The Interest in B2B Marketplaces is Real

CommerceConnect Dallas

Whenever you get a passionate group of individuals away from their daily routine and engaged in discussions with their peers on a single topic like marketplaces, it’s a tremendous opportunity to learn! My thanks to all the customers and partners who joined us in Dallas for the latest CommerceConnect – the feedback on the event has been amazing.

The attendees had participated in the Sponsored User Group for the launch of the new native Marketplace solution that is built into HCL Commerce. Our style is not to build new capabilities in a vacuum, but to collaborate with ‘our family’ of customers and partners to ensure that what goes into our Commerce platform will truly help our customers sell more. This group helped steer the delivery of Marketplaces to its launch.

The buzz around Marketplaces is real. Sitting on a couple of webinars recently, the speakers were focused on key issues like channel conflict and pricing transparency. This group in Dallas has a remit from their business leaders to introduce Marketplaces as a new channel and were focused on making this solution work in their own markets as quickly as possible. Sure, they still have challenges like regulatory requirements, but these teams were quick to point out that when marketplaces are part of your commerce platform, it makes life simpler for them, makes it easier to try out marketplaces and it minimizes the risk by removing the need for additional integration. Also, they love the ‘one vendor’ to manage in case of any problem resolution.

Key Take-Aways

1. Marketplaces is not only about the technology. It’s the operational side that is equally important and perhaps more challenging. Having the right tools to manage a group of vendors that have the same UI, the same familiarity, the same control for business users is key.
2. Marketplaces belong in commerce. This was the message from the consultants who have been on the leading edge of Marketplace implementations. Marketplaces create stickiness for merchants, they drive traffic to your site, its where many customers want to buy. A unified commerce experience removes friction.
3. Marketplaces solves challenges that Commerce cannot. Whether that is helping a manufacturer get closer to the customer, expanding assortments, to providing fulfillment options.
4. Marketplaces that are native provide agility, improve ROI. One of the top messages was simply ‘Get Started Now’. Whether it’s for a brand, geo, industry, get started now and reap the benefits without the risk.

HCL Commerce is building a marketplace solution that comes at no additional cost to clients. It is rich in capabilities and benefits from a Commerce Platform with a single management center with embedded tools to synthesize the managing of catalogs, search, promotions, all those aspects critical to a powerful marketplace solution but shared with your Commerce platform.

A quick mention for the HCL Commerce Global Summit at the Chicago House of Blues, July 19-21, where the next release of Marketplaces will be announced.