@studyfreak.s guide to buying from ezbuy and taobao
Hello!! As many of you have requested,, here is @studyfreak.s guide to buying from taobao / ezbuy !!
First of all,, i would like to clarify that these are my personal opinions and experiences and if you have any questions, feel free to dm me on instagram, i will be more than happy to help ^^ also,, this post is not sponsored by any of these companies mentioned (tbh i wish LOL)
Now let’s start with the basic, what is ezbuy and taobao? And what is the difference between the two?
Taobao is a china website which has many wholesale items for REALLY REALLY cheap prices !! it also fully in chinese O.O
Ezbuy (formerly know as daigou95) is a taobao agent. They basically help you to order from taobao. The best part for most people is that the website/app is in english YAY (for people who cmi in chinese lmao jkjk but seriously,, i still struggle with chinese even though i take higher chinese whoops). Ezbuy also charges 7% agent fee for “normal” users aka most of us. BUT they frequently have free agent fee and discounted shipping offers so be sure to wait for those! BTW heres a tip for you, if you are a first time user (aka you have signed up with your mobile phone before) you can use youtuber links to get $10 off your first purchase! (min $20 spend). Im pretty sure the youtubers gain profit but i mean,, its a win win situation right?
Heres the ezbuy sign up link from one of my favourite singaporean youtube channel heh : http://marketing.ezbuy.sg/ezbuyMobileRegister/index_SG.html?identId=rhwXwt
I will be breaking the guide up into different parts because there is seriously so many things to cover AHHHHH
ONE. how to buy from taobao & ezbuy?
Let’s start with taobao! So to buy something, you need to find it right? HAHAH if you download the taobao mobile app on your phone, you can search with PICTURES yAy which is a huge lifesaver especially when you have no idea what the item you want is called in chinese.
All you have to do is to screenshot whatever you are looking for and search it! BAM you get many many listings from various sellers!
alternatively,, you can also search using chinese heh so heres a mini list of common (studygram) items in china chinese (bear in mind, china chinese and singaporean chinese is quite different LOL)
Washi tape 纸胶贴
Sticky notes/ post-its N次贴
Stickers 贴纸
Notebooks 笔记本
Then add choose your items, quantity and add it to your cart ! (if you need help,, you can try using the good ol google translate for not so accurate translations HAHAH)
Moving on to ezbuy! Personally, i prefer to search up the products on taobao then copy and paste the link to ezbuy because the prices are cheaper (most of the time heh). For example, one washi tape from searched from ezbuy costs about $1+ but if you copy and paste the taobao link into ezbuy (which falls under what ezbuy would call the “buy for me” category), it will cost you less than $1.
TWO. SHIPPING 包邮
There might be two kinds of shipping domestic shipping and international shipping (they ship to your countries)
Lets start with domestic shipping. Some sellers provide free domestic shipping aka shipping in china for free right of the bat, however some only provide free domestic shipping if you purchase above a certain amount. This “amount” varies from seller to seller. You should always ask before buying because if you are getting a washi tape that costs $0.60 and the domestic shipping is $2 for that one washi tape, it aint worth it.
Now the thing is,, ezbuy doesn’t tell you the minimum amount required by the seller for free domestic free if you are using this platform. So you still have to go ask the seller on taobao yourself.
To make your life easier, here is something you can ask in chinese which you can copy and paste to ask the seller, “您好。请问我需要花多少才能拿到免费包邮呢？” which translates to: hello, may i ask, how much do i have to spend in order to get free (domestic shipping)?
You’re welcome hehe :)
*IMPORTANT*
If you are buying from ezbuy and QUALIFY for free domestic shipping, be sure to edit the domestic shipping fee and leave a remark in the comments saying that you have spent $x which qualifies for free domestic shipping. If you want, you can also copy and paste what the seller from taobao has sent to you as “proof”. This way, you won’t get charged for it. I wasn’t aware of this previously and waste $3 on domestic shipping when i qualified for it TT
So that is for domestic shipping PHEW… now to international shipping,,
So here is the difference between ezbuy and taobao when it comes to international shipping. If you are buying from taobao, make sure to chose “global consolidation and shipping” and NOT direct international shipping because that will cost you a BOMB. then, choose a forwarder, i usually pick the cheapest one lol.
For ezbuy, you dont have to select anything for international shipping.
now ,, from my personal experience, here’s what i would recommend: if you are just buying everything from one seller, you can just get it directly from taobao. If not, choose ezbuy. Why is this so? Ezbuy actually helps you to repackage all your items from different sellers aka remove all those useless cardboard and all (your taobao forwarder does not), which reduces your overall shipping fee. Trust me, its not fun having to pay for shipping fee for all those useless cardboard -,-” ezbuy’s shipping international shipping fee for economy air is SGD$1.69 for 500g. For taobao’s rate, it depends on your forwarder. The only downside is that ezbuy does not ship directly to your house for free (your taobao forwarder does though) which means you have to collect it from a) their warehouse; b) mrt stations; c) neighbourhood stations. Its still pretty convenient i guess because they have collection points all over the country (at least for singapore).
And that is IT !!! omg good job if you have read till here because this is lengthy af (im sorry ><)
Like i’ve said before, feel free to dm me if you have any questions / if i havent covered a topic regarding this matter!! I hope this is useful for all of you! Happy shopping! ≧◡≦
