Mistakes to avoid while running online stores

Selling products online stores can earn you quick reorganization, but at the same time is complicated too. Many ecommerce business owners who simply rush in running more than one store tend to make one or more of the same kind of mistakes. This is seen amongst new-sellers but many experienced sellers fall into some of the same common mistakes.

Below are four most common mistakes owners make while running multiple stores and ways to avoid them

1 – Your product listing have not been updated

You may have dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of products selling across multiple stores or marketplaces. But, you are unable to create single listing for each product. Because, if you do or the marketplace allows you do so then the same products will appear multiple times on the same products page and will make your customer’s confused. Therefore, when you list your products on multiple stores and marketplaces, they’ll ask you for a unique identification number which they use to associate several sellers with a single product listing. Now, what many ecommerce business owners don’t realize is the importance of the unique identification number while integrating or updating their listing in stores or marketplaces they sell.  Because, if there is an error in the code or a marketer accidentally associates a product with the wrong code, a huge problem arises.

What to do about it?

Investing in a multi-channel retail software will help you automate and update your products listing associating correct unique identification number to the correct product. By doing this, you will avoid costly errors that directly hits the bottom line of your business. This is certainly a mistake that you’ll want to avoid.

2 – Miscalculate product price

Selling across multiple stores will no doubt expand your offering in wider platform, but at the same time you have hundred of competitors selling the same products or services as you do.  Therefore, the only way to compete is with price. Many ecommerce merchants do so, but often they either miscalculate the marketplace fees, shipping charges, or list products at a very low price. This happens quite often when ecommerce owners forget to include such charges in the pricing calculation.

What to do about it?

For instance, you sell a products on Amazon for $50.00 plus $5.00 shipping and handling charges, for a total of $55.00. Now Amazon will charge you $10 as a marketplace fee. This leaves you with $ 45.00. But, your actual shipping charge was $10 and product price was $ 30, leaving $5 in profit. Calculating your selling fee is something that you will not like to mess up with while running multiple stores!

3 – Your inventories have not been updated

Managing inventory has been the most common mistake for retailers running multiple stores including marketplaces. This mainly occurs when they forget to update inventory levels due to lack of visibility.

For example, a retailer having an online stores, a physical store, and also selling on marketplaces like Amazon and eBay has three products available in his warehouse. Imagine if he has listed those three products in his physical store and also listed them in his other stores and marketplaces too, then there are more chances of him over-selling that product that are actually in hand. This way you may have to deny customers, who in-turn will never shop from your site. And, if you are selling over marketplaces they may not allow you list any more products in future. This is a major mistake made by many ecommerce business owners till date!

What to do about it?

Automating your inventory management will help you eliminate stock issues by giving you a real-time visibility of all your inventory in a glance. Investing in a software that allows multi-channel integration of stock coming from multiple sources in one system will help you avoid this big mistake. This solution will ensure that the correct quantity is updated in the correct store.

4- Not advertising, or missing marketing opportunities

When you decide to run more than one store means you are looking for new prospects and potentially build customer relationships. But, what most multi-channel online sellers often make a mistake of missing marketing opportunities. It is easier to attract existing customers than get new ones. When you run multiple stores, advertising in a correct way will help you promote all your stores effectively.

What to do about it?

For example, if you are selling on eBay then include discount coupons in the box which can be used at one of your other stores. This way you can advertise your other stores and

products in a very effective way. But, you cannot blindly target any and every customers as it will increase your marketing costs. Therefore, infuse a multi channel selling software that has an in-built marketing tool which will help you track and analyze your top customers to avoid missing marketing opportunities.

In closing

Selling across multiple stores is a new discipline and everyone is still learning. The odd mistake will be forgiven, but ignoring the most common ones will not.