Despite the DTC growth, the retailer’s net sales decreased 18% year over year to $251.9 million. However, net sales at its two physical stores (in Hollywood, California, and Everett, Washington) grew 41% year over year. Mariotti attributed that to a nearly 50% increase in foot traffic.

“While we can’t make up for all the lost retail opportunity, we are continuing to see extraordinary growth in the channels we do control,” Mariotti said.

Funko ecommerce sales

The brand launched a new, Salesforce-powered website in its fiscal Q1, he said. He did not say what platform Funko used for its previous website. The transition better allowed Funko to upgrade its order management system, improve functionality, receive better analytics and improve integration across its websites, he said. Funko ecommerce sales account for about 17% of net sales, Mariotti said.

“In the channel — where we control inventory levels and product newness — demand is at an all-time high,” Mariotti said. “Our data suggests that among avid collectors, many purchases that may have occurred at a retail partner in the past are migrating to funko.com.”

At WonderCon, the first convention in 2023 that Funko attended, the new site helped more than double Funko’s ecommerce revenue compared with the prior year’s event, he said. WonderCon is an annual comic convention in Anaheim, California.

Funko earnings

For the fiscal first quarter ended March 31, 2023, Funko reported:

• Net sales decreased 18% year over year to $251.9 million.
• Funko direct-to-consumer sales grew 61% to $42 million
• Wholesale decreased 26% year over year to $210 million. Funko chief operating officer and chief financial officer Steve Nave attributes this to retailers being cautious about restocking and inventory levels.
• U.S. net sales declined 23% to $178 million. Meanwhile, Funko sales in Europe grew 4% to $59 million.

Percentage changes may not align exactly with dollar figures due to rounding. Check back for more earnings reports.

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“I don’t want to bury the lede: after today, Shopify will be smaller by about 20% and Flexport will buy Shopify Logistics; this means some of you will leave Shopify today,” CEO Tobi Lütke said in a memo to staff. “I recognize the crushing impact this decision has on some of you, and did not make this decision lightly.”

The company expects to incur severance charges of $140 million to $150 million.

“Our numbers were unhealthy, just like it is in much of the tech industry,” Lütke said. “With the right numbers, we’ll fully focus on outcomes and impact.”

Shopify earnings

The ecommerce platform provider also announced its fiscal first-quarter earnings on May 4. It said revenue increased 25% to $1.5 billion compared to the prior year.

Gross merchandise volume, the total value of merchant sales across Shopify’s platforms, was $49.6 billion. That’s above Wall Street projections of $47.68 billion, and some $6.4 billion higher than comparable quarter of 2022.

The Ottawa-based company also gave an outlook for the second quarter, saying it expects revenue to grow at a similar rate to the first quarter growth rate on a year-over-year basis. It also expects to achieve free cash flow profitability for each quarter of 2023.

Shopify bet early in the pandemic that a rapid rise in online shopping, fueled by customers staying home, would become permanent. As that wager soured, Lütke has attempted to turn the company around. It cut about 1,000 jobs last summer, raised prices and focused on building out client offerings and its in-house fulfillment network. Shopify had 11,600 employees at the end of 2022.

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Marcel Fairbairn, CEO, GearSource.com

“I would say I wasn’t brought up as a tech founder, I was brought up as a pretty normal, boot-strapping business guy,” says chief executive Marcel Fairbairn, who launched the business in 2002.

That approach has worked well for GearSource, which gets 70% of its orders through online searches and the remaining 30% through live customer service. Relying mostly on email and word of mouth to build business, revenue growth averaged 5% to 7% annually without acquisitions, says Fairbairn, who won’t reveal actual numbers.

“Everything we’ve done is organic,” he says. “We’ve been profitable almost every year.” The only exceptions were in 2008 in the wake of the economic crash and more recently in the fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Customers range from the Super Bowl to Google and Apple

GearSource provides all manner of lighting, audio, video, staging and rigging, and related equipment to vendors servicing live entertainment venues. Ultimate users have included touring bands and mega-events such as Super Bowl half-time shows, and occasionally such large companies as Google and Apple.

More typical purchasers are companies working with nightclubs, other smaller entertainment venues, and wedding-reception halls. In one notable instance of GearSource working in what Fairbairn calls “very high-touch mode,” the country-music star Morgan Wallen needed 100 rare lighting fixtures ASAP. GearSource found them in Singapore and got them delivered to Nashville in six weeks — a quick turnaround given the logistics involved.

