Marketplaces: Using niche marketplaces to grow new customer acquisition (episode 115)
by April Buencamino-dyJesse Wragg lives deep in product data for marketplaces! As co-founder and Managing Director at eCommeleon he’s busy making the process of getting your product data ready much more automated. So you can distribute to multiple marketplaces globally much more easily.
Listen now for free:
Subscribe to Keep Optimising on your favourite Podcast App
About Jesse Wragg
Jesse moved to Germany and the first English-speaking job he could find happened to be at a marketplaces agency.
This was back in 2015 and Jesse says he has already seen a lot of changes in marketplaces since then.
Achieving Marketplace Success
Marketplace algorithms are more success-based, so performing well in a marketplace will get you rewarded.
The key things to do are to present your products to consumers quickly, respond to customer service inquiries consistently and in a timely manner, and price well. These factors will help your products rank well in the marketplace.
Also, make sure you don’t go out of stock. This is an important piece of your success.
Maximizing the Potential of Marketplaces
With marketplaces, the traffic is already there.
What you need to figure out is how to stand out from your competitors. Learn and understand the options you have in optimising the marketplace you are on and take advantage of them.
In the case of niche marketplaces, the benefits are there as well. There’s less competition, they’re more eager to help and support you, and they’re less likely to ban you because your success means their success, too.
Find the marketplace that’s already home to your ideal buyers and find out how to start selling on that.
Optimising Your Marketplace Strategy
You have to understand what the rules are for different marketplaces. Most marketplaces don’t restrict sellers from putting communication materials in packages or boxes because that’s a barrier to entry and goes against their goal of getting more products on their platform. In this manner, they provide more flexibility to the sellers.
Find out what the rules are for the marketplaces you are on because learning them will help you optimise the channel and get more customers.
All About the Data
Jesse clarifies that it’s not just about the amount of data you provide in your feed but also what’s in it.
Marketplaces change rules all the time so make sure you’re able to keep up by updating your values quickly and regularly.
Insider Tips
Newbie advice: If we’ve inspired someone to take their first step – what do they need to know to give themselves the best chance of success?
Aside from making sure you have enough stock, Jesse says having granular product data is crucial to your success.
Right from the beginning, prepare to have lots of information about your products. Not only does this make it easier for you to add more marketplaces in the future, but it also makes it easier for you to add more products.
Once you’ve started of course you’ve got to ‘keep optimising’! What’s your favourite way to improve performance?
Focus on attributes and item specifics.
Provide every piece of information you can about your products to the marketplace, because this will help the platform suggest your product to suitable buyers. Make sure to keep the information up-to-date as well.
If someone listening wants to learn more about this is there one cheap/free resource you’d recommend?
Jesse recommends eCommeleon’s guidebook on selling on marketplaces and also their marketplaces database.
He also suggests searching for any resource on private label sellers. This will help more traditional retailers and brands to understand how typical digital nomad businesses do well on Amazon.
Crystal ball time – what’s coming up in the next 6-12 months that we should be getting ready for?
Jesse says there will be more traditional retailers becoming marketplaces.
They’re going to grow this marketplace-side of their business, so there are going to be advantages to getting in there early.
Interview Links
Jesse on Social media:
Sponsored by…
Klaviyo is a leading customer data and marketing automation platform dedicated to accelerating revenue and customer connection for online businesses. Klaviyo makes it easy to store, access, analyze and use transactional and behavioral data to power highly-targeted customer and prospect communications.
The company’s hybrid customer-data and marketing-platform model allows companies to grow by fostering direct relationships with customers, without giving up their valuable data to popular big-tech ad platforms. Over 80,000 innovative companies like Unilever, Custom Ink, Living Proof and Huckberry sell more with Klaviyo. Learn more at www.klaviyo.com.
