The benefits of multi-channel sales: Amazon Marketplace and eBay

Every day, large marketplaces stand as a point of reference for the online purchases made by thousands of users. In fact, they can be called the virtual 'shopping centres' of the contemporary age, the 'places' where consumers buy various types of products.

From a business owner's point of view, marketplaces are platforms from which to sell products without necessarily having to have a personal website. The company can thus combine its name and products with the credibility of a recognizable marketplace. But there's more. Visited by millions of users, retailers can also take advantage of the visibility and the traffic generated by these channels.

Merchants often wonder if it's a good idea to open their own online store instead of simply selling on these well-established channels. In that regard, it's important to remember that an eCommerce website and selling on a third-party marketplace are two completely different tools in terms of the conditions and logistics of sales. One cannot, in any way, be considered a substitute for the other. Instead, they must be seen as complementary.

​​​​​​​Marketplaces help many businesses increase sales numbers. After all, those channels are frequented each day by millions of users searching products in all merchandise categories. Surely a business's presence in a marketplace could be used as a starting point to develop an online presence, to reach new clients and new markets by fully exploiting the traffic to that specific marketplace. Let's take a closer look at what they are and how the two largest marketplaces in the world came about.

Founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994, Amazon is considered the largest electronic commerce site in the world. In addition to selling products directly, it allows third party vendors to use and sell their products within the shop, as long as they adhere to precise terms and conditions.

On the other hand, eBay opened as a site for online auctions in 1995. It entered the Italian market only in 2001, following its merger with PayPal, the online payment system. eBay offers users the ability to buy and sell both new and used items. It includes fixed-price sales as well as a dynamic option, commonly referred to as an online bidding.

These two giants, which stand out for their web traffic and fame, may be true springboards for merchants looking to launch their online sales strategy.
Let's find out how to reap the full benefits of sales on each of these channels.

Amazon

In order to start selling on Amazon, retailers must have an active vendor account. In addition, it's necessary to have a subscription plan to activate sales. All Storeden clients are able to simply and quickly synchronize their entire catalogue, uploaded to Storeden, within Amazon. In particular, retailers can decide which products to publish on Amazon, define processing times and set price changes - all done quickly from the retailer's Storeden dashboard. In addition, this synchronization system offers the centralized management of products and orders. Once it's all configured, it's no longer necessary to open the Amazon panel as every last detail will be synchronized and managed from your Storeden dashboard. Storeden's multi-channel system makes it possible to update stock/inventory, prices and information in real time. You no longer have to worry about manually or directly inputting quantities: the system does it for you. You can relax and dedicate more time to sales, without having to deal directly with their management.  

5 benefits to synchronizing with Amazon  

1. Automatic synchronization: no more manual inputs
2. Quantities and prices are always updated in real time
3. Order management is centralized on the Storeden platform
4. Shipping and returns are managed via the logistics systems used for your online store
5. More sales determined by the popularity of and traffic to Amaz

You can sell products throughout Europe with just one Amazon account

eBay

Storeden has also developed a synchronization system for your catalogue within eBay. Thanks to a few simple configuration steps, you can start selling online even before you've set up your eCommerce site. Using the settings panel, you can customize the layout of your listing, directly modifying the template, the number of product photos to display, the description, and the category under which the product is to be published. The benefit of such synchronization is surely linked to the fact that the entire catalogue, prices and orders are all updated in real time. You can manage orders up to their completion directly from the Storeden dashboard. In addition, if you've created your eBay store, you can connect the products in your Storeden catalogue to your eBay shop, publishing products in their proper categories. Storeden makes it possible to synchronize your catalogue within more than 20 eBay sites with their separate currencies, shipping policies and purchase options. The entire system has been designed to increase your sales by offering a quick, easy management platform. 

Our advice

For a winning strategy and to get better feedback and more sales, we recommend reinforcing the creation of your webstore with sales within the various marketplaces. This makes it possible to introduce your products via popular websites with high visitor counts and millions of daily users who make purchases, search, comparison shop and determine which products they want to buy.