GearSource works both ways, providing vendors with the equipment they want and as a market for disposing of equipment no longer needed by the original buyer. In all, GearSource claims 40,000 users, including 5,000 to 6,000 active sellers offering 933 brands and between 30,000 and 60,000 products, according to Fairbairn.

“I would venture a guess that about 98% of our business is B2B,” he says.

GearSource focusing on fast growth

GearSource’s parent company, GearSource Holdings LLC, is based in Miami, but its 17 employees are fully remote. Most are in the United States, with some in Canada, Europe, and Asia.

Now GearSource aims to grow revenue by 10 to 20 times over current levels in three to five years, Fairbairn says. To do that, it’s going to ramp up search and email marketing, employ some unspecified “in-person branding opportunities,” and possibly return to trade shows, which it used in the past but hasn’t recently.

The company shifted into a higher gear recently after  a larger marketplace expressed interest in acquiring it. No deal materialized as GearSource’s would-be acquirer itself became acquisition bait. But the suitor’s interest prompted Fairbairn and his team to take a close look at their operations and business model. They soon saw untapped growth potential.

The platform clearly needed improvements. GearSource had used an in-house platform for 15 years, until 2020, when it was replaced by one developed by a third-party vendor augmented by various plug-ins and custom coding. But while the new platform had some strengths, order documentation sometimes took 30 to 40 seconds to pull up, and it had difficulty handling complex orders,  Fairbairn says.

“We were on a Frankenstein platform,” he says.

Managing a complicated marketplace

There’s no lack of complex orders on GearSource. The marketplace operates in 100 countries, thus “we’re a very complicated marketplace,” says Fairbairn. “Sixty to 70% of our transactions involve more than one currency,” he says, adding that all settle in U.S. dollars. The average transaction is $18,000. The company also has to track taxes and logistical data.

Enter New York City-based Nautical Commerce Inc., a multi-vendor marketplace platform founded in 2020. CEO and founder Ryan Lee had done stints at Apple Inc., where he worked on the Apple Pay payments service, and at Visa Inc. in new products and business development. GearSource decided to take a chance, signing on with the newbie last May and going live on Nautical’s platform in November.

So far, so good

“Speed is one of them,” he says when asked about Nautical Commerce’s advantages. Other improvements include better dashboards and reconciliation processes. “The information is more accurate, the dashboards are very clean and simple,” he says. The platform also gives GearSource customers the ability to create so-called micro-marketplaces for their own customers within the GearSource site, he says.

GearSource accepts credit cards through payment processor Stripe Inc., but most of its transactions are wire transfers processed through Nautical Commerce. GearSource charges fees to sellers based on order size and frequency.

Next up, within a couple of months, is the planned launch of a freight-brokerage subsidiary dubbed GearMoves to handle customers’ transportation and logistics needs throughout GearSource’s global footprint. Buyers will continue to be able to use sellers’ shippers or third-party shippers, but GearMoves will provide another option, says Fairbairn. Also in the works, though Fairbairn isn’t ready to give details, is a software-as-a-service (SaaS) offering.

All of this is part of a drive to keep his online market a go-to place for equipment buyers and sellers. “The show must go on is the overriding theme in our industry,” Fairbairn says.

B2B Ecommerce Handbook

This article is part of special report, B2B Ecommerce Handbook: Formulas for Digital Growth, which is available at no cost from Digital Commerce 360.

Jim Daly is a Mount Prospect, Illinois-based freelance journalist covering business and technology.

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In underground mines and tunneling projects, Normet’s new SmartDrive battery-electric-powered and massive mining and construction equipment comes with benefits similar to those of modern electric cars: “one-pedal” driving and relatively sleek designs emanating from the lack of traditional gearboxes and driveshafts.

Normet’s drive into electric vehicles coincides with its foray into digitalization — two developments the Espoo, Finland-based company highlights in its 2022 annual report as among the critical industry trends supporting the manufacturer’s long-term growth.

“We continue to expand our core process areas, with advances in electrification, digitalization, automation, and technology leadership,” president and CEO Ed Santamaria says in the annual report.

Normet has also positioned itself for growth amid other significant trends impacting its industry: mines moving further underground, an increase in remote locations, and customers expecting more options and ease in dealing with the manufacturer and ordering parts, supplies and services to keep their costly equipment running in top shape.

Pekka Jaarinen, director of digital services, Normet Oy

Digital commerce is critical to addressing these trends, says Pekka Jaarinen, director of digital services.

“We are able to react faster to customer requests, and the customer has better transparency” into the availability of products and services and their order status, he says. “But it has improved our internal efficiency as well.”

