As the leader in a market of over 635 million people in the Latin America region with one of the world’s fastest-growing Internet penetration rates, MercadoLibre provides buyers and sellers with a robust online trading environment, now available to the United States sellers.
What is the MercadoLibre marketplace?
Most likely, you have already heard about MercadoLibre’s success from the press, but it is not just another e-commerce site. MercadoLibre is the largest in Latin American technology and commerce ecosystem, offering an e-commerce marketplace platform, logistics, warehousing, and online payments. MercadoLibre is present in 18 countries including Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, Chile, Venezuela, and Peru.
How can a US seller sell in Latin America?
To simplify the process, MercadoLibre created the Global Selling Program, which allows international merchants to sell throughout Latin America. Currently, Cross-Border Trade is enabled in Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, and Chile.
MercadoLibre knew that to get international sellers to join the marketplace, they needed to support them with all the complexity of selling globally. Thanks to the Global Selling Program, they conquer challenges such as currency, calculating customs, taxes, and shipping. Global Selling Program makes selling in Latin America as simple as selling within the US.
MercadoLibre partners with local carriers (in the US it is DHL), so sellers do not need to worry about calculating shipping costs and import taxes. Sellers receive ready-to-print shipping labels without a need to integrate or negotiate with a new shipping provider. Sellers drop off packages to the local DHL office (or it is picked up by the carrier), everything else is taken care of by the DHL and MercadoLibre.
What Can You Sell on MercadoLibre?
MercadoLibre offers all categories of products, and if you currently sell your products in US marketplaces, you are most likely to be able to sell them on MercadoLibre as well. However, before you start uploading products to MercadoLibre, you need to take into consideration the dimension and weight restrictions, as well as a list of restrictions for some Latin American products.
Uploading products to MercadoLibre
MercadoLibre offers an option to upload products via CSV to the seller center. However, this is much easier to do using GeekSeller’s tools and graphical interface. Before you start working on your catalog, keep in mind that similar to other marketplaces, MercadoLibre will need your products to have correct categories, GTIN (EAN or UPC), and proper dimensions (weight and size). The good news is that you do not need to translate your product description to local languages. MercadoLibre technology will do it for you!
Returns
- When fulfilled by the seller: MercadoLibre is going to refund the buyer. The seller is not getting the payment for the product and it will need to afford the cost of the return shipment.
- When fulfilled by Mercadolibre: MercadoLibre is going to refund the buyer and there is no extra cost for the return shipment.
See the following link where you can find more information regarding Returns.
How much does it cost to sell on MercadoLibre?
It is free to list your products on MercadoLibre. Similar to other marketplaces, MercadoLibre charges a percentage of the sold products as a fee. The applicable fees for Mexico are between 12.5% and 22.5% (depending on your products category) and 16% for Brazil and Chile. On top of that, if you are selling with free shipping (i.e. Mexico) you will be paying for a percentage of the shipping cost; see details.
You are selling in Latin America, but you will receive an international wire transfer in USD. This is important to mention that you do not need to worry about currency fluctuations. Sellers submit products to MercadoLibre indicating the price in the USA. Buyers on MercadoLibre pay in their local currency, but sellers receive the amount in USD, so MercadoLibre takes on them the potential currency rate changes.
Shipping products to Latin America
MercadoLibre offers a few options to help the US sellers ship products to buyers from Latin America:
- Ship By MercadoLibre – similar to Amazon’s FBA and Walmart’s WFS program, qualified sellers can ship products to MercadoLibre’s warehouses and have products being automatically fulfilled by the marketplace. Learn more about Fulfillment by MercadoLibre here.
- Ship with Partnered Carrier – this is the preferred way for the US companies selling on MercadoLibre. MercadoLibre works with the local carrier (for the US sellers this is DHL) and provides ready-to-print shipping labels to sellers. Below, we go into details about how it works.
How does Ship with Partnered Carrier work?
Step 1.
Working with GeekSeller, sellers publish products on MercadoLibre, making sure listings have the dimensions and weight information provided; see product Dimensions and Weight Restrictions.
Step 2.
Based on the information provided by the sellers, MercadoLibre calculates shipping costs and taxes for each market; more details about costs.
Step 3.
When a seller receives an order, MercadoLibre automatically generates a label and a seller can print it directly from the GeekSeller panel.
Step 4.
A seller needs to deliver products to the carrier within 3 business days (maximum handling time allowed). If a seller generates at least 10 orders per day, it is possible to schedule the carrier to come for a pickup (you need to contact MercadoLibre to activate it).
Step 5.
Carrier delivers products to the buyer; see standard delivery times.
Advertising on MercadoLibre
MercadoLibre has a lot of traffic, with proper products and pricing you will not complain about a lack of orders. However, MercadoLibre allows sellers to give even more visibility of their products with MercadoLibre’s advertising solution called Product Ads. MercadoLibre will create ads with your listings and choose the best place and time to show them to buyers. Sellers have the ability to hide, pause, or activate campaigns, as well as set a daily budget. The platform is based on the PPC model, so you only pay when a user clicks on your ad.
How to register on MercadoLibre?
Ready to sell on MercadoLibre? Not all sellers can join the program, MercadoLibre works with sellers with a track record of selling quality products and offering outstanding service to buyers. There are also some preferred categories of products that MercadoLibre is looking for.
GeekSeller works with MercadoLibre to select and onboard sellers, please contact us to see if you qualify and work with us on your application.