How to write an attractive RFQ in Alibaba?

We shared 2 small skills to help you quickly find satisfactory products on Alibaba.com. Direct research and Request for quotation(RFQ).

When you post a purchase request through RFQ, once approved by Alibaba industry experts, it will be posted to the RFQ market. How to stand out from millions of inquiries and attract high-quality suppliers is the key to successfully using the inquiry service to find the most matching supplier.

The free Alibaba RFQ service enables you to receive quotations from multiple suppliers, in a matter of days. All you need to do is to fill in a form and click on the submit button.

In this article, you will learn how you can save time and money using the RFQ service while making sure that you provide enough information for the suppliers to calculate an accurate unit cost

Next will show you how to develop high-quality RFQ through actual cases.

Step 1: Go to the Alibaba inquiry page https://rfq.alibaba.com/, click to submit RFQ.

Step 2: Complete the inquiry form

Pay attention to some tips, which can make your inquiry more attractive to suppliers

1. Specify your product name or category, specification and quantity. Accurate product name or category can make it easier for suppliers to find your inquiry in the market. In addition, the minimum order quantity requirements for Alibaba suppliers are also different, ranging from US$1,000 to US$3,000. If the quantity is too small, then suppliers will have no incentive to send quotations.

2. Upload the photo of the product you are looking for. With product photos, suppliers can more easily check whether they own or produce the same products you need.

3. Main content: This is the most important part for the supplier to analyze your purchase needs and evaluate this RFQ as a priority. 

It can be written according to the following template, which consists of 5 paragraphs, each of which points out a key point.

1. Introduce yourself in the first paragraph and specify the product you want to buy in the clearest way. You can also mention your company name here.
2. Specify the quantity to be purchased. If it is a trial order, you can also declare that the quantity will be increased in the future.
3. and then increase the high packaging cost. By discussing custom packaging, you can also exclude suppliers who cannot provide personalized packaging.
4. Ask about shipping costs. If you show the supplier that you have your own forwarder and you are a professional buyer, the supplier will likely not defraud you from shipping costs.
5. Specify the address in detail. If you want the supplier to help ship the product to a specific location in your country/region, the supplier’s forwarder will need a detailed address to calculate the accurate shipping cost.

In short, quantity, packaging, and shipping costs are all important aspects so that the supplier can provide you with a reliable quotation. In addition to this information, you can also include other questions to ask before submitting the RFQ. In this way, you can also easily find professional suppliers by check their answers to your questions.

Step 3: Click the submit button to submit the RFQ

There are free and paid RFQ services, and you can choose the type that best suits your current buying needs.

Step 4: Check the quotation in the message center of the RFQ information center

At this time, you can find all the supplier contact information and quotations in the message center, and start to review them one by one.

Step 5: Choose a supplier

After checking the quotation and supplier information, if you are satisfied with 2-3 suppliers, you can directly contact them for further price negotiation, or you can start collecting samples to check the quality.

As mentioned above, if these prices are unfortunately unacceptable, you can start another round of inquiry, or you can try to send the inquiry directly on Alibaba. 

It should be noted that the price does not mean anything unless the supplier can deliver what you want.

Then, once the quotation from the inquiry supplier is received, how to select it? Taking wine glasses as an example, we summarize the following points.

1. Choose a manufacturer instead of a trading company.

You can identify them by studying the supplier’s information and product catalogs. Factories usually specialize in the production of certain types of products, and trading companies tend to sell multiple categories of products, and their prices are usually 10%-30% higher than those of the factory.

2. Select suppliers located in the industrial cluster of this product.

For experienced buyers, they have an industry map in mind. For example, most of the suppliers of stainless steel wine glasses are concentrated in the Wuyi area of ​​Yongkang City, Zhejiang Province. If the supplier is not in these areas, you can check their quotations and information to decide whether to proceed.

3. Choose experienced suppliers and salespeople with good communication skills.

The experienced sales staff will not only answer your questions in a professional way，but also provide you with suggestions and various solutions before you make your request.

4. Balance price and quality.

If you are satisfied with 2-3 quotations, you can contact the supplier and asking for samples to compare quality. Then, you can more fully consider which supplier to work with.

Hope that the above templates and main points can help you when you are looking for reliable suppliers on Alibaba!

Hope to help you have a clearer understanding of finding suppliers through Alibaba RFQ, and hope to help you in your next inquiry!