Normet’s equipment ranges from multi-ton mobile mining equipment to cement-spraying trucks costing in the tens of thousands of dollars or more; the manufacturer’s new online store provides a quicker and more helpful way to order parts, supplies and services.

In addition, the digital channel extends Normet’s market reach, expands revenue opportunities, and provides a more helpful and accessible buying experience for customers. Moreover, its new ecommerce site runs on technology designed to be highly customizable — an advantage Normet is already using to develop new ways to interact with and serve customers.

Customizing a site based on customer feedback

The manufacturer’s first ecommerce site — launched as a pilot project last year in Australia and extended this year to the United States and Canada — is processing customer orders on a commercetools digital technology platform designed for customization, resulting in increased sales, including upselling and cross-selling transactions, and a 75% reduction in calls to customer service, Jaarinen says.

Normet says the digital Normet Store is helping to both attract and retain customers. The company plans to introduce new features as it learns more about how its customers want to use its new ecommerce channel.

“Our approach is to listen to customer feedback,” Jaarinen says. “We want to take a step-by-step approach to develop features that help make commerce easier for us — but especially for our customers.”

Companies that invest in Normet’s equipment typically lay out extensive capital for their mining or tunneling projects; they rely on steady connections with Normet and their maintenance contractors to order supplies, replacement parts and services to keep their equipment running smoothly.

Normet SmartDrive battery-electric mining equipment at work underground.

“These companies are investing hundreds of millions of dollars for getting the infrastructure in place before they get any money out of the ground,” Jaarinen says. “The environment they operate in is quite harsh, the conditions quite extreme, so they want to make sure that whatever equipment or machines they buy from Normet are maintained and running all the time.”

A better way to order from remote job sites

Normet’s customers, however, have relied for years on phone and email communications between their personnel, contractors and Normet to order what they need from the 65,000 products in the manufacturer’s catalog. But phone and email ordering can be tedious and time-consuming, requiring multiple back-and-forth comments among the several parties to ensure they’re bundling the correct mix of items and services for multi-ton mining and tunneling equipment.

Moreover, with many job sites in remote locations far from Normet service personnel, customers and their maintenance contractors rely even more on electronic communications that are faster and more accurate than traditional ordering methods.

“The customer locations are extremely remote,” Jaarinen says, adding, “So using the digital channels, we can get actually close to the customer and be more personalized. We know what machines they are running; we know what parts should be there. If a customer is trying to buy a part A, we can also say, hey, if you buy this, it makes sense to also replace part B.”

A sample mining equipment product landing page on the online Normet Store.

Because such online interactions are automatic, they avoid situations where human error or forgetfulness fails to recommend the correct products customers need to keep their equipment running, Jaarinen says.

Normet doesn’t break out ecommerce sales transaction figures. However, its ecommerce site’s third-quarter 2022 launch preceded a full-year 22% increase in total revenue to 439.24 million euros (US$480.17 million) for the year ended Dec. 31. Profit for the full year rose 31% to 36.69 million euros (US$40.11 million).

A flexible ecommerce platform for what lies ahead

Normet’s ecommerce opportunities are just beginning, Jaarinen says.

To give Normet the flexibility it needs to keep developing its ecommerce channel, Normet decided to deploy ecommerce technology it figured it could modify as needed to meet future challenges and opportunities.

Its Normet Store ecommerce site, store.normet.com, requires users to log in and runs on the commercetools Composable Commerce for B2B as its primary ecommerce infrastructure.

The MACH-based platform encompasses microservices, an API-first development platform, scalable cloud-based applications, and headless commerce technology. The headless commerce design separates the customer-facing front-end interface from the ecommerce engine and the enterprise resource planning system. The current version of Composable Commerce for B2B was refreshed last fall with “next-gen flexibility” with an API portfolio designed for building a customizable commerce infrastructure, says commercetools chief product officer Mike Sharp.

IT services firm Columbus Global led the commeretools implementation, which took about 4.5 months, Jaarinen says. Developed with responsive web design, the site is accessible via mobile devices but doesn’t have a related mobile app.

Because this was Normet’s first ecommerce site, he adds, the overall deployment of the new ecommerce platform was easier than it would have been if the manufacturer had to replace a pre-existing ecommerce technology.

Smoothing out the purchasing process

Jaarinen says the MACH infrastructure will make it easier for Normet to develop online features and applications customized to customer needs — without having to modify the ecommerce engine or the back-end software.  

