Increasingly, we hear distributors say that their e-commerce site is not getting the revenue traction they expected. The distributor went into the initiative thinking, “Build it and they will come.” But, what really happened was, “We built it and they didn’t come.” As part of a Distribution Strategy Group study of over 5,000 distributor end-users, we posed an open-ended question to survey participants about why they leave an e-commerce site without buying. The graph below summarizes the reasons.
It is no longer enough merely to have an e-commerce site as many distributors have now deployed one. The price to do so is dropping significantly. Small distributors can deploy a site for a few hundred dollars per month.
The customer experience MUST STAND OUT!!! Customers should be able to easily navigate the site to find detail on products that you have in stock at prices that are competitive. Otherwise, customers and prospects will visit your site and not return. For customers where e-commerce is essential, you may lose that customer altogether.
If your e-commerce site is not getting the expected revenue consider the factors shown in the graph. They are all fixable issues with the right technology solution and some elbow grease.
