Electrical Wholesaling through E-commerce
Posted by: electime 28th April 2021
By Mohit Sharma, owner at MohitEcommerce
E-commerce has its own advantage to the Online sellers. My experience in selling the items online was totally different when I enrolled as a Flipkart seller, Paytm seller, Snapdeal seller, Meesho seller on these different e-commerce marketplaces. The scope of selling items on these marketplaces is very good to explore and expand the business.
I had no idea about the internet capabilities in Online business world. But when I took training and understood the e-commerce marketplace guidelines then I started earning good online income by selling different products as per the demand from the customers.
Customers still value and believe in the traditional services like branch pickups and deliveries on the site but most of them expect the electrical distributors to have their own website that includes online purchasing options, access to a large number of products and product data.
Online selling is made for individuals, small scale industries, big organisations. Anyone can start selling items online through their own website or from different e-commerce marketplaces.
There has been so much written about e-commerce over the past few years. From the customer perspective, Channel Marketing Group connected with electrical contractors about their view of e-commerce. It included the below subjects:
- Do electrical distributors’ customers use online ordering tools to order or get services?
- If online ordering is common among the customers, from where and for how much are they purchasing?
- Which services and attributes do they expect from an electrical website?
- What will be the differentiating factor from one site, one distributor to another?
- Where do they see the growth of e-commerce in the future?
The greatest concern for wholesalers is the growth of online sales according to a research conducted on behalf of the Electrical Distributors’ Association. It is clear that the wholesalers realised the importance of e-commerce experience to the customers for electrical wholesaling. However, very few are able to offer the best customer experience.
It’s not enough to provide the basic e-commerce functionalities. Today’s B2B online market has become quite huge. Users expect the same experience in retail as well. As an electrical wholesaler, moving into e-commerce is the basic step which must be to provide a seamless shopping experience. Keeping this point in a mind, here is a list that can walk you through the benefits of online selling.
- Customer Specific Pricing
Various standard e-commerce platforms provide customer specific pricing. Individual pricing lists should be available to your customers across all the buying channels. This means you can have a system that assists continual price changes at different SKU item levels which could be different for each customer accessing the system.
Also, in ecommerce, the sellers can compare prices with competitors using tools. This gives them a about product pricing, alternatives, the standard rates and if a product need is unfulfilled.
2. Quick order, refund/cancellation/reorder
With the perfect e-commerce website, users can place orders easily. Due to the high frequency of component ordering, customers know what and how to order. And depending upon ecommerce, the system can locate and list products as per the customers needs.
These customers can be easily able to search a list of items that they want to purchase. They also should be able to order in bulk. With the e-commerce services, the customers should be able to re-order from their previous orders. Also, the cancellation and refund policy should be convenient and flexible for the customers.
So the entire process becomes simple for the customers. They can book electrical services, order products, reorder or even claim cancellation and refund for any damaged products.
3. Simple and Bundle tiered pricing
The ecommerce platforms allow different types of pricing to configure the items. The items can have different categories such as a simple item, bundle item or customizable items. The simple items mostly consist of a single part item. Where as a bundle item is a combination of multiple simple items.
The B2B platform allows the business holders to customize the products and price products as per the business needs. These should be easily marketed, merchandize and purchased.
4. Inventory and Stock Management
Business owners can manage their inventory through the back-end. Visibility of the stock and backorders are critical in managing the supply chain. A product listing is what generally the customer expects while searching for items. Product listing can be personalised after creating them. All you require is product name and codes such as SKU, EAN, ISBN,UPC or ASIN.
Customers might want to track their orders. With exact dates, ETA can also be given to the customers. Perhaps ensuring the delivery dates to the customer.
With backordered products, wholesalers can also ask the customers if they want to wait for the backordered items, cancel the order or replacece the item. Hence improving the customer experience.
5. Customer Friendly
One of the advantages of an ecommerce business is the wholesalers and retailers can provide flexibility to the customers. The products and services are ready 24*7. The outcome is that the sellers can offer their items at any time, any place.
Customers can see all the purchase orders in their accounts. They can manage their profile under My Account. Check the order status and list of orders placed under My orders section. So, customers can keep track of their orders.
Customers are more likely to return for repeat purchases online because of the experience they get. The conveniences include free shipping, discounts, express shipping, and subscription advantages.
6. Various Payment Modes
Shoppers like personalisation – this applies for paying their orders too. Ecommerce marketplaces allow multi payment modes that include – UPI, net banking, cash on delivery, debit card or credit card.
Because of multiple payment methods, buyers have options to select payment methods as per their convenience. This means for sellers, they no longer will lose customers and potential sales due to lack of available payment modes.
Cart recovery – This is a huge benefit of having an ecommerce store. Sometimes the buyer reaches the checkout page but does not complete the purchase.Here, the sellers can notify the customer via emails, phone messages to complete the purchase.
7. Customer Assistance
Each and every interaction is faster when you start selling online. Speedily responding to the customers queries gives them customer satisfaction. Product return and refund management is one of the plus point that can be handled easily and quickly.
When a shopper wants to purchase an item that is out of stock, he may click on ‘Notify me’ options. This will inform the customers when the item is available again for sale. It may also inform the sellers to restock the item, to get more sales.
Customer satisfaction and response is as important as sales because customer reviews matter a lot. As the customers are the ultimate ones who make or break your business.
- Cloud
Cloud system is the latest one which all the technology stack must follow. The cloud based systems provide flexibility to the system because of its large space which makes the system very smooth.
The focus of business should be on driving profits, huge revenues and reducing costs rather than on managing the technical aspect. But you cannot ignore the technical infrastructure. So to make it smooth in a one go, go for cloud based systems that provide cost savings and flexibility to the business.
Conclusion
With the evolving technology and market’s changing needs, it is important to make sure that every business survives and thrives. The electrical wholesaling is no different. It is important that electrical wholesalers have to respond quickly getting into the online business part.
The leading B2B commerce model, allows the management of multiple business models, markets and channels into a single platform with the abilities to manage complex pricing, inventory management, customer portals, product configurations, global inventory management and quote workflows.
So, with the evolving technology, the scope of electrical wholesaling through e-commerce is quite lucrative.
