How to Make Vendors Fall in love with Your Grocery Marketplace?

A marketplace indeed survives due to customers, but it is the vendors who give life to it in the first place. Since vendors have hundreds of marketplace options today, you as a marketplace owner got to have something uniquely striking to offer which will lure them to your site. What? Let’s take a look

Vendor vs Customers

We all have talked a lot about how to attract customers to an online store and how to woo them but hardly do we focus on attracting the retailers who are the prime source for the survival of a marketplace. Attractive design, smooth navigation, and all; will work for customers but to encourage vendors to list their products or services on your eCommerce marketplace, you need to work upon something else. Remember the strategies to attract vendors is entirely different than the ones you apply for customers.

Why Attract Vendors to Sell on Your Marketplace?

Just like it is difficult to convince consumers to shop from the online stores instead of offline shops or shopping malls, convincing the vendors to sell their products on the marketplace is strenuous too. But why convince them? Well; it is the vendors who will bring customers, and it is they who can convert a simple e-store into a multivendor eCommerce marketplace. Therefore, not only you need to convince vendors to sell on your marketplace, but you also need to put continuous efforts to keep them stay with you for the long run as well. Before we begin, keep in mind that some strategies to attract vendors differ as per the marketplace, and here we are going to focus on how you can onboard vendors for a grocery marketplace. So, let’s begin.

1. Work on the look and feel of your marketplace

Indeed, the look and feel of the marketplace is beneficial in attracting customers more, but it is equally advantageous in onboarding vendors too. Start by designing and developing an excellent online grocery store that looks and feels great. Approach an experienced online grocery store website builderto make it eligible in every way for anyone to sell and buy.

2. Understand what vendors want

For a vendor, achieving a good sale is the prime focus. Also, there might be a few things on their mind regarding how they want to sell that you need to understand first before pulling them in. Since there are various categories of a vendor like small, medium, large, startup, experienced; narrow down your vendor segment by building a detailed picture of their personalities, professional characteristics, and expectations first to present themselves as to their customers.

3. Show off your marketing skills

Vendors are out there in large numbers, and more than they need you; it is your marketplace that needs them. So, you must effectively market your marketplace. Reach out to the vendors directly and in every possible way i.e. both online and offline methods. Find them on existing platforms or approach their offline shops, hunt them on Facebook groups or online forums, share informative and promotional posts on social networks, run a google search and display ads campaign, create ads for the vendors to register on your online marketplace as a seller etc. to grab their attention. In short, leave no stone unturned in promoting your marketplace for the vendors to give you a position in their mind and heart.

4. Simplify the transaction process

Many vendors are still habituated to cash payments and are unaware of the benefits and ease of online transactions. Hence, you can lure vendors by educating them about the safety and advantages of using online transactions for their sales. Make them understand; how today’s customer is tech-savvy and hence; how vendors can achieve a large customer base by starting selling online. How with multiple payment options in your marketplace, vendors can get paid on time and at the very instant from the customers.

5. Be clear about all the benefits they will get

Of course, for a vendor to sell on your marketplace, the first that will come to their mind is the benefit. How selling on your marketplace is going to benefit them is all that matters to them. List out all benefits to them starting from the wide customer base, good sales, cost reduction, to the commission they can get by selling on your grocery marketplace.

Explain how their workflow and management of everything from inventory, sales, orders, payments, delivery etc. becomes streamlined and effective via your marketplace that will save them time, cost and their resources.

6. Make your grocery marketplace policies transparent

The reason many vendors don’t want to get into online sales is the fear. The fear that people won’t notice them and nobody will shop, fear that they won’t gain much by selling online, and other security fears. Therefore, make it clear to them before their onboarding everything from your demand and supply policies to avoid any confusion later.

Tell them about your USPs and make them feel they are important for you. List out what all services and benefits they will get from your marketplace like marketing assistance, delivery support, management scenarios, easy subscriptions, payment options, customer data, and connectivity. Before making a deal, come into terms with each other regarding the demands, payment plans, commission, detailed catalogs, deals, and offers to be advertised. Avoid hidden charges and shake hands on a clean and sorted agreement.

Wrapping up

The act of luring and convincing vendors is not a one-time thing; you need to do it continually and improvise as per the needs and requirements. Remember, running a multivendor marketplace doesn’t mean you have to be only customer-focused; you also have to pay attention to the needs of your vendors as well. And, with the COVID-19 pandemic, the competition among online groceries have doubled up and so, make sure you get your marketplace built with the right planning at the hands of an experienced grocery delivery app builder like mobicommerce to avoid any kinds of pitfalls.

Rakesh Jain

Rakesh Jain is the co-founder and CEO of MobiCommerce. When he is not busy taking the company to newer heights, he authors detailed blog posts for leading publications, teaching eCommerce store owners different ways to manage, grow and scale their business. As a seasoned entrepreneur, he is passionate about proactively finding the “next big thing.”