One development already helping to smooth the buying process is a feature that lets either a maintenance contractor or the final customer (or both, depending on how they operate) submit an  online request for parts and supplies for a maintenance project on a specific type of Normet equipment. Normet will then return an online list of recommended products with prices more quickly and accurately than would typically be done through phone or email, Jaarinen says.

Normet fulfillment workers preparing to ship orders.

“They can drop that request in place on the ecommerce site, then see the availability and the pricing and also do the purchase,” he says. Normet will consider additional online services through ongoing development projects to introduce more value into the purchasing process, Jaarinen says.

New IoT-backed ordering to come

One project in the works is using the ecommerce platform’s composable architecture and internet-of-things sensors to develop a system for pulling real-time information on the equipment’s operation and need for parts and service. The composable architecture with its APIs and microservices enables Normet to connect to the commerce platform’s commercially available or in-house-developed software modules that, for example, could show customers on Normet’s ecommerce site their equipment’s operating status and any recommended replacement parts, supplies and services.

“We are able to get real-time data from all records, which means we can analyze the wear and tear of the equipment and predict upcoming maintenance,” Jaarinen says. “And once we link this data to the ecommerce store, the customer can see what they need to order. And they can order the parts beforehand to have them on site when they need them.”

“This is not integrated today,” Jaarinen says, “but in the next year, most likely, yes.”

“We aim to be selling more than parts,” he adds. “We want to provide more services as well from the online store.”

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Eberhardt Weber

The B2B wholesale business is an essential part of the global economy, providing products and services to all kinds of customers. Despite its vast influence, however, the industry continues to face several challenges that impact its growth and success.

The single most crucial inhibitor to growth is the slower adoption of digital transformation in the B2B sector, especially when compared to businesses that sell direct-to-consumers. Without prioritizing digital transformation and modernizing to digitally-led sales processes, the long-term impact for B2B businesses will hit sales figures, profitability, and customer success. And the gulf between businesses that rely on legacy processes and those that adopt digital commerce strategies will widen, too. Moreover, companies will intensify this gap by introducing more automated tools to fast-track process enhancements.

Of course, change does take time. And it takes even more time when the day-to-day challenges always seem to take precedence over longer-term growth ambitions and digital transformation initiatives. As a result, many wholesalers get stuck in a cycle of troubleshooting to balance their margins and maintain customer satisfaction constantly, and this prevents them from moving to the next growth stage.

The fact that many digital commerce platforms were designed for B2C, with B2B features as an afterthought, makes it harder to overcome these daily challenges. The consumer ecommerce features are bent to try and fit a B2B proposition, but B2B sales journeys and business processes are often highly different and far more complex than their B2C cousins.

B2B digital commerce requires a digital solution that caters specifically for wholesaler needs and gives them the tools they need to use data and insights to their advantage. It’s worth taking a closer look at some of the biggest challenges specific to wholesalers — ones  that may be standing in the way of progress — and see how wholesalers can overcome them.

1–Inventory Shortage & Overstocking

Managing inventory levels is the trickiest task for any wholesale business. An inventory shortage can lead to missed sales opportunities, dissatisfied customers, and reduced order values. On the other hand, overstocking can result in increased expenditure due to the cost of holding excess inventory, which could also get damaged or spoiled if handled incorrectly.

Implementing an automated inventory management system will allow wholesalers to track inventory levels in real time and make informed decisions about when and how much to order. Alerts will not only be triggered as stock lines deplete, but these can be connected with other data, such as expected lead times for deliveries from different suppliers, seasonal changes in demand, or the frequency of repeat orders from large clients. In this way, inventory levels will work in harmony with customer demands so that products are not out of stock when the customer needs them, and not overstocked when they don’t.

2–Poor Visibility into Product Profitability

Determining which products are the most profitable and which ones are not may sound like simple business sense, but these details can often get lost when managing enterprise-level operations. In one scenario, siloed decision-making that varies from one department to another can lead to inconsistent strategies. Or, at the other end, giving equal importance to all SKUs can take the spotlight away from hero products that should otherwise have a greater share of sales to increase profits.

It is possible to create a more insights-driven strategy by collecting data on product profitability across different lines and then building the right product mix. With digital support, this product strategy can also create customer-specific catalogs. A digitized process will enable a far more sophisticated and dynamic approach to managing multiple lines and customers. Managers will no longer need to make all of the calculations and decisions manually. Using process mining technology, for example, the system will capture all the data for a holistic view and then provide insights on the most effective strategies. A platform designed for wholesalers will also make it easier to turn these insights into action by implementing the orchestration of the new rules.

