Innovation has changed our daily lives. Technology has brought the world closer and has changed the way we interact with the world around us. Since the rise of globalization and progression, all developed technologies become available in day-to-day life as well as in business.
Optimization techniques for marketplaces offer assistance companies oversee and optimize their deals on such platforms as Amazon and eBay. The wide range of possibilities opens up with the right platform and appropriate settings for it. Sometimes it may seem that built-in marketplace tools are too basic but the reason why they are not working is that you do not use their full potential.
In this article we will go through methods on how to optimize a platform and attract potential customers using inner and external tools for managing.
Essential marketplace tools for fast start and further growth
These tools are built-in features. They can be utilized for numerous purposes, from making product listings to shipping. There are some challenges that businessmen can face and solutions which can help to save these problems. We will learn about them and the solutions CS-Cart Multi-Vendor gives entrepreneurs.
Marketplace management
- Difficulties of design—code-based platforms are difficult to manage for citizen users. The innovative way, no-code platforms, has been invented. As no-code is a number of features that can be combined in this or that way, it may lead to certain limits—CS-Cart Multi-Vendor is a low-code platform. It means that this platform is a mixture of no-code and code-based parts. Add-ons allow for expansion of basic features and can be added easily by vendors or an administrator via interface. However if you need a very specific feature you can find a specialist to develop and implement it.
- Possibilities of design—this point is not about simplicity but about the range of design tools. A wide range of them may eliminate the needance in additional coding—CS-Cart Multi-Vendor has different customization tools: the layout editor, the theme editor, and a fully-customizable checkout page which make storefront customization adaptive and detailed. Furthermore, it is a content management system that helps to control content in an easy and convenient way. We have a powerful CMS which allows for adding pictures, video, and HTML elements.
- No automation in payments—automation is a global trend in business. It is not for nothing since automation reduces the need in labor forces and increases speed of the working processes. Automatic money division between an administrator and vendors, and among vendors—We have two integrative systems for payment Paypal and Stripe Connect. Paypal can derive a fee from the entire price of purchase and send it automatically to an administrator. The advantage of these systems is that they work globally except for several countries.
- Lack of available features—lack of possibilities always turn into limitations. The more features are presented on a marketplace, the more possibilities it opens up—CS-Cart Multi-Vendor has advanced order management and flexible product approval systems. Customers can filter the products according to different characteristics and order products from different vendors in one purchase. These possibilities may seem simple and can be taken for granted. But these details are very important and included in our platform.
CS-Cart Multi-Vendor: Admin panel
Vendor administration
- Sparse documentation and analytics—one of the most important parts in any business is planning. Without appropriate marketing strategy people cannot control and plan the future development of a business. We provide great analytic tools on our platform. They include reports and statistics represented as graphs and charts. Vendors and an administrator can track money transactions.
- Lack of settings for vendors—various appealing features should be provided for all users of a marketplace to make it convenient for all types of users—not only can an administrator create a design but also vendors have access to designing tools to make their micro store unique and handy. An administrator can set different fees according to a product category to balance commission on low- and high-margin products. Implementation of vendor plans has also the balancing purpose. Vendors can choose the tariff that suits most for them. All these features are available on CS-Cart Multi-Vendor.
- Limitations related to client traffic—the problem of attracting clients is a perennial problem of a business. We offer a great marketplace tool for setting different loyalty systems, discounts and sales. Apart from it there is no language barrier between vendors and customers since a marketplace has 26 languages in a package.
CS-Cart Multi-Vendor: Vendor panel
Product catalog management
- Issues with product import—It is significant to keep speed and functionality when expanding a marketplace—CS-Cart Multi-Vendor has an advanced tool of product import. You can upload an unrestricted number of products in a couple seconds.
- Content management issues—this point is about designing product pages—Vendors can create and edit product pages easily. They can change texts, images and descriptions.
- Various integrations—integrative systems serve for optimization of business services. They are external apps that help to solve a certain problem. We will take a detailed look through them in the next paragraph—Marketplaces based on our platform have a lot of possibilities of integration with other systems. The last convenient innovation is integration with Tilda. Tilda is a platform for creating one-page no-code landings.
