Invenco has teamed up with The ICONIC to see your business succeed

Is your online business on the growth fast-track, and you’re looking to large Marketplace Platforms, such as The Iconic, to reach a greater number of your customers? Here’s how Invenco can support you.

The online retail industry continues to evolve. Technologies continual advancements in functionality as well as payment services such as Afterpay, has contributed to the 18.7% increase in online sales in 2017(1). This is evident with the leading online fashion and sport retailer – The ICONIC. With the increased growth of online sales and strengthening consumer demands for fast delivery times and wide product range, eCommerce marketplaces such as The ICONIC, must exceed these expectations and offer wider product ranges and efficient service to continue to grow.

Since launching in 2011, The ICONIC has become the leader in online retail sales attracting on average 12 million visits per month, offering over 1,000 local and international brands and has over 60,000 products on their marketplace. This growth is due to the expansion of products as well as consistent and efficient service delivery.

At Invenco we strive for business growth for our clients and one of the ways we looked to achieve this goal was to open up The ICONIC’s eCommerce marketplace as another distribution stream for several of our clients. To do this our in-house team built a direct integration into The ICONIC which allowed retailers such as Incy-N to start selling on the platform. However The ICONIC don’t just let anyone sell on their marketplace, it was Invenco’s exceptional SLA metrics, several follow-up’s and high performance numbers which influenced their decision.

The New Face Of Retail: Marketplace Platforms

With the increased growth of consumers demand for online eCommerce stores, more and more eCommerce business owners like yourself are beginning to partner with large Marketplace Platforms, such as Amazon, The Iconic, Etsy, and Hard To Find, because they all have a large following of potential customers searching their websites daily for the latest products, such as fashion and accessories. These Platforms offer you a way to get your products onto their high-traffic digital marketplaces to increase sales volumes and business growth.

Their websites both expose your brand to a wider scope of audience and provide an exceptional customer experience that may not be otherwise possible from your website or shopfront alone; and for a growing business like yours, this is exactly what you need to build brand awareness and a far reaching reputation in the market.

The Challenges of the Marketplace For Your Business

Just like any other reputable, customer-superhighway Marketplace, these organisations have strict rules and regulations that your business must comply with if it wants to be accepted and continue to trade in their popular digital space.

As they are all about improving the shopping experience for the customer, these platforms require your business to offer options such as picking, packing and dispatching all in the same day. In addition, you must always be on time with delivery and never out of stock, so that the customer is always delighted by every transaction.

Failing to meet these levels of standards is seen as poor customer service and can see your business temporarily banned or even blacklisted permanently across several related Marketplace platforms, which would have a devastating impact on your business, whereas living up to these high standards will guarantee a greater chance of success.

These strict rules are all for the good of the end-customer, which is a shared goal for all involved, however these kinds of demands can be very tough on growing businesses.

The Relationship Between Your Business and a Marketplace Platform

With marketplaces like The Iconic, your business is responsible for logging into their ‘Seller Center’ system, collating all of your orders and details manually, and then sending them to your warehouse for processing, before you have to log back in again to enter the tracking details and mark each order as complete.

This is a very slow and labour intensive process, which can create the following concerns:

• Bottlenecks 

Repetitively downloading and uploading Excel files into the backend system to keep all of the inventory levels displaying correctly on the website can get out of sync quickly, causing stock errors.

• Non-Compliance

If the tracking data is not updated within 24 hours to confirm shipment of the order to the customer, or cancellations are required due to lack of inventory, then Marketplace Platforms will punish your brand for disappointing their customers.

3PL, Your Business and The Marketplace

Third party logistics (3PL) is an absolute must at this point, as joining these busy Marketplace Platforms requires superior storing, shipping and logistics capabilities in order to comply with their fast and accurate turnaround requirements. However, choosing the right 3PL solution is essential if you want to capitalise on this larger audience opportunity, while avoiding consequences of falling short or being out of stock.

The Invenco and Iconic Integration – Revolutionising The Process

At Invenco, we understand that eCommerce businesses like yours require a robust and reliable 3PL solution to meet The Iconic’s strict requirements in order to expose your brand to their thousands of eager customers and grow your business effectively.

As a result, Invenco has built a comprehensive ‘three flow direct integration’ system with The Iconic’s Seller Center to completely automate this process for you. This means that Invenco can remove the manual process of order exporting and fulfilment importing in real time with a full synchronisation between our system and The Iconic’s.

What Does This Mean For My eCommerce Business?

This integration between our 3PL service and The Iconic system can be quick and easily installed for any Invenco client wanting to transact through their Marketplace Platform.

It means that your business can:

• Sell through the Marketplace without any issues
• Take full advantage of The Iconic’s large customer base
• Maximise customer service and experience
• Offer fast fulfilment and response times to ensure compliance
• Update inventory live to reduce inventory and cancelation problems
• Avoid labour intensive data entry to focus on more important tasks

But most importantly, you can grow your business and your bottom line.

How Invenco Help You Capitalise On This Opportunity

To discuss a solution to help your business grow by successfully meeting the demands of a Marketplace Platform and expose your brand to thousands of new customers, contact our team today on 1300 795 800, or visit our website. Alternatively book a free consultation with one of our 3PL Solutions Experts. Our friendly Invenco team are here to help! We specialise in assisting businesses like yours expand by improving your internal processes so you can delight your customers.

(1) Australia Post [2017] ‘Inside Australian Shopping’. https://auspost.com.au/content/dam/auspost_corp/media/documents/2018-ecommerce-industry-paper-inside-australian-online-shopping.pdf