Business-Do

6Nurture a Global Mindset

Your business ideas change depending on how you view the world. To create new business models, you have to nurture a broad, realistic worldview.

81 The essence of e-commerce is communication

The internet is a tool that connects people. No matter how far technology advances, the essential qualities of people don't change. Human beings are living creatures who want to connect with others of their kind. The internet may have made countless things possible, but what hasn't changed is that fundamentally, it's a tool to connect people.

The Rakuten Ichiba shopping mall concept was born because we focused on this function: communication. People often stress the convenience and ease of purchasing things online, but these aren't the essential selling points. Rakuten Ichiba's defining feature is that it uses the internet to make a personal connection between shoppers and merchants: Its greatest strength is that it enables direct interaction with people all over Japan regardless of the location of physical stores.

There were already a few other internet shopping malls when I started Rakuten Ichiba. However, all of them basically employed a consignment sales model. The shopping mall handled everything from creating product catalogs and shipping products to dealing with customers.

I thought there was no way to succeed using this kind of system. Merchants know ...