Marketplace tools for sales
- Absence of loyalty tools—customers should be rewarded for big purchases or for frequent usage of a platform so that they have motivation to repeat purchases—different loyalty systems, promotions which can be started by vendors, rewards for purchases are available on our platform.
- No encouraging tool for extra purchases—you miss a lot if you do not use cross- and up-sell marketing. This type of marketing encourages people to buy more products. It is a service which offers to buy products related to the items people have already chosen. These tools increase the average bill—CS-Cart Multi-Vendor provides such services for administrators of marketplaces.
- No tools for cultivating trust in a marketplace—one of the main factors in seller-buyer interaction is credibility. People want to know characteristics of a product and their quality from real users—Product reviews which are also available with our platform is an indispensable part of building a rapport between vendors and customers. Furthermore, it helps to form a community around a marketplace which also has a good impact on a company's image and marketing.
Growth tools
When expanding your business these three marketplace tools are important and they are available in CS-Cart Multi-Vendor:
- Mobile application of a marketplace—mobile apps have become extremely popular for the last decade. Today businessmen prefer creating it as fast as possible after launching a website version of their marketplace. In cases of old players in eCommerce like Amazon and eBay the gap between building a website and application was about 20 years, while for modern marketplaces this gap is 2-3 years. A mobile app may be a great marketplace seller tool as well.
- Open code—With open source code an administrator has full control over a platform. They can add new functionality by code-based development and set certain security properties.<\li>
- Multiple storefront and localization—localization is a number of features. Some of them, like multilingual representation, have already been mentioned. It also includes various shipping and payment options. Multiple storefront is about the opportunity to create different storefronts according to the countries. These features are needed for globalization.
CS-Cart Multi-Vendor: mobile application
For all the words about advantages of the platform to esteem it objectively, you may need to get first-hand experience. So, you can try a free demo version of CS-Cart Multi-Vendor.
Integrative systems for automation and optimization
There are other external eCommerce instruments, these systems are planned to work with existing commercial platforms. These systems simplify work from the point of view of contributors like an administrator or vendor. The aim of them is automation, optimization and managing business processes. The common benefit is that these systems allow for collecting all information about certain business sides in one place. There are three major types of systems.
Client side services: CRM
Customer relationship management—these systems serve for accumulating all the information about clients in one place. In general terms it may be represented as a common table with data like first name, last name, agde, mobile phone, email, etc. But speaking in terms of tables, CRM is a complicated one and its possibilities extend wider than possibilities of a common table.
What are they needed for:
- Information about customers
- Communication with customers
- Getting statistics
- Manager control
- Additional services like mailing, filtering requests by purpose, etc.
Examples of CRM: Salesforce CRM, HubSpot CRM, and Zoho CRM.
Financial services: automated accounting system
These are services related to money flow. With implementing them you can structure all the information about money transactions. They also accumulate client’s documentation from a marketplace. Not only is it a convenient way to store information but also a very secure one. Such services are very concerned with security.
What are they needed for:
Examples of automated accounting systems: Quickbooks, Xero, and FreshBooks.
Product services: automated storage and retrieval system
These instruments serve for tracking products and product distribution. This technology is a combination of equipment and programs that help to manage products. They are usually used when a business has a massive amount of products.
What are they needed for:
- Allow for monitoring stock
- Increase capacity of the storage space
- Define a minimum number of workers
Examples of automated storage and retrieval systems: Daifuku, Dematic, and Honeywell Intelligrated.
These are external integrative marketplace tools. All of them can be connected with CS-Cart Multi-Vendor. You can see other advantages on our website.
Summary
In conclusion, there are a lot of features which can help to broaden the horizons of business. Platforms have a lot of handy build-in marketplace tools but not all entrepreneurs use them. Apart from them, we took a glance at the external instruments of management.
CS-Cart Multi-Vendor has an impressive range of possibilities for expansion. Our platform suits both: startups and advanced businesses. With listed tools marketplaces can flourish and develop easily.
