PLATFORM

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PLATFORM

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Alan Keller VP Business Development, Vertical Response ... eBay, Magento, osCommerce, and several other online shopping cart platforms ... – PowerPoint PPT presentation

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Title: PLATFORM


1
PLATFORM INTEGRATION EFFICIENCY
2
Panelists
  • 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

3
FitForCommerce
  • 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
4
VerticalResponse
  • 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

5
Stone 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!

6
Interapptive/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.

7
Atandra
  • 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)

8
Common 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.

9
Common 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!

10
Key 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
11
Key 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
12
Marketing Throughout The Lifecycle
  • Old view of customer acquisition based marketing

13
Marketing 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
14
Marketing 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?

15
Marketing Throughout The Lifecycle
16
Webstore 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

17
Back-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

18
Webstore 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

19
Ten 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.

20
Ten 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.

21
Post-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

22
Integrations 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)

23
Integrations 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

24
Integrations 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)

25
Save 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.

26
Save 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

27
Panel 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

28
QA
  • 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 !
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