3–Mismatch in Customer & Supplier Demands

The key to running a wholesale business successfully is balancing the demands of customers and suppliers. Wholesalers face a careful balancing act of keeping both customers and suppliers on good terms. Good supply chains will help protect margins, and good customer satisfaction is needed to protect revenue, but these are both on constantly shifting sands and require close attention.

Managing a supply chain using digital tools and insights will provide the analytics to know of any changes in real time so that these can be factored into the front-end customer experience. For example, a wholesaler may receive an order for a product that experiences unforeseen delays. Instead of having to apologize to the customer that delivery will be delayed and risk losing that relationship, an automated system can immediately identify suitable alternatives based on the customer relationship history and diffuse the situation. It could offer an adjustment to the order, for example, such as a discount or other promotional privilege, and keep the customer on good terms.

Or perhaps a manufacturer decides to change the price of its product, making it less competitive in the market, and a decision is needed on whether to continue to stock it. Again, process mining will help to identify the data relating to that product, such as popularity or profitability, and offer insights on the best course of action. In these examples, digitized processes speed up decision-making and minimize the impact of an issue on the end user.

4–Profit Margins & Cash Flow

Wholesalers must maintain the profit margins to remain competitive while also ensuring they have cash flow to meet maintenance and financial obligations and  experiment with new projects. Business owners need to carefully manage their pricing strategies and monitor their cash flow closely, taking steps to reduce costs and increase revenue wherever possible.

Dynamic pricing is increasingly coming into play to enable businesses to have more flexibility in their pricing strategies. In the same way that taxi fares increase when there are high levels of demand, and decrease at less busy times, so too can wholesaler pricing strategies.

At some points, it is worth changing prices to offer more promotions and bulk buying incentives to keep valued customers happy. But it is essential to protect margins when challenging new environments hit, a frequent occurrence in many wholesale industries. Wholesalers should make such adjustments on a customer-by-customer basis, too. By introducing dynamic pricing options, wholesalers can become far more agile in responding to market conditions. They are disadvantaged when facing changes outside their control if they don’t.

5–Slow Growth

In a highly competitive market with rapidly changing demands, dropping the ball on these challenges might mean management spends time troubleshooting, not on strategies that can grow the business. When executives manage operations inefficiently, it’s unsurprising that they hamstring growth.

Digital transformation is the fuel needed to accelerate growth. Neglecting to invest in it will mean losing a competitive edge over the long run. Key to this digital strategy is adopting a more data-driven approach that helps wholesalers maximize sales opportunities, reduce the cost of inefficiencies, and look after customer satisfaction.

About the author:

Eberhardt Weber is co-founder and CEO of Emporix, a cloud-native digital commerce platform provider for both B2B and B2C. He has been involved with digital commerce technology since 1997 and previously worked in management at ecommerce technology providers Hybris (now owned by SAP SE), Intershop, and Hewlett-Packard. In 2010, he founded Lieferladen.de, the first online supermarket in Germany.

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Amazon ranks No. 1 in the Top 1000 list of ecommerce retailers in North America, and No. 3 in the Online Marketplaces database. 

Amazon returns at UPS will no longer be free

Customers who drop returns off at UPS locations could be charged $1 per order going forward, The Information first reported. The fee will only apply if there is a Whole Foods, Kohl’s, or Amazon Fresh location closer to the order’s address than the UPS store. 

“We offer convenient, easy returns to Amazon customers, with one or more options for label-free, box-free returns at no cost,” a spokesperson told USA Today. “We always offer a free option for customers to return their item. If a customer would prefer to return their item at a UPS Store when there is a free option closer to their delivery address, a very small amount of customers may incur a $1 fee.”

Amazon will list some products as “frequently returned”

The online retailer also added a badge to some items warning customers that they are “frequently returned.” The Information first noticed the label on a record player and two dresses.

“We’re currently showing return rate information on some product detail pages to help our customers make more informed purchase decisions,” a spokesperson told The Information.

Amazon did not return Digital Commerce 360’s request for comment. 

Returns matter to customers, but they’re not the most important factor

A Digital Commerce 360 survey of over 1,000 consumers in August 2022 found shoppers regularly consider a potential return before they purchase. 54% take free returns into consideration, and 39% also look at the cost of a return. One-quarter of consumers said the timeframe is important.

It’s too soon to tell if Amazon customers will react negatively to the new policy, according to Michael Levin, co-founder and partner at research firm Consumer Intelligence Research Partners. 

