With millions of consumers shopping online every day, businesses need to establish online storefronts in order to compete. Online storefronts are usually designed to showcase the products or services offered by a business. An online store, however, is a single shop selling only its products online. All marketing and operational processes are handled by the business which owns the site and the products it sells.
Unlike traditional storefronts, online stores don’t own the actual inventory they sell, unlike most marketplace owners. When consumers purchase items from the online store, the marketplace owner then takes possession of the items and resells them to customers on an online auction platform. While the items remain in the control of the marketplace owner, they are not actually sold to customers directly. Instead, they are sold to another individual, called a middleman, who acts as a go-between for the consumer and the marketplace owner. These middlemen earn their profit through a commission. However, this profit is offset when the items are sold.
There are a number of online marketplaces, also known as multi-vendor sites. The most popular marketplace is eBay, which enables sellers to list and sell virtually any product, regardless of whether the item is brand new or used. eBay works with thousands of vendors offering nearly every kind of product you can imagine. Many of the larger or more well-known multi-vendor marketplaces have grown over the years due to the large number of individual sellers operating eBay stores.
A buyer in an online marketplace can search for the product or service to be purchased from a seller. When a buyer locates what they want, they may be directed to the online marketplaces homepage where they can browse through available listings. They may then decide whether or not to make a purchase and click on “buy it now.” At this point, the buyer and seller may enter into a transaction, typically through a secured gateway provided by the marketplace. Once a buyer purchases something, the seller keeps possession of the goods until the buyer pays for them using another method such as a credit card or electronic transfer. Online marketplaces generally offer buyers and sellers free and secure trading options, so it is easy for buyers to shop and for sellers to see what their products are worth.
Although there are online marketplaces for nearly every kind of product and service imaginable, some specialty items may require special consideration in order to find a buyer. For example, because health and beauty products are specialty products, they are often less readily available and more expensive on some marketplace websites than in other websites. One reason for this is that these products are seen as non-reputable. Therefore, buyers may be less willing to purchase from a seller with poor customer feedback. If you have a product that you wish to sell on an online marketplace, consider setting up an affiliate account in order to increase your visibility to potential buyers.
An important aspect of a good marketplace is inventory management. Because merchandise moves rapidly from the warehouse to the customer, it is important that the marketplace owner has a mechanism in place to manage his or her inventory efficiently and effectively. This can be achieved through an online store’s platform, which could be a software program or a website interface. In addition to managing inventory, an efficient inventory management system allows the marketplace owner to keep track of sales and returns on the products he sells, allowing him to maximize on his or her profits.
