The Blog - Where Business Collides with Human Nature

Selling online is a wonderful way for companies, small and large alike, to become more successful. They can appeal to new customers, advertise their products more widely and even cut down on costs. Some owners don't want to create their own website or wish to sell on a more established platform. This is where Amazon comes in to play. 

Amazon's Marketplace service is a convenient way for small- and medium-sized businesses to advertise and sell their goods. They can even choose for their orders to be fulfilled by Amazon. When half of all items sold on the website are from third-party sellers, it can seem like a great way to put your name in front of an established consumer base.

While this is certainly true, it seems as though Marketplace has just as many cons as it does pros. Let's take a moment to run through them so you can get an idea of what it's like to sell on Amazon.

Average ecommerce conversion rates are only 2 to 3% across all sectors and devices, which means the vast majority of shoppers are leaving without making a purchase. Each of these empty-handed departures provides an opportunity for savvy marketers and business owners to substantially increase revenue.

For instance, for a business with 10,000 daily visitors and an average conversion rate of 2.5%, increasing conversions 0.5 points to 3.0% would generate an extra 50 orders a day. With an assumed average order value (AOV) of $100 those additional orders result in $5K of added daily revenue, or more than $1.8M annually.

A marginal increase from 2.5% to 3.0% may not seem worthwhile to pursue, but the aggregate effect over the course of a year can be astonishing. While larger companies benefit most from increases in conversion rates due to scale, businesses of all sizes can profit from incrementally improving conversion rates over time.

Regardless of how much traffic your site receives or what your AOV is, these elements are fundamental to increasing ecommerce conversion rates:

In the news was another headline announcing a new record for online sales during the Christmas season. Each year their online revenue grows and its not too late for you to "open a store" online to take advantage of the shopping trends. A top priority is to get paid, but how? Let's review the basics of merchant services.

Getting paid for your knowledge and wisdom may be an attractive path.  You have the expertise, a history of success and believe: “Knowledge empowers so learn and teach”. There is now a long list of options to create and sell courses online.

What you are looking for is a specially designed software system referred to as “Learning Management System” (LMS). A Docebo report anticipates that e-learning will grow to a $50 billion industry this year, thanks to double-digit growth in Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe, and Latin America. With hundreds of vendors, however, choosing an LMS isn't a simple task.

Do you have a churn policy? Is it "Good riddance"? Or as Mr. Wonderful on Shark Tank would say "You are dead to me"?  

It's easy to give up on people who have given up on you. Without an understanding of why they rejected you, it is difficult to improve. "Complaints" are the most valuable type of feedback but when they "walk away" or "unsubscribe", guessing is all you have.

An excellent webinar from Practical ECommerce which has ChannelAdvisor experts talking about how a business can get started with international sales.