Expand Your eCommerce Sales Channels

You know it is exhausting keeping up with your store, your customers and keeping one eye open for new platforms where you can sell your products. Let’s explore the locations where you need to be selling.

Your Own Store

Let’s get the obvious one out of the way first. If you don’t already have an online store, you need to consider building one. The main reason you want to create your own online store is that you set all the rules and you make much higher margin selling through your own store than you do selling through a 3rd party. A 3rd party like Amazon will take 15% off your revenue right off the top, that may not sound like a lot, but if you consider that the average retailer only has a 30% profit margin, Amazon is taking ½ of your gross profit.

We build online stores for our customers in both WooCommerce and Shopify. There are pluses and minuses to both platforms, if you want to research them both in depth before deciding take a look here to learn more.

Amazon

Amazon is the 90 pound gorilla in the room. The market cap of Amazon is more than 4 times the market cap of the following brick and mortar retailers: Macys, Kohls, Sears, JCPenny, Nordstrom, Best Buy, Target, Gap, Dillards + Barnes and Nobles. That is an astounding stat and just reinforces that you need to be selling on Amazon. It’s easy to get started selling on Amazon and if you’re yet to make the plunge, there is no time like the present to get started.

Take selling on Amazon with a grain of salt as there are many pitfalls and issues that merchants have encountered. If you try to game Amazon with fake reviews or you deliver poor or misleading service you can run the risk of losing your Amazon account.

eBay

Selling on eBay is easy to get rolling and if you are already doing well on Amazon, you need to set up your eBay account right away. eBay may still carry the stigma of only being an auction site that sells beanie babies, but the reality is that with their fixed price model there is a lot of product that moves on the site. With all channels you must have great photos, get excellent seller reviews and avoid the mistakes that many first time eBay sellers make.

Walmart Marketplace

You may think brick and mortar store when you hear the name Walmart, but don’t forget their marketplace is a great place to sell your product. Walmart purchased Jet.com and that only expands the reach of their marketplace offering greater opportunities for your product to reach customers. There are over 80 million visitors each month to Walmart online and you can sell your own products and they also accept drop ship vendors.

Etsy

More than $2 Billion dollars of products each year is sold through Etsy shops. With no monthly fees, Etsy is an attractive option for sellers of handmade, vintage and craft products.