Multichannel E-commerce Solutions

ChannelAdvisor

Most of the time, e-commerce business owners enter the arena with relatively small and simple stores. It doesn’t take long for the growing importance of multichannel sales to hit home…hard! Long story short – to get by in modern e-commerce, you need to quickly and extensively branch out beyond the confines of your primary online store.

The problem being that the more balls you attempt to juggle with, the more likely the whole thing is going to come crashing down around you.

This is precisely why software suites and service providers like ChannelAdvisor exist. Put simply – you take your online store to ChannelAdvisor, they expand your operations via multiple retail channels, and you ultimately benefit from an influx of business. All without having to do the hard work yourself.

What Does ChannelAdvisor Do?

From eBay to Amazon to Wal-Mart to Tesco, ChannelAdvisor brings the products and services of e-commerce business to the masses. Boasting around 3,000 customers worldwide and total annual gross merchandise value of more than $8.1 billion[ELA1] , ChannelAdvisor has become a tried and trusted name in multichannel retail.

In terms of how the process works, ChannelAdvisor handles the technicalities of promoting and selling your goods via multiple channels of high value. From listings and optimisation to syncing customer orders with inventory to maximising sales with powerful analytics, ChannelAdvisor promises the kind of exposure it would be borderline impossible to achieve single-handedly.

Rather than focusing exclusively on the typical standards (eBay, Amazon, Rakuten, etc.), ChannelAdvisor provides access to more than 100 popular sales channels on a global basis. Essentially, it’s a service package that takes care of every aspect of expanding your business via new sales channels and targeting the largest possible audience.

What Are the Benefits of ChannelAdvisor?

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The obvious benefit of handing over these kinds of responsibilities is not having to handle them yourself. Not that you’d be able to anyway – unless you took on a full team of specialists to handle the intricacies involved. For some, going multichannel at a high level is a case of outsource or forget about it.

For those who choose to go ahead and work with ChannelAdvisor, just a few of the features and benefits on offer include:

Product content optimisation. Meticulously tailored content engineered to meet the requirements of the respective channel make it easier for your products to be found.

Algorithmic repricing. An automatic pricing adjustment system takes into account the prices offered by your rivals and ensures you remain competitive.

Support for social commerce. Social media is fast becoming one of the most important e-commerce platforms of all time. Effective social commerce often represents a full-time job in its own right.

Amazon advertising. They provide comprehensive Amazon advertising services, including everything from keyword bidding to ad creation to budget management and more.

Support for Google Shopping. Climbing the ranks in the Google Shopping listings is never easy, but can be made possible with expert intervention.

Paid search campaign management. Paid search marketing can be a powerful and effective complement to a wider organic search marketing strategy, delivering fast, effective, and highly targeted results.

ChannelAdvisor benchmarking. Discover how your business is performing in comparison with thousands of rivals across Walmart, Jet, Amazon, eBay, and Google Shopping. Explore their strengths, their weaknesses, and your own opportunities for taking the lead.

Ongoing support. For obvious reasons, the involvement and ongoing support of a team of seasoned experts can be invaluable for any e-commerce business owner.

Are There Any Downsides to ChannelAdvisor?

As for the downsides, experiences with ChannelAdvisor differ enormously from one customer to the next. However, there’s one big negative that eliminates most smaller business from contention in an instant:

The price.

Not that they make it easy to determine costs…you have to get in touch for a quote. In any case, at the time of this writing, it costs $12,000 to get started ($1,000 per month paid up-front for the first year) along with commissions charged on everything you earn of up to 2%. There’s also a $1,000 implementation fee for every new channel. For obvious reasons, not a realistic possibility for smaller and newer businesses with limited budgets.

There’s currently no free trial of any kind on offer and this up-front one-year commitment is the minimum requirement. There’s a live demo that can be scheduled, but nothing really ‘hands-on’.

Who Uses ChannelAdvisor?

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As touched upon, ChannelAdvisor is most certainly not a solution for the average small business. For larger brands looking to expand their empires significantly, ChannelAdvisor has bred some quite remarkable success stories.

Just a few examples of major brands currently using the services of ChannelAdvisor include Crocs, Forza Sports, Kitchen Aid, Target, Timex, and many more besides. All of which have significantly improved their reach and revenues as a result of the services offered.

As you’ve probably guessed by now, the long and short of it is pretty self-explanatory. For the smaller business with a limited budget, forking out $20,000+ to get a multichannel sales campaign up and running probably isn’t realistic. That said, if there’s sufficient capital sitting around and looking to be put to good use, it could be worth getting in touch with ChannelAdvisor. Though definitely a more plausible prospect for larger and more established businesses, ChannelAdvisor certainly has the potential to make incredible things happen.

With online sales accelerating by close to 15% annually, e-commerce is growing like never before. [ELA2] Those looking to capitalise on this extraordinary industry need to take it seriously, all of which begins with the selection of the perfect platform for your business, along with the channels you intend to focus on.

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While there will always be complexities involved, selecting an appropriate e-commerce platform doesn’t have to be difficult. Consider the following factors and narrow down your shortlist accordingly.

Pricing. Price isn’t everything, but budget limitations are inevitable. If you don’t have an abundance of cash to get things up and running, you can immediately strike off the more expensive paid plans and software suites. At the same time, opting for a barrel-bottom option when you could easily stretch to a more professional and feature-rich option is inadvisable.

Integrations and plugins. Both of these will help you expand and customise your store to create a winning experience for your target audience. From marketing to loyalty programs to shipping to taxation to the basic functionality of your website, there’s no such thing as a library of plugins/extensions that’s too big.

SEO friendliness. Any e-commerce platform that isn’t SEO-friendly is a platform you want nothing to do with. The simplicity and effectiveness of the SEO baked into the platform should also be taken into account. Hence why the likes of Magento, WooCommerce, Shopify, and so on come highly recommended in this department.

Mobile friendliness. Likewise, it’s important to ensure you work with a platform that’s capable of delivering the total experience for mobile web users.

Skill level. Designing and launching an e-commerce business can be anything from a walk in the park to spectacularly complicated. For the most part, it comes down to the platform you choose, so be sure to factor your skill level into the equation.

Support. Are you happy to go it alone, or would you prefer the reassurance of a dedicated customer support team, just in case things go wrong? For obvious reasons, e-commerce platforms that are free of charge typically come with no such support whatsoever.

Security. Both for the sake of your business and your customer base in general, you need to give security the utmost priority. Take the time to assess and consider the security (or otherwise) of the platforms you’re considering.

Scalability. Assuming you want your business to grow in the future, you’re going to need an e-commerce platform that can accommodate your store as it expands, evolves, and diversifies. On the plus side, most leading e-commerce platforms these days offer limitless scalability.

As for additional services like ChannelAdvisor, M2E Pro, and so on, looking beyond the confines of your platform is technically optional, though comes highly recommended. If not right away, you’ll quickly find that restricting yourself to your primary online store simply isn’t enough to remain viable long-term. Branching out is something you’ll have to do – it’s up to you as to when and how you make it happen.