Today we’re going to introduce you to a friend of ours, Andy Geldman from Web Retailer.
It’s one of our favorite sources of information about what’s going on in the world of e-commerce (other than our blog, of course). There’s a great directory of software that can help your online business, including reviews!
We sat down with him recently at the Internet Retailing Expo and he was kind enough to answer some questions about himself, his site and online selling.
Keep reading to learn more.
What is Web Retailer?
Web Retailer is a free global community site for e-commerce businesses, with over 10,000 members worldwide. It features a software directory, discussion forum, in-depth articles, and original research – all specifically tailored for small to mid-sized businesses selling products online.
Back in 2003, I started selling on eBay to clear my flat (Editor’s Note: that’s “apartment” to those of us on this side of the pond) of junk. I caught the trading bug and sold a lot of products, including hundreds of CDs of vacuum cleaner noise – it works a treat for calming grouchy babies. I discovered that there’s a lot of admin involved so planned to create my own software to help manage and automate all the grunt-work. I worked at the time as a software developer.
Before I got into the coding, I spent a lot of time looking for what was already out there and found several companies producing software for marketplace sellers. I tried them out and wrote reviews. When I shared the list with other sellers, they were surprised that there was software available and relieved that someone else had already researched and reviewed them all.
So I put my research online as a categorized and reviewed directory of software for eBay sellers. It was called The eBay Software Review, then The Auction Software Review (when eBay’s lawyers objected!) then Web Retailer. It’s changed a lot over those 12 years and it’s about a lot more than eBay software now.
Why should Amazon sellers visit Web Retailer?
Just one thing they might be interested in is an interview with FBA/private label seller Will Tjernlund and our list of the top Amazon sellers worldwide.
There’s also discussions in the forum about selling on Amazon, and software in the directory for Amazon sellers (e.g. for inventory management, feedback solicitation, getting product reviews).
What’s the Web Retailer Directory?
It’s how it all got started and has evolved a lot over the years. The idea is to provide a comprehensive source of information about software specifically for small to mid-size business who sell physical products online. So we don’t cover general business software like QuickBooks for example, but we do cover tools like Profit Bandit and Sellery.
We try to combine several different sources of information to help sellers research software, so on each profile page, there are reviews, news, related discussions, upcoming webinars etc. Some profiles are more fleshed out than others but one good example is ReplyManager – it’s a tool which helps eBay and Amazon sellers manage their communications with customers efficiently.
What are some of your must-read blog posts?
Here are the top five most popular posts:
- The World’s Top eBay Sellers
- The World’s Top Amazon Marketplace Sellers
- Marketplace Repricing: The Ultimate Guide
- Neil Waterhouse on Building a Million-Dollar eBay Business
- 10 Statistics from the Online Marketplace Seller Survey
What other sites should Amazon sellers be visiting?
Wow, there’s a lot of good ones and also a lot of different ways to sell on Amazon so it depends.
SellerEngine really is a good source for tips and Amazon news (Editor’s Note: *blushes*). Some others I follow are Online Selling Experiment and Book to the Future (solo sellers providing a lot of information about their businesses) and StartupBros (they cover more than Amazon, check out their popular posts or do a search to find the relevant ones).
What’s in store for the future of e-commerce?
Amazon will continue to dominate in the countries where it is already doing well, but not become a big force in the fastest growing markets like India and China. Sellers should continue to watch their performance carefully and also the threat of competition from other sellers and Amazon themselves. Don’t forget that you are a very powerful product research tool for Amazon and they won’t hesitate to exploit that. Private labelling will continue to grow and we’ll see more genuine brand names emerge, but consumers and Amazon themselves will become a little wiser to those that really are just a label with no substance behind it.
I think eBay will start to turn things around, maybe they’ll be acquired by one of the internet juggernauts, and inevitably they’ll become more like Amazon as a venue – for the good of almost everyone.
There’s a lot going on in the wider e-commerce world but the truth is a lot of the trends in delivery, customer support, personalization etc. don’t affect marketplace sellers all that directly.
What makes some online retailers more successful than others?
Ha ha! It would be easy to say hard work, grit and determination but I think a lot of it is down to old-fashioned business sense and being able to carve out a unique place for themselves. Too many sellers are just trying to copy others without putting their own spin on it, and that’s not a good recipe for success. Being original is what counts.