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Welcome to Part 2 of our three-part Amazon Accelerate 2024 series. Let’s dive into strategies for streamlining fulfillment, shipping, and catalog management across multiple ecommerce channels.
Did you know that multichannel retailers see up to 190% more revenue compared to single-platform sellers, according to a Stitch Labs report?
As consumer appetites for fast shipping grow, managing orders across platforms like Amazon, Shopify, eBay, and Walmart presents increasing challenges.
This post will equip you with insights to:
- Navigate multichannel complexities
- Reduce operational costs
- Deliver better customer experiences
Whether new to multichannel selling or refining your current approach, you'll find valuable tips to boost your ecommerce success.
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Centralizing Inventory Management for Multichannel Selling
One of the biggest hurdles for multichannel sellers is maintaining accurate, real-time inventory across multiple platforms. Failing to do so can lead to overselling, stockouts, or missed sales opportunities, potentially damaging your reputation and incurring marketplace penalties.
Implement a Centralized Inventory System
A centralized inventory management system allows you to:
- Track stock levels in real-time across all sales channels
- Ensure consistent product availability updates
- Reduce the risk of overselling and overstocking
Diversifying Fulfillment Methods to Maximize Efficiency
Relying on a single fulfillment method can lead to bottlenecks, increased costs, and missed opportunities. Savvy sellers leverage multiple fulfillment options like Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA), Fulfilled by Merchant (FBM), and third-party logistics (3PL) providers to meet demand and offer the best customer experience.
Introducing Supply Chain by Amazon
At Amazon Accelerate 2024, Amazon unveiled improvements and new services for their Supply Chain by Amazon program—now a fully managed, end-to-end solution for sellers looking to optimize delivery speeds and inventory management. This service offers significant benefits:
- 15% average increase in sales
- 25% discount on AWD storage fees
- 15% off transportation costs
Integrating Supply Chain by Amazon into your strategy can help you leverage Amazon's extensive logistics network to boost efficiency and streamline fulfillment across all your sales channels.
Create a Hybrid Fulfillment Strategy
By diversifying between FBA, FBM, and 3PL providers, sellers can strategically allocate inventory based on product type, sales channel, or customer region:
- Fast-moving items: Fulfill through FBA to leverage Prime eligibility and Amazon's fulfillment network
- Slower-moving or oversized items: Use FBM or 3PL to avoid high storage costs
- Peak seasons: Allocate more inventory to FBA to capitalize on increased demand
- Capacity Workaround: If maxed on in FBA, leverage AWD to ensure your Prime status while storing lower velocity products at a discounted rate.
- FBM backup: Use when restocking FBA becomes difficult to ensure continuous sales and maintain seller performance metrics
Multi-Channel Fulfillment Updates from Amazon Accelerate 2024
Amazon announced several updates to Multi-Channel Fulfillment (MCF) that can help sellers optimize their operations:
- Faster Delivery: Standard Delivery option reduced from 5 to 3 business days at no extra cost.
- Dynamic Delivery Estimates: Merchants can now show real-time delivery estimates on their website, Google Shopping ads, search results, and TikTok ads (coming later this year).
These updates demonstrate Amazon's commitment to improving fulfillment services for multichannel sellers, helping them compete more effectively.
Optimizing Shipping Costs and Speed for Customer Satisfaction
Shipping is a critical component of fulfillment that can make or break the customer experience. Offering fast, affordable, and reliable shipping options is essential for meeting customer expectations and reducing cart abandonment rates.
Implement an Inventory Management System
Choose the right inventory planning model to determine optimal inventory quantities:
- EOQ (Economic Order Quantity) Model: Calculates optimal order quantity to minimize costs
- Periodic Model: Reorders stock at fixed intervals
- Perpetual Inventory System: Tracks inventory levels in real-time
- Min/Max Inventory Method: Suggests stock replenishment to arrive before reaching a minimum buffer and calculates the quantity required to restock to the maximum based on set parameters
Additional Shipping Optimization Strategies
- Build an Inbound Shipping Schedule: Plan shipments to align with demand fluctuations and qualify for Amazon-optimized shipment splits.
