Last weekend you could read an article in several newspapers in which Unizo warns about certain practices of Bol.com. Indeed, Unizo tries to get small self-employed people online, but at the same time points out some points of attention.
On the one hand, there is the observation that Bol.com appropriates the right to offer good running products itself at a lower price. This leads to a direct price battle that the average merchant can never win. To this end, they use merchants' content to sell their own products. Which may not exactly be ethically correct, but which is clearly cited in their terms and conditions.
We would like to make two important nuances here:
1. It is imperative that we ask ourselves to what extent merchants, large or small, should sell products online through their own BtoC webshop or through online marketplaces. Too little thought is given to the added value offered and how this should be conveyed online! If this is not done, you do indeed quickly end up in the online world of generic products, where you yourself offer little added value and you end up in a price war.
2. You need to think more from your consumer's point of view and figure out why your consumer buys from you offline and how to translate that online. So it is quite possible that you only sell offline, but bring your story online. This is also a form of e-commerce! Being successful online just like offline is only possible with the right value proposition or in other words a good product with a unique experience.
If you put this puzzle right, then marketplaces such as Bol.com, can certainly be a valuable part of your online sales channels. However, they must be integrated with your other online and offline sales channels. After all, marketplaces are very strong at generating traffic and sales, but never give you a chance to really get to know your customer. Which we think is a much bigger problem than the price war and using our content. Hence, it is also often appropriate to integrate these marketplaces into an overall sales approach, where other channels are more likely to allow you to interact with your customer in a sustainable way.
In short, online marketplaces are certainly and definitely useful, provided that thorough thought is first given to how they can be integrated so that the added value for your customer becomes clear!
