Navigating the ecommerce marketplace maze

From the bustling metropolis of Amazon, to the curated, specialist boutiques of Etsy and eBay, the ecommerce marketplace landscape is as diverse as it is vast. With so many ways to find the perfect product, ecommerce marketplaces have become a go-to for customers. A survey from Digital Commerce 360 and Bizrate Insights found that 49% of respondents make monthly purchases on marketplaces.

However, not all marketplaces are worth the investment for your business. With over 150 options to navigate, finding the best fit can be quite the challenge.

This blog will guide you through the process of finding the ideal marketplace for your unique products and how integration can help your business thrive once you’ve found the perfect match.

Identifying the right marketplace

The key to success when leveraging a marketplace is ensuring it aligns with your business goals, product niche, and possesses characteristics that match your business model. Marketplaces are becoming increasingly specialized, so it’s crucial to select one that your customers frequent and that will fit your specific needs.

For example, TikTok Shop is great for retailers that want to showcase the latest fashion, but isn’t the right fit for motor parts. The opposite is true when it comes to eBay.

Let’s explore some of the most common marketplaces and the distinct environment and tools available within each of them:

TikTok Shop: The ultimate lifestyle marketplace

TikTok Shop offers a vibrant marketplace of personalized products like cosmetics, beauty, home goods, fashion, and accessories. With a diverse range of products and styles showcased through engaging short videos, TikTok serves as the ideal platform for lifestyle brands.

Etsy: A tapestry of craftsmanship

For those who craft with care and tell a story in every stitch, Etsy is not just a marketplace but a community of like-minded artisans and aficionados. It’s a haven for the bespoke, the vintage, and the handcrafted.

eBay: The one-stop shop for affinity products

eBay is the malleable marketplace that suits all, yet has an affinity for the niche, particularly in the toy, electronics, and automotive sectors. It’s the perfect marketplace for the treasure hunter.

Amazon: Empowering big and small sellers

Amazon is the titan of digital marketplaces, where giant retailers mingle with mom-and-pops. Here, the focus is on availability and convenience. If you value volume and visibility as your keys to success, then Amazon might be your go-to spot.

Temu: Reinventing social shopping

Temu is an online marketplace selling a variety of discounted products. It’s been making waves in the ecommerce sphere by offering credits to users who promote the app on social media and get friends and family to sign up. Sellers seeking to provide budget-friendly products and deals will find this platform aligns well with their goals.

Shein: An affordable fashion powerhouse

Hosting a plethora of trendy fashion products at affordable prices, Shein is an excellent platform for businesses targeting the fashion-savvy, budget-conscious buyers.

Zalando: A destination for European fashion

For the fashion retailers aiming to break into the European market, Zalando is the prime destination. It offers a unique and diverse mix of fashion, shoes, and accessories, making it an attractive choice for businesses with a fashion-forward product line.

Walmart: The retail giant’s digital arm

Walmart combines its retail presence with a thriving online marketplace catering to a broad customer base. Selling on Walmart can be a good choice for businesses seeking breadth over depth, with the security and reliability of a well-established retail giant.

Target Plus: A select hub for trusted brands

Target Plus, an invite-only marketplace, is all about promoting a curated selection of trusted brands. If you can secure a place, your products will be showcased among other high-quality brands that value customer service and satisfaction.

OTTO: Center of German ecommerce

OTTO is one of the most successful ecommerce companies in Germany, providing an extensive range of products. As a retailer, if you seek to penetrate the German market, OTTO could be your perfect match.

ASOS: The trendsetter’s choice

ASOS is home to more than 850 brands, capturing the latest trends and styles for young adults. It’s an excellent marketplace for fashion retailers targeting trendy buyers that appreciate a mix of established brands and emerging designers.

Bol: The Dutch giant

Bol.com serves as the dominant marketplace in the Netherlands and Belgium. It offers a wide range of products, making it an ideal marketplace for businesses looking to establish a presence in these regions.

Your next move: Building an integration strategy

Once you’ve determined the marketplace that works best for your business, you need to optimize it to gain the greatest amount of ROI. The key to creating smooth and personalized customer experiences is integration. Without it, you will be stuck with time-consuming, error-prone manual processes and inefficient operations.

By integrating your marketplace with the rest of your ecommerce tech stack, you can make sure data is flowing between your applications and your marketplace. This allows you to automatically update inventory and product information to prevent stock outs and frustrated customers.

You can also automatically update order information in your order management system and accounting systems, send instant notifications to your customers detailing the status of their order, and keep them up to date on shipping information. This helps you avoid mismatched orders or payments and late deliveries.

Implementing integration: Customer success story

By leveraging Celigo’s iPaaS (Integration Platform as a Service) to integrate their marketplace and tech stack, customers have experienced improved efficiency, customer satisfaction, revenue growth, and more.

Erin Condren Design, a lifestyle brand known for creating fun and functional organization essentials for the home, office, and everything in between, was able to leverage a Celigo prebuilt connector to integrate Amazon with their ERP (enterprise resource planning) software. All Amazon orders, standard and non-standard, now accurately flow to their ERP–saving the company countless hours and headaches in the process.

To dive deeper into ecommerce integration and automation and start to build you plan, download our eBook, “The scoop on mastering ecommerce automation: Your guide to end-to-end integration.”