How Russian online stores to deal with Amazon

Despite the fact that the general situation in the Russian economy has recently been described in the main words “stagnation” and “slowdown”, the domestic e-commerce market remains a tasty morsel for many. Over the past year, it grew by 26% to 510 billion rubles, and, according to some experts, by 2015 we can expect it to double. All this makes Runet an important goal for large foreign players like Amazon, eBay, Asos and Alibaba. How can the respected online retailers resist such online retail monsters?

Problem?

The fact that Amazon finally decided to come to Russia was announced in April 2013. Then Forbes reported , citing its sources, that Arkady Vitruk, the former general director of the Azbuka-Atticus publishing group, will head the office in Russia. It was expected that the company would officially launch by the end of 2013, but this did not happen. However, the cancellation of these plans was also not reported.
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Meanwhile, eBay behaves much more actively on the Russian market ( even strategic bombers are already selling there ). The company not only spends significant funds on advertising (including on TV), arranges actions , but also invests in technical means that will help to gain a foothold in the Russian market. In particular, to address localization issues, it is planned to resort to machine translation technologies — expensive experts are hired to work on this area.



ASOS sent goods to Russian users quite a long time ago (to facilitate the shopping process, a Russian version of the site was launched), but with the introduction of new customs rules, difficulties may arise in this area. On the other hand, this could also be a kind of stimulus for further penetration into Russia.

One day, all these events can develop into a puzzle that will mark a new era of Russian ecommerce - competition not only with foreign stores sending packages to the Russian Federation, but with monsters from world retail who have come with one goal - to conquer this market.

How, in such a situation, resist online stores to resist them and save chances of survival?

Expansion of the range

One of the most important aspects in attracting and retaining customers of an online store is the range. The wider the choice - the more purchases are made, the more time is spent on the choice, during which the visitor can have time to show different products. As a result, the turnover of the online store is growing. This has been proven by the experience of many large retailers - for a reason, the very same Lamoda places information on thousands of products on its website.

At the same time, expanding the range is, in fact, easier said than done. An online store that wants to do this will immediately face a lot of questions, the main of which is the availability of storage space and the amount of working capital that can be used to purchase goods. If you add to this the need to create ecommerce-content (descriptions and photos of new products), which also costs a lot of money, then everything becomes even sadder.

On the other hand, you can also begin to work under the order , acting as a virtina, advertising the product, which lies in the warehouse of the supplier. This is a profitable scheme - the supplier only provides information about the remaining goods, he gives them a description and a photo, and the store only needs to advertise and sell the goods, only after ordering its delivery. An excellent scheme, if it were not for one “but” - suppliers who are ready to work very little, but in order to really expand the range (and not just add a couple of names of Chinese smartphones), you need at least a few.



To solve such problems, there are special b2b portals , which, on the one hand, unite on one site those suppliers that are sufficiently equipped to work under the order, and on the other hand - provide the Internet stores with an interface to access the system, thanks to which, in your personal account, you can upload data on the balances in the warehouses of specific suppliers, reserve goods.

As a result, the online store serves as a “shop window” that attracts a buyer (and descriptions and photos of goods are also provided by the portal), and the goods are stored in suppliers ’warehouses, which entails a reduction in costs.

Automation

Even if there are a lot of goods on the website of the online store, this does not mean that you can give up on UX , usability and not engage in automation. It has long been proven that product recommendations raise sales. Large retailers spend a lot of resources on creating their own engines, but for a small store it is much easier to use the existing recommender system - several companies provide such services in RuNet.



Another aspect of online store operation that can be automated is logistics. Far from all stores can afford to organize delivery around the country, and the online retail market in Russia is growing, mainly due to buyers from the regions. But if there is a demand, then it must be satisfied and earn on it.

There are also special services for automating logistic tasks in RuNet, for example, MultiShip purchased by Yandex, which allows online stores to arrange delivery across Russia. Most of the country's largest logistics services are connected to this service, which can be operated without a separate contract and additional technical integration. All calculations go straight through the service, which is extremely convenient.

And, of course, among the tasks of automation, the need to build an analytics process is a separate task - where did it come from, who ordered what products, etc. It is necessary to constantly work to improve the site and, as a result, increase conversions.

Conclusion

Despite the fact that at the moment not all the major players who have laid eyes on the Russian market, have come to it, in the end it is inevitable. And then small and medium online stores will have to compete not only with their foreign counterparts (new customs rules here play into their hands) as well as with Ozone, Yulmart and similar domestic companies, but with recognized leaders in the global e-commerce industry, which have a huge experience, authority and virtually inexhaustible resources.



Then the situation will be similar to the one in the same America that happens when Walmart comes to a new area - difficult times come for local small shops, and they either die or find new niches and opportunities for business optimization. There are no other options.