Pitfalls to avoid when selling on marketplaces

With ecommerce growing strongly, the market is becoming more and more competitive. Many consumers start their online search on marketplaces, meaning that online sellers need to make sure their products are easy to find, but approximately 30 percent of products online have findability issues. This can lead to revenue loss.

The rate of ecommerce adoption has rapidly accelerated and it’s more important than ever for consumer brands to stand out from the crowd. At the end of 2021, online marketplaces were estimated to value around 120 to 150 billion euros. Recent customer data from an inriver survey of 6,000 consumers shows 44 percent of online shoppers use marketplaces as a starting point to either search or purchase products. It doesn’t come as a surprise since marketplaces offer an extensive reach and scale but there are some challenges that come with.

Revenue pitfalls

Online shoppers don’t have much patience and are constantly aware of options from other brands. They will quickly choose to buy the same product elsewhere if they run into problems. The opportunity for revenue across online channels is high, but so is the risk to lose sales.

‘The opportunity for revenue across channels is high, but so is the risk to lose sales.’

Below are the three most common revenue pitfalls:

Poor product findability

Broken or missing links and products not being found in searches on relevant keywords or under expected categories, heavily impact a products findability. This is an all-too-common issue with approximately 30 percent of products across online channels having low findability.

Content issues

Almost half (45 percent) of online shoppers visit the product detail page (PDP) at the time of purchase. On average, 40 percent of products suffer from missing product information or contain inaccuracies. This can include missing or inaccurate titles, descriptions, specifications, ratings, images, or videos.

Out-of-stocks

If a product is out-of-stock, it is no longer available for purchase. However, there is a 30 percent rate of products that are still listed on an online store, but are out of stock. Consumers will become discouraged if they place an item in their basket and then find out that it is no longer available.

Turn revenue pitfalls into opportunities

Product information plays a key role to win the online shopper. Brands are faced with the challenge of running multiple websites globally, in different languages while making sure that product content is consistent and accurate across all sales channels.

‘Product information plays a key role in winning the online shopper.’

Learn how to monitor your products at scale and how to reveal where your products suffer from poor findability, content issues or out-of-stocks so that you can make the right adjustments where you might lose sales.

Read more on how you can turn these pitfalls into opportunities for a successful digital strategy.