Orange County’s biggest online shopping site is about to get a new identity on Jan. 31, a gamble that analysts say comes with big risks in a fast-changing e-commerce world.

Buy.com, which is based in Aliso Viejo, is getting a makeover as Rakuten.com Shopping – a change that the company’s executives say is necessary for parent company Rakuten Inc. to establish the Japanese brand internationally.

The company is setting its sights on the giant of e-tailing, Amazon.

“In the long term, Rakuten is going global,” said Roger Andelin, president and chief technology officer of Buy.com. “We want to be known for global shopping – a place where shoppers can connect with merchants all over the world. That is where this is heading.”

Founded in 1997, the site sells an assortment of products, including apparel, books, electronics and toys. Rakuten Inc., which is based in Tokyo, bought the company in 2010 and expanded the name to Rakuten Buy.com.

The acquisition of Buy.com, with its digital infrastructure and American customer base, allowed the Japan-based company to enter the competitive U.S. e-tailing landscape, said Clark Fredricksen, vice president of communications at eMarketer.com, a company that analyzes e-commerce information.

But the new Rakuten.com Shopping has a “big task ahead of it,” said Sucharita Mulpuru, principal analyst for e-business and channel strategy at Forrester Research.

“The challenge is that they’re starting from scratch in building a new brand in the U.S.,” Mulpuru said. “Outside of e-commerce circles, Rakuten is not a brand that is recognized in the U.S.”

More than just a name

Mulpuru and other analysts questioned whether changing from a succinct and catchy moniker that rolls off the tongue to the longer, foreign-sounding name is a decision that might hurt the traffic, loyalty and brand awareness the O.C. company has built up over 15 years online.

“Buy is a three-letter name,” Mulpuru said. “It would be a shame to throw away that equity.”

From a practical standpoint, the shorter name has other advantages. “It’s a truism that a shorter domain name – URL – is better because it’s easier to type and remember,” Fredricksen said.

The name change is far from inconsequential.

“What Rakuten stands for as a brand in the U.S. is the challenge – awareness, proposition, differentiation,” said Alan Brew, senior vice president at RiechesBaird, a branding agency in Irvine and New York. “The name tells us nothing, which is a problem.

“Overall, (it’s) a classic roll-up strategy by an ambitious entrant to the U.S. market but with significant brand challenges.”

Wiley Ehrke, vice president of business development for In That Case, a luggage and bag e-tailer that sells its products on the site, expressed concerns about the rebranding.

“I think it’s going to be a tough sell,” Ehrke said. “Most people are familiar with Buy .com. As long as Rakuten retains that, it will be good.”

The Irvine-based firm has been selling computer cases, backpacks and suitcases on Buy.com as well as Amazon .com. “We’ve actually had a lot of success at Buy.com over the years … overall, we’re positive on Buy.com,” Ehrke said.

No one understands the value of the Buy.com moniker more than the team at Aliso Viejo, Andelin said.

“Rakuten is a little bit harder – it’s more syllables,” he said, with a laugh. Nevertheless, the company plans to make the rebranding seamless for customers, he said.

“Longer term, shoppers of Buy.com will be greeted with messaging to help with that transition,” he said. “We want to be sure that our conversation hasn’t changed and the shopper is still emotionally connected with the brand.”

The new name, Andelin said, “is part of our future.”

Global expansion

Rakuten Inc. purchased Buy.com for $250 million as part of an ongoing international acquisition and investment spree that started in 2008.

The company’s vast holdings have since expanded to include e-commerce subsidiaries in Austria, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Indonesia, Malaysia, Taiwan, Spain, Thailand, United Kingdom and the U.S.

Several of those carry the Rakuten.com name, including those in Brazil, Austria and Germany and more are likely to be rebranded.

Although Rakuten is not a household name in the United States, the company is a significant player in the online global marketplace.

Its Japanese site, Rakuten Ichiba, racked up more than $34 billion in gross purchases in 2011, the most recent year for which figures were available.

“Any online retailer in the U.S. faces one overarching challenge: competing with Amazon,” Fredricksen said. “Rakuten does have the advantage of having competed with Amazon in Japan, and in its home market, it is No. 1.”

Already, Buy.com has been leveraging one of the practices at Rakuten’s Ichiba and some subsidiaries: the Super Points loyalty program. Consumers who buy an item at Buy.com earn points – symbolized on the site by red balls with the letter “R” – which they can use to get items for free or to pay for part of an order.

The site also has begun to give merchants space on the home page to “tell their stories to shoppers” in an effort to build relationships with customers beyond a single transaction, Andelin said. Those home page spaces are not exclusive to merchants willing to pay more for premium placement, he added.

Buy.com prefaces the merchant space with this description: “Buy from people, not the Internet.” Each story begins with a portrait of the merchant and a narrative and sometimes features videos.

Mulpuru and Brew said the site still needs to do more to improve the mix of brands.

“It has to be a unique assortment,” to distinguish itself from Amazon, Mulpuru said.

Brew agreed. “Amazon has locked (up) the online retail market, and Buy.com had little that was different or unique to offer,” he said.

Rakuten is working to expand its products, Andelin said. The brands that U.S. shoppers will find at Rakuten will be international one day, he said.

“We’re very confident that marketplace model of Rakuten in Japan that is now being taken worldwide is a fabulous shopping model,” Andelin said.

Contact the writer: lliddane@ocregister.com or 714-796-7969