare for the next step of customer order.

04 Can I find the contact information of key people directly

Customs data can directly target customers, but if you want to quickly negotiate cooperation with the other party, the key is to have contact information of key people.

For policy reasons, we know that customs data itself does not carry contact information. Even if some can see it, it must not be the key person. It is probably just a freight forwarder.

Therefore, when selecting customs data, we also need to see whether we can deeply explore the telephone, email, social account and other contact information of key people and key people of the enterprise. Otherwise, no matter how many accurate customers you have, you can't start.

At this time, we need to combine social media development tools to find the customer's address and contact information, and then analyze the customer's strength background in detail, and then develop customers targeted, which can achieve twice the result with half the effort.