Introduction

Just after the Chinese Spring Festival of 2025, the Trump administration has brought "shocks" to cross-border sellers.

According to the Gloda team's compilation, on February 1, Trump signed an executive order imposing a 10% tariff on Chinese goods. On February 3, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) announced the cancellation of the duty-free policy for goods imported from China (including Hong Kong) worth less than $800 into the United States, and an additional 10% tariff would be levied. On February 4, the United States Postal Service (USPS) announced the suspension of accepting inbound parcels from mainland China and Hong Kong until further notice. On February 5, the USPS announced that it would resume accepting inbound parcels from post offices in mainland China and Hong Kong.

These policies not only increase the logistics costs for Chinese cross-border sellers but also lead to disruptions in the logistics supply chain. With this series of measures, cross - border sellers faced a particularly difficult start in 2025.

And this may just be the beginning.

Background of U.S. Policy Changes

The background of the U.S. policy changes stems from Trump and his team's campaign promise to use the tariff weapon to support domestic enterprises in the international trade deficit and bring the United States back to being a manufacturing powerhouse.

On February 1, while announcing a 10% tariff on Chinese goods, Trump also announced a 25% tariff increase on some goods from Canada and Mexico. Although the percentage increase seems higher, due to the historically low tariff base between the United States and Canada/Mexico, even with a 25% tariff increase, the impact is relatively smaller compared to Chinese cross-border sellers. However, it still suppresses some of the "detour" channels used by Chinese sellers.

This action by the United States is carried out against the backdrop of the ongoing tense Sino-U.S. trade relations. The U.S. government has always sought to reduce the trade deficit and protect domestic industries from foreign competition. By canceling the small-value duty-free policy, the U.S. aims to increase tax revenue and make trade policies more "fair." In addition, imposing tariffs is part of a broader trade strategy to prompt China to change its trade practices.

Direct Impacts on TikTok Sellers

Drastic Increase in Tariff and Logistics Costs

After canceling the T86 (small-value duty-free) preferential policy, goods that were originally duty-free now need to be taxed at the normal tariff rate, with an additional 10% increase. This directly raises the costs for sellers. Moreover, a large number of low-value goods can no longer go through the simplified declaration process, resulting in more complex logistics clearance procedures and higher customs declaration costs. The customs declaration fee per batch of goods has increased from about $50 to $200.

Substantial Damage to Logistics Channels and Timeliness

In recent years, with the rapid growth of orders on TEMU and TikTok, a large number of small-package logistics shipments have been sent from China to the United States. Under the T86 policy in the past, batch parcels could be cleared quickly, ensuring logistics timeliness. After canceling the T86 policy, not only are the original small-packages affected, but the overall logistics timeliness is also expected to be affected due to the increased workload of U.S. customs officials and logistics companies in checking small-package tariffs. The USPS's suspension of accepting parcels from China and Hong Kong may be partly due to the excessive number of small-packages from China, causing the staff to be overloaded. In the future, more logistics channels may face difficulties or significant cost increases.

Higher Risks Due to Increased Stocking Costs & Extended Commodity Turnover Period

With the impact on logistics timeliness, some sellers may choose to stock goods in overseas warehouses in advance (both TikTok and Amazon platforms have requirements for the delivery timeliness of local warehouses). As the tariff and customs declaration costs increase, the investment in stocking in local warehouses also rises accordingly. Sellers have to bear 20%-30% more financial risks than before. The increased complexity of customs declaration procedures affects logistics timeliness and extends the commodity turnover period. With higher capital costs and lower turnover rates, sellers face greater risks.

Sellers' Coping Strategies

The difficulties and challenges brought by the market are fair to all sellers. The key for sellers is to seize opportunities in the new policy environment.

Importance of Product Selection Further Enhanced

In cross-border e-commerce, product selection accounts for 70% of success, while operation accounts for 30%. In the new policy environment, product selection becomes even more crucial. If the wrong products are selected, sellers will pay a higher cost in terms of time and money. For TikTok sellers, simply "following the trend" by referring to TikTok's best-selling lists has become more difficult. You may see a new product on the list and rush to stock it, but you may miss the hot - selling period due to longer waiting times during customs declaration.

Click in ->>Gloda - TikTok Hot Sale Rank

Gloda recommends cross-platform linked product selection with Amazon. That is, by looking at the best-selling products on Amazon, we can verify that the products meet the needs of local consumers. Then, we can check if there are similar competing products on TikTok and how they perform. This way, there is an opportunity to find potential top-selling products that are popular on Amazon but not yet available on TikTok, and seize the opportunity before they become popular on the TikTok list.

Role of TikTok Short-Video Product Testing Before Bulk Stocking is Highlighted

Under the T86 (small-value duty-free) policy, the "small-order, quick-return" model could fully utilize China's industrial belt. Through a large number of AB tests, sellers could then follow up on popular products. However, in the new policy environment, the cost of small orders has increased, and it is difficult to maintain the original scale of testing due to the high cost of numerous AB tests. How can we narrow the testing scope while increasing the hit-rate of popular products? The TikTok short video product planting strategy may provide a solution.

💡How to Test Products with TikTok Short Videos?

• First, sellers must pay more attention to VoC (Voice of Customer). By mining the pain points and pleasures of consumers from the comment sections of their own and competitors' product pages and product promotion videos, sellers can identify the core selling points ABC of the product.
• Second, for each core selling point of the product, design short video scripts, shoot a series of video content, and publish them through matrix accounts.
• Third, for each short video, conduct advertising delivery to the target customer profile, track metrics such as likes, comments, and interaction rates, rank the core selling points of the product, and optimize the packaging of product selling points based on the comments.

By testing products through early short video content and then stocking accordingly, sellers can effectively increase the hit-rate of popular products. At the same time, they can also explore content promotion strategies in advance, and immediately launch a large amount of content after stocking to speed up inventory consumption.

In the foreseeable future, Sino-U.S. trade frictions may continue to escalate. For cross-border sellers, this is both painful and attractive. It's painful because the future environment will only become harsher, but it's attractive because sellers who can adapt to the new environment more quickly are more likely to make a fortune first. Continuously looking for new market opportunities and seizing the dividend of the changing window period is a fair chance for every seller. The Gloda team will continue to help sellers explore new growth dividends in 2025 through platform data and industry information. Here's wishing all sellers a prosperous 2025!