Title: PLATFORM
1PLATFORM INTEGRATION EFFICIENCY
2Panelists
- Bernardine Wu CEO, FitForCommerce
- Alan Keller VP Business Development, Vertical
Response - Barney Stone President, Stone Edge Technologies
- Wes Clayton CEO, Interapptive/Shipworks
- Manish Jha President, Atandra
3FitForCommerce
- FitForCommerce is a consultancy founded to help
online businesses figure out what they need and
how/where to find it - Team of former multichannel retailers, marketers,
technologists and service providers, with
hands-on expertise in eCommerce - eCommerce Diligence is a philosophy and
methodology based on diligent preparation and
decision-making to ensure success - Strategy, Requirements/RFP, Provider Selection,
eCommerce Marketing, Implementation Coaching - Rapid Site Evals are quick 2-day evaluations of
ecommerce sites, delivering suggested
improvements and prioritization - FitBase is the first eCommerce market knowledge
base and community, offering - 1000s of best practices, feature evaluations,
expert advice and community content on 300
features, functions and topics - 100s of provider and solution comparative info
Discount code INF100BETA 100 off 795 annual
subscription
4VerticalResponse
- Helping SMBs Grow Their Business Via Online
Marketing Since 2001 - Leading provider of self-service eMarketing tools
for biz of all sizes - Deep integrations with SFDC, Intuit, Long Jump,
many others - 75 employees - based in the SOMA district of San
Francisco - Tools For Marketers, By Marketers
- Create and send an email campaign in minutes with
no help from IT needed - Sophisticated tools and analytics, yet simple to
use - Email, online survey, and direct mail postcard in
one tool - Award Winning and Customer-Centric
- Inc. Fast 500, Deloitte, Business Times, ClickZ,
and many more - Active Member of the Email Sender Provider
Coalition since 2003 - We thrive on making small businesses look like
giants - Environmentally Community Friendly
5Stone Edge
- Founded in 1980 by Barney Stone.
- Began shipping the Stone Edge Order Manager in
2000. - Now have one of the largest installed bases of
order management systems over 2,000 merchants,
including 12 of the 2008 Internet Retailer Top
500. - Feature-rich system for managing orders,
customers, inventory, purchasing, drop shipping,
payment processing, picking, packing and shipping
of orders, etc. - Integrated with over 40 shopping carts and sales
channels - Compatible with credit card gateways, fraud
prevention systems, fulfillment companies and
(coming soon) sales tax systems. - Integrated with UPS, Fedex and USPS for shipping
labels. - Extensive multi-channel features.
- Open source code highly customizable.
- Very affordable!
6Interapptive/Shipworks
- Wes Clayton Co-founder.
- Started as a web development business in 1996.
- Transitioned from developing e-commerce sites to
software solutions in 2001. - Launched what is now known as ShipWorks in 2002.
- ShipWorks now integrates with 21 popular
sales/marketplace systems, supports direct
integrations with all major shipping carriers,
and supports daily shipping operations for
businesses across the United States and abroad.
7Atandra
- Based in New Jersey, founded in 2004
- Software solutions for small business, helping
online retailers be more efficient and
successful. - Our goal is to make systems integration easy
enough for business owners to tackle themselves - Products
- T-HUB integrates eCommerce stores with QuickBooks
or QuickBooks Point of Sale. T-HUB works with
Amazon, Yahoo Store, eBay, Magento, osCommerce,
and several other online shopping cart platforms - Data Flow Manager (DFM) helps businesses
integrate other systems with QuickBooks through a
comprehensive data mapping. - Credit Card Charger is a plug-in to integrate
QuickBooks and Payment gateway (Authorize.net or
CyberSource). - Gold certified by Intuit highest level of
certification (Tech. Review and customer
satisfaction surveys)
8Common Challenges
- In this market, online retailers must do (even)
more with what you have and get (even) more out
of each you spend. - But can you remain competitive with just tweaking
in 2009? - How will you be set up for success in 2010 when
(if?) the market rebounds? - Times are challenging for the mid to enterprise
companies, but its a matter of survival for
small/mid-sized businesses (SMBs). - SMBs spend 80 of effort fixing things as
opposed to implementing new growth elements.
9Common Challenges
- Multiple databases, product feeds, promotions,
limited visibility or reporting, etc. are common
challenges. - Rarely a one-stop shop to fulfill any business
objective. - Over time, ecommerce businesses piece together
multiple components but are often backed into a
corner (hard to change). - Now more than ever, efficiency of operations
(people, process, technology, data) are critical
to succeeding. - Thus integrated platforms and platform
integrations must be the pillars of efficiency!
10Key Integrations
Marketing
Traffic
Webstore
Customer Service
Merchandising
Product Catalog Pricing
Tracking info
Inventory Price/Stock Qty.
Sales
Order Management
Fulfillment
Shipping info
Tracking info
Customers/orders
Inventory
ERP
11Key Integrations
Marketing
Traffic
Webstore
Customer Service
Merchandising
Product Catalog Pricing
Tracking info
Inventory Price/Stock Qty.
