Marketplaces: The Truth Behind Connectors

At first, selling online on a marketplace, such as Amazon, may seem simple. You open an account quickly, without a hitch, you move almost immediately to adding your products to the marketplace, and then you have a few orders to ship. But what happens when we invest more in selling online and using the tools at our disposal? Supply and demand grow. Suddenly, we find ourselves jumping from one platform to the next to manage shipments, customer service, product adjustments, and soon, we get overwhelmed. If this example sounds familiar to you, it may be time for you to invest in a connector.

A connector is a web interface that, when connected to your accounts, lets you simply your eCommerce management by playing the role of a middleman. These interfaces include the following three elements:

• Procedures: Procedures refer to the specific tasks or functions that a program executes.
• Protocols: The protocol is the format used to communicate data between applications.
• Tools: A set of functions made available to the user.

In short, this is an interface that allows one piece of software to communicate with another. Connectors provide a secure and standardized way for applications to work with each other and provide the requested information or features without the intervention of the user.

The purpose of a connector is mainly to facilitate the management of your stores and your inventory. It manages your warehouses as well as your online stores to let you access all the information quickly from a single interface.

For example, if you have an eBay account as well as an Amazon account, the connector would allow you to manage all your orders from a single system. It will also be able to communicate with the different marketplaces to offer the customer the tracking number and the different shipment statuses.

For example, if you have an eBay account as well as an Amazon account, the connector would allow you to manage all your orders from a single system. It will also be able to communicate with the different marketplaces to offer the customer the tracking number and the different shipment statuses.

Whether it’s a modification of the description, price, or quantity, or even the removal of a product, the connector manages the new information and sends everything to all the systems in question. In addition, the system remains in communication with your marketplaces thanks to the call principle. This represents the sending of data from one piece of software to another. This logic then ensures that your inventories are up to date from one marketplace to the next, regardless of their source.

Furthermore, most of the services to which you can subscribe allow you to make mass changes to your inventory. You can then prepare a file (normally in .xls format) to make a single update for your entire inventory or simply a portion of your products. This type of operation will allow you to save a great deal of time.

First of all, it’s important to assess your needs, your objectives, and your challenges. The principle of a connector is attractive and may seem beneficial to any seller. Who wouldn’t want to use a single interface to perform all these tasks?

However, without a certain sales volume or an immediate need for support with your daily operations, it can quickly become a significant non-essential expense.

Here are the questions you should ask yourself:

• Do you currently have several obstacles in the management of your online business?
• Over the next few months, do you aim to expand your offerings or multiply your sales channels?
• Do you have other service subscriptions? Are you using their tools to their full potential?
• Do you have a team ready to support a new program and an integration process?

Several options are available to you, and you should consider your current infrastructure before making your decision. Here are our recommendations:

1. Codisto Channel Cloud

   

   The Codisto interface is very simple to learn and master. In addition, their product fully adapts to the following platforms: Shopify, WooCommerce, BigCommerce, Magento, and Ecwid with the help of their extension, which is easy to install on your website. This is a good tool that lets you quickly browse your offers, regardless of the marketplace, from your own website.

   In addition, Codisto recently developed the new native Shopify connector, Amazon by Codisto. This is a separate service from Codisto Channel Cloud that aims to support you in Amazon marketplaces with tools that let you create new products, synchronize your inventory and your orders, and simply the addition of new sales territories.

2. Store Automator

   

   This solution is less affordable and would primarily be recommended to businesses that already have a firm footing in eCommerce. This is a highly comprehensive service that adapts to almost all marketplaces and offers the user multiple tools to automate the control of their inventory. The team behind this connector is heavily involved in the system installation process and makes sure to respect the needs of the seller.

   It goes without saying that transferring your data and tasks to a connector should only be done once you have properly assessed its usefulness. The work can be longer and more difficult than you might think. You also have to find the most relevant offer for your business. More and more online services are launching their own connectors and, despite the fact that most of the offers are similar, their tools, the cost, and the support that you will receive for the integration period will be different.

Do you want help selecting and implementing the right connector for your business? Our team supports the integration, configuration, and troubleshooting of many connectors, including Codisto, which was mentioned in this article. Novatize is also the exclusive official integration partner of this solution in Canada.

In collaboration with:

• Pier-Olivier Doyon, Project Manager, Marketplaces, Novatize
• Pascale Turpin, eCommerce Advisor, Novatize