- Offer Multiple Shipping Options: Provide various choices to cater to different customer needs.
- Negotiate Shipping Rates: Leverage order volume for discounts with carriers or 3PL providers.
- Use Zone-Based Fulfillment: Distribute inventory across multiple fulfillment centers to reduce delivery times and costs.
Improving Catalog Management for Accurate Listings and Reduced Errors
Managing a catalog across multiple platforms involves ensuring that product data, pricing, and descriptions remain consistent and accurate. Inaccurate listings can lead to customer complaints, canceled orders, and even account suspensions on some platforms.
Use Product Listing Tools to Manage Catalog Data
Listing management tools allow sellers to create, update, and manage product listings across multiple channels from a single dashboard. These tools help reduce the time spent on manual catalog updates while ensuring pricing, stock levels, and descriptions are consistent across all platforms.
Consider leveraging expert services like SellerAssist by Carbon6 to manage your FBA product catalog. This can be particularly helpful if you're experiencing inventory discrepancies, have complex catalog management needs, or are struggling with account health alerts related to product listings.
Continuously Optimize Product Listings
Product listings are never truly finished. Regularly optimize product titles, descriptions, and images to improve search rankings and conversion rates. Monitor customer feedback and returns data to highlight opportunities for improvement.
Managing Returns and Defects to Improve Profitability
Returns and inventory defects are an inevitable part of ecommerce, but poor management of these issues can eat into profits and damage customer loyalty. Sellers need streamlined processes for managing returns, defective items, and reimbursements from platforms like Amazon.
Implement Clear Return Policies
Balance customer satisfaction with profitability by implementing clear return policies. Consider:
- Offering hassle-free returns for high-margin products
- Charging a restocking fee for low-margin items
Use Amazon's Defect Management Tools
For Amazon sellers, tools like Amazon's Reimbursements Report can help manage lost or damaged inventory and streamline reimbursement claims. However, Amazon does not automatically issue FBA reimbursements for these problems. It's up to you to identify these mistakes and initiate the claims process.
With Amazon slashing the reimbursement filing window from 18 months to 60 days starting October 23, 2024, consider using a reimbursement service provider before time runs out.
Expanding Your Multichannel Strategy Globally: Insights from Amazon Accelerate 2024
As you refine your multichannel approach, the next frontier for many sellers is expanding into international markets. This natural progression can significantly amplify your reach and revenue.
At Amazon Accelerate 2024, Melanie Shabangu from Avask highlighted why global expansion should be a key consideration in your multichannel strategy:
"If you don't expand over to Europe or other Amazon platforms, somebody else is going to do it for you. They will take your SKUs, hijack your listings, and beat you across the globe."
The European market represents a "632 billion European market" opportunity across 5 different platforms and languages.
Key takeaways for successful global expansion:
- Leverage existing Amazon knowledge to get started faster on international platforms.
- Localize with the support of local agencies to understand cultural nuances.
- Research thoroughly to avoid mistakes like using inappropriate imagery.
- Consider checking trademarks and patents in other countries and trademarking your brand internationally before expansion.
Next Steps: Navigating the Multichannel Maze
The data shows that efficient multichannel management is no longer optional—it's a critical driver of growth. With multichannel retailers seeing up to 190% more revenue, optimizing fulfillment, shipping, and catalog management across platforms is key to capturing market share and improving profitability.
Make sure to put these high-impact strategies on your roadmap:
- Implement an inventory management system, such as SoStocked by Carbon6 to reduce overstocking and stockouts.
- Balance FBA with FBM to optimize operations and cater to different product types and customer needs.
- Offer various shipping options and use zone-based fulfillment to improve delivery times and reduce costs.
- Leverage tools or expert services like SellerAssist by Carbon6 for streamlined catalog management and compliance.
- Implement efficient return and defect management processes, potentially using third-party services like Seller Investigators for FBA reimbursements.
By adopting these strategies and leveraging powerful tools from Carbon6, you'll be well-equipped to navigate the complexities of multichannel ecommerce, streamline operations, reduce costs, and ultimately drive sustainable growth.