Sales
Order Management
Fulfillment
Shipping info
Tracking info
Customers/orders
Inventory
ERP
12Marketing Throughout The Lifecycle
- Old view of customer acquisition based marketing
13Marketing Throughout The Lifecycle
- Integrated approach to data-driven marketing
- Sales Marketing
- Sales and marketing now act as one
- Data-driven segmentation
- ROI by channel
- Focused cast
- Some room to experiment
- Every dollar counts
- Fulfillment Service
- Instantaneous data capture
- Immediate follow-up
- Real time results
- Lifetime value vs. one-time purchase
- Information shared across the org
- Data is as important as the dollar
Every data point is a marketing opportunity
14Marketing Throughout The Lifecycle
- Actionable Marketing Data
- Standard Record
- Leads, contacts, customers
- Physical contact details, email address
- Marketing record
- How did they find out about you?
- How satisfied are they?
- Previous marketing offers?
- Purchase history
- Purchase only sale items?
- High-end purchaser?
15Marketing Throughout The Lifecycle
16Webstore Front-End Site Management
- Many more components to a webstore than what is
commonly discussed or written about - Very little is focus on Site Mgmt yet it is just
as critical as the storefront - Every feature must be planned with Site Mgmt in
mind - Examine each component carefully 2-4x/yr
17Back-end, Data, Security
- Order Mgmt is the heart of the operation
- Hub of the wheel
- Drives front-end yet handles the post-order
- Impacts the CX
- Data is king
- Use data to make decisions on marketing, store
features, processes - Integrations are the 1 failure point for most
online businesses
- Security is a critical system requirement
- Security for shoppers is a critical trust
component - PCI compliance
- Other, e.g. Accessibility, COPA
18Webstore Platform
- Prioritize features functionality on the
webstore that garnish ROI (conversions,
brand-building, loyalty) - Have the right Site Admin tools that reduce staff
time and increase efficiency and accuracy always
know how you are going to manage a new feature - Be deliberate in your use of third-party
technologies (e.g. site search, web analytics,
rich media) - Integrate with all components as tightly, but
flexibly as you can
19Ten Other Rules for Ecommerce Success
- Know what you want to be when you grow up.
- Dont re-type it. Dont even type it once if you
can avoid it! - Use SKUs!
- What is real-time inventory tracking, and why
should you care? - Just because its a small room, doesnt mean its
not a warehouse.
20Ten Other Rules for Ecommerce Success
- Dont put all of your eggs in one software
basket. - Dont get sucked in by the latest 3- or 4-letter
high-tech acronym. - Find and fix your pain points.
- Dont waste your money choose your tools
wisely. - Take all advice (except mine, of course!) with a
grain of salt.
21Post-Order Challenges
- Orders taking too long to fulfill
- Duplicate data-entry in multiple systems
- Physical and web inventory out of sync
- Accounting not updated with sales
- Cannot handle increased volume without increasing
head-count - Monkey-proof systems and processes
22Integrations with ERPS, Accounting etc.
- Integration with back office systems - part of
daily order processing - Identify system for customer service (Website,
Order Manager or Back Office system) - Direct integration vs file import/export
- Exception handling (Invalid address, out of stock)
23Integrations with ERPS, Accounting etc.
- Where to create products first, in Accounting
system or website? - Standardize Product SKU coding
- Revenue (Online product sales, Shipping income)
- Expenses (Shipping costs, Fee, Commissions)
- Track customers for future marketing
24Integrations with ERPS, Accounting etc.
- Returns
- Accounting for multi-channel (Sales by channel)
- Inventory Sales vs Cost of Goods
- Plan B for order fulfillment and accounting
(Software problems, Network issues)
25Save Time Shipping
- Analyze Current Processes
- Look for areas with repetitive and manual tasks.
- Copying and pasting? Re-keying? Manual
imports/exports? - What other areas can be streamlined?
- Talk to staff members to identify specific pain
points. - Implement a Specific Workflow
- Simple Based on status. Shipped, Not Shipped,
Backordered, Etc. - Advanced Automatically group orders based on
SKU, Weight, Destination, Customer Chosen
Shipping Method, Etc.
26Save Time Shipping
- Bulk Process
- Pre-set weights, dimensions, etc. with your
online inventory items. - Select multiple orders and generate all labels at
one time. - Multi-part documents (invoice/packing slip
shipping label). - Automate Tasks
- Automate tasks based on user interaction with
your data. - Automatically generate invoices/packing slips.
- Automatically email customer when label is
generated. - Automatically update the online order status.
- Re-Evaluate, Fine Tune
27Panel Summary
- Hard to find a single platform that does
everything you need - Choosing best-of-breed solutions means
integrating disparate systems - Data flow and integrations can be the weak link,
even with the best components - Tight, seamless integration is a must
- Integration is not just about systems, but also
about data, processes, people, strategies - Choose your solutions and partners for their
integration inter-operability and support
services, as much as for their features - Make sure you have mapped out your total picture,
including how data gets from A to Z and back - Revisit your assumptions and your workflows
frequently
28QA
- Bernardine Wu - CEO, FitForCommerce
- bwu_at_fitforcommerce.com 973.379.7399
- Barney Stone - President, Stone Edge Technologies
- barney_at_stoneedge.com 610.994.3699
- Wes Clayton - CEO of Interapptive/Shipworks
- wes_at_interapptive.com
- Alan Keller - VP Business Development, Vertical
Response - akeller_at_verticalresponse.com
- Manish Jha - President of Atandra
- mjha_at_atandra.com
THANK YOU !