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There are many different ways to start an eCommerce business, whether that’s creating your own website, selling your products on Amazon or eBay or a mix of the two. With products being sold in multiple places, finding the best way to manage the fulfilment process can be tricky. Our technology and eCommerce fulfilment knowhow means you can have the benefit of selling on multiple platforms without the headache.
There are many advantages to having your products listed on multiple eCommerce platforms along with a few pitfalls to think about.
The advantages of multiple platforms are that you’ll always be wherever your potential customers are searching. As an example, in multiple studies over the years, Amazon has become one of the first places people go to when searching for a product and even more so if they have Amazon Prime. Making your products available on your own website, Amazon and eBay mean that wherever your customers are searching your products will be there.
Another reason you might want to sell your products on multiple platforms is that when you’re selling via third-party platforms such as Amazon or eBay you’re playing by their rules. If you have your own website with your products alongside the other platforms then you don’t have to worry about potential policy violations or account suspensions.
By selling on different platforms you can adjust your prices to cater for different price-sensitive audiences. When people are searching for products on Amazon and eBay they’re presented with a long list of similar products from other sellers, as well as yours. This means you have to be very competitive on price, otherwise, people may choose a cheaper option, even if your product is superior. When selling on your website you’re only showing products that you sell, so you can increase your profit margin without worrying about a large drop in sales.
A benefit of having your own website as well as shops on third-party platforms is that you can build a brand, rather than just selling products. With a website, you can start to capture valuable information such as email addresses, order frequency and more. This data will allow you to create loyalty programmes, and email marketing messages which will help you to increase the profitability of your eCommerce business.
With all of the benefits offered by selling on multiple platforms, you’re probably wondering why all eCommerce businesses aren’t doing this? Let’s take a closer look at some of those reasons.
When selling on multiple platforms you need to be able to keep everything running smoothly and the more platforms you add the more complicated this becomes. When you offer new product ranges or bundles you’ll have to create these on all the platforms. This can become time-consuming to manage if you regularly acquire new stock or need to update product specs.
Another issue is managing the stock across all of the platforms you sell on, especially if one platform is more popular than the others. This means it’s not as simple as dividing your stock between the platforms, as you don’t want your most popular platform being marked as sold out and missing out on sales while your other channels still have stock just sitting there.
This is where we come in! At Whitehouse Solutions, we have created an order management system that plugs into popular third-party platforms such as Amazon and eBay. It also integrates with your own webshop as we have created WooCommerce, Shopify and Magento integrations.
This means you can have one single system that manages the fulfilment and order management required when running multiple eCommerce websites. With your orders being fulfilled by us it’s easy to manage your stock across the various platforms and you can offer multiple shipping options with ease. Find out how we can help you scale your eCommerce business with our fulfilment expertise.
