Multi-channel e-commerce is the technique of selling products in more than one place on the internet. A brand that sells its products on its website as well as in online marketplaces such as Amazon, eBay, Etsy, Flipkart, and others is a multi-channel business.
Many brands are hiring e-commerce SEO providers to help them with their multi-channel strategy. If you are considering selling on more than one channel, then this blog post is for you. Know why multi-channel selling is best for e-commerce businesses and how can they succeed in it.
Reasons to get into multi-channel e-commerce
Here are the eleven main reasons why e-commerce businesses should get into multi-channel marketing.
1. More customers are shopping using multiple channels: A Havard Business Review study of 46,000 shoppers showed that 73 percent of the respondents used multiple channels while shopping. With so many e-commerce platforms, many customers are shopping using online shopping.
2. Massive foreign investments: Large corporations such as Walmart and Amazon are scaling up massively and investing billions of dollars in their online marketplaces. This provides e-tailers an enormous opportunity to grow by selling on third-party sellers.
3. Increase brand visibility and brand recognition: When a company sells its offerings using multiple channels, its brand is visible to a large number of target audiences and prospective customers all at once. With increased brand visibility, the company improves its brand awareness and recognition.
4. Boost reach: A multiple channel strategy helps a business expand its reach and make its products and services available in many channels. By taking the help of e-commerce behemoths such as Amazon.com, a small-sized business entity can reach a wide range of potential customers.
5. Enhance conversions: When a business generates brand awareness and recognition manages to reach many potential customers, it is more likely to convert them into paying customers. As per experts, businesses that adopt multi-channel e-commerce strategies witness a 20 to 50 percent increase in their conversion rate.
6. Provide more choice to customers: When a company adopts a multi-channel strategy, it provides its customers with more choice to purchase the products and services from their favorite channels. As per studies, nearly one in three online customers look for products on one channel but purchase using a different channel.
7. Generate higher sales and revenue: Shoppers who shop from multi-channel websites, purchase more compared to the ones who shop from a single channel. According to a study, customers who use more than a single channel spend four times like the ones who use just one channel. By using a multi-channel strategy, businesses can increase their sales as well as revenue.
8. Diversify risks: A multi-channel e-commerce platform safeguards against the risks of depending on a single sales channel. Some companies may not have a robust marketing plan to drive all their sales from their website. In such a scenario, a multiple-channel e-commerce platform enables them to sell from other channels and diversifies their risks.
9. Get valuable insights: A business using multi-channel strategy can gather useful data and insights about their customers, which include:
- Purchasing history
- Location
- Time zone
- Devices
- Demographic
- Interests
This information helps the business develop marketing campaigns and sales strategies to enhance the conversion rate.
10. Streamline business process: Multi-channel selling helps e-commerce companies to streamline their business process. By listing and selling their offerings on more than one sales channel, they are better equipped to handle and fulfill orders on more than one platform. It also helps them to centralize their data and control inventory.
11. Customize better: E-commerce businesses that use multi-channel marketing strategies can customize their prices, promotions, descriptions, and offers as per various platforms. Online retailers can also customize their products to some extent. For instance, a publisher that offers e-books (Kindle edition) and paperbacks on Amazon can provide a limited edition hardcover on Etsy. Several manufactures also have different prices for a single product on different platforms
12. Keep pace with competitors: Multi-channel selling has become the norm rather than the exception for most manufacturers and e-commerce players. Businesses that use multi-channel selling list all or most of their products on the platforms, which also have their competitors’ products. This enables them to remain competitive and level themselves up.
Tips to be successful in multi-channel e-commerce
Here are a few tips to be successful in multichannel e-commerce:
- Select the most suitable channels as per your goals and budget
At the very beginning, select the channels that are best for the business goals and budget. Also, find out what channels are suitable for your niche, prospective customers, and profitability plans.
- Manage inventory
The second tip is to manage the inventory by taking the help of an inventory management tool or dashboard. Keep track of the existing stock and the reordering level to ensure an optimum level of inventory during all times.
- Customize strategies for different channels
One of the biggest advantages of multi-channel selling is that companies can customize strategies for different channels. They can customize prices, promotions, descriptions, delivery, and many more things. A company that has free delivery on its website needs to customize its delivery and pricing policies when selling on a platform such as Amazon.
- Monitor analytics
Last but not the least, monitor key analytics of each channel closely to know which platform performs the best and which needs to improve. Apart from that analytics will also inform about the number of customers in each channel, the average spend, cart abandonments, and the average return on investment.
Summing up,
Multi-channel selling is becoming the most popular choice of many e-commerce businesses. Businesses that use more than one platform to sell their offerings report better conversions, sales, revenue, profits, and return on investment compared to those that use only one channel to sell. At PeddleWeb, we offer e-commerce SEO services to businesses that sell on multiple channels. If you are looking to use a multi-channel strategy, contact our team to help you get started.
