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Metrics type: Key Metrics • Category: Listing Health

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At a glance

Median RFQ Response Time (hours) is a Listing Health metric tracked from Alibaba data. It measures the typical time you take to reply to a buyer’s request for quotation or inquiry, in hours. Buyers shop multiple suppliers at once and reward the fastest reply, so a median above the day mark routinely loses business to competitors who answer within a few hours. The card pairs with RFQ Response Rate to show both speed and coverage of your buyer responses. Cross-reference the related cards below for context.

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Calculation

Calculated automatically from your Alibaba data by taking the time between each RFQ or buyer inquiry arriving and your first reply, then reporting the median across the trailing period with a comparison against the prior period. The median is used rather than the mean so a handful of very slow or very fast replies do not distort the typical experience. Inputs are the RFQ and message timestamps the Alibaba integration exposes. See the At a glance summary above for what the metric tracks and the worked example below for a typical reading.

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Worked example

A representative reading of Median RFQ Response Time (hours) for a typical Alibaba supplier. Suppose the 30-day median reads 31 hours on 12 Mar 26, up from 14 hours the prior period, and the alert has fired because it crossed 24 hours. Looking closer, weekend inquiries are going unanswered until Monday, dragging the median up even though weekday replies are quick. The fix is operational: add weekend coverage or a quick-reply template so first responses go out within a few hours regardless of day. Bringing the median back under the day mark typically lifts quote-to-order conversion. For deeper investigation, use Vortex Mind to see which days and message types are slowest; for natural-language exploration, ask Ask Viq which RFQs waited longest last week.

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Sibling cards merchants should reference together

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Reconciling against Alibaba Seller dashboard

Where to look in Alibaba’s own dashboard: Open My Alibaba > Message Centre and the RFQ Market response metrics, where Alibaba reports your average response time and response performance. Confirm period boundaries and filter settings match the Vortex IQ profile to reconcile cleanly. Why the Vortex IQ value may legitimately differ: Cross-connector reconciliation: complement with sibling cards in the same category for the full diagnostic picture. For divergence investigations, use Vortex Mind.

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Known limitations / merchant FAQs

Q: How often does Median RFQ Response Time (hours) update? The card refreshes on the standard data refresh (typically every 30-60 minutes for live integrations). For real-time signals, force a manual refresh from the dashboard. Q: Why does my Alibaba dashboard show a different number? The most common reasons are that Alibaba often reports an average while Vortex IQ reports the median, plus period-boundary, time-zone, and filter-scope differences. Match these settings and compare like for like before assuming a real divergence. Q: How does Median RFQ Response Time (hours) relate to other Listing Health metrics? Read it alongside RFQ Response Rate and Buyer Messages Unread: speed and coverage together tell the full responsiveness story, and both feed badge eligibility. Single-metric reads can mislead; the diagnostic value is in the cross-reference. Q: Can I customise the alert threshold? Yes, alert thresholds are configurable per profile in the Alert Rules tab. The default trigger fires above 24 hours. Adjust to match your business baseline rather than relying on the generic default.

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Tracked live in Vortex IQ Nerve Centre

Median RFQ Response Time (hours) is one of hundreds of KPI pulses Vortex IQ tracks across Alibaba and 70+ other ecommerce connectors. Nerve Centre runs the detection layer; Vortex Mind investigates the cause when something moves; Ask Viq lets you interrogate any number in plain English. Start for free or book a demo to see this metric running on your own data.