Brad Eckhart, partner, Columbus Consulting International will be presenting Building a Made-to-Measure Online Retail Marketplace at retailX, in partnership with Retail TouchPoints on August 25, 1:30 – 2:00 PM.
Online marketplaces are rapidly gaining momentum in retail. Sales by Amazon’s third-party sellers increased 48% in 2020 over 2019; meanwhile, its first-party sales increased only 33% for the same period. While Amazon and Walmart launched their marketplaces over a decade ago, only more recently have retailers of all sizes begun to experiment with an online marketplace strategy of their own.
Online marketplace strategies can take on many forms and can be tailored to fit an overall brand strategy. This can be anything from “Everything Stores” a la Amazon to a more niche marketplace like Madewell. There are two critical questions to ask when developing a marketplace strategy:
- How will the marketplace serve our brand?
- How can the marketplace help us better serve our customers?
In this session, attendees will walk away with an understanding of the following:
- Why retailers have adopted or are considering an online marketplace as part of their ecommerce strategy
- The advantages of an online marketplace over the traditional ecommerce model
- Key differences between dropship and a marketplace strategy, and how they can complement one another
- Learnings retailers can apply from online marketplace data to influence their brick-and-mortar strategies
- How retailers can tailor a marketplace strategy to complement their brand and enhance the customer experience