“We expect it’s not a huge deal, though, and a very small percentage of marginal customers would react negatively,” he said. “Consumers decide first on cost and convenience of buying something, and think later, if at all, about how easy (or not) it is to return that thing.”

Some customers have already taken to social media to complain about the change, Business Insider reported.

The new policy keeps Amazon on par with the competition, Levin said.

“Many, many retailers charge customers for return shipping, although as far as we know, the major ones (Walmart, Target, etc.) don’t do it aggressively,” he said.

These changes around returns are a more transparent way for Amazon to be upfront about costs with customers, Josh Lowitz, also of Consumer Intelligence Research Partners, said.

“This move is similar to Amazon offering a dollar or two for accepting slightly slower shipping, or combining deliveries into a single delivery day. Amazon is letting shoppers know that they will share the savings, if a customer allows Amazon to operate more efficiently,” he said, by keeping prices lower for less expensive types of returns. Lowitz also pointed to Amazon’s policy of offering returned items for sale at reduced prices.

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Staytuned, a global software company that acquires and builds ecommerce applications with a core focus on Shopify, recently raised $34 million in funding from a large group of investors.

The investors include:

• TenOneTen
• Rembrandt VC
• Hawke Ventures
• DragonX
• FJ Labs
• Interlace
• Riverpark Ventures
• Comma Capital
• Kotti Capital
• Alumni Ventures Group
• Jason Finger

Angel investors also participated in the new equity round. Tacora Capital led the debt funding. Previous investment rounds included Bowery Capital, WTI, Social Leverage, and others.

Staytuned was co-founded by Serge Kassardjian and Randy Jimenez, a pair of entrepreneurs with previous stints working for Google and other technology companies. To date, it has raised more than $46 million in funding.

Staytuned focuses on tools for Shopify stores

New York-based Staytuned provides a suite of software tools for managing online stores. The startup focuses on websites that run on Shopify Inc.’s namesake ecommerce platform. Shopify’s platform processed $61 billion worth of purchases last quarter, according to Silicon Angle. Millions of merchants worldwide use Shopify’s platform.

Staytuned has assembled its software suite through a combination of in-house product development and acquisitions. The eight tools in the suite cover a variety of use cases. Some focus on automating general store management tasks, while others cater to companies in specific markets such as the events industry, according to Silicon Angle.

Four of the eight tools focus on helping online retailers issue discounts to customers. One application, Moonship, uses machine learning to target website visitors with personalized discount offers. Another tool called ADG enables retailers to mark down the price of products when a customer is about to complete a purchase, says Silicon Angel.

“We hope to become the Salesforce suite for ecommerce stores — an end-to-end suite to scale a fast-growing brand seamlessly within the Shopify ecosystem and beyond, where brands want to grow their presence and revenue,” Kassardjian says.

Staytuned will use the latest round of funding to make more acquisitions and for product development. To date, the company has made seven acquisitions. In November, the company acquired Tabarnapp, a developer of Shopify apps for product discounts, upselling, and cross-selling.

To date, Staytuned also says it has more than 20,000 merchants using its various apps.

“This new funding enables us to acquire bigger apps, hire amazing talent, and scale faster than ever to become the foremost tech stack in the Shopify ecosystem,” says Jimenez.

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The roster of industry thought leaders, movers and shakers is now nearly all set, and our latest speaker additions showcase even more that EnvisionB2B is sparing no expense in vetting and recruiting the best analysts and practitioners in the industry to give attendees helpful, useful, practical best-practice advice they can take and use now to help their organization achieve excellence in B2B ecommerce.

Meet our new speakers:

Our most recent update of industry thought leaders, in alpha order, includes:

Dan Banks
Founder
Domani Strategies

Gene Carbonara
VP, Ecommerce & Digital
US Foods

Kellie Casey
Manager, Aftersales Communications and Ecommerce
Hyster-Yale Group

Val DuVernet
Senior Director, Digital Strategy & Optimization
McKesson

Tom Funk
Ecommerce Director
Ann Clark Ltd.

Shep Hickey
Founder & CEO
Bryzos

Marylou Hornung
Director, Sales Operations
Bendix Commercial Vehicle Systems

Kyle Kaiser
Founder
Our Forest

Brooke Logan
Director, B2B Digital
NAPA (Genuine Parts Company)

Doug Novack
Managing Director, Business & Industrial Markets Practice
Google

Jordan Nussbaum
Chief information officer
Midland Industries

Nick Ostergaard
Senior Manager, Head of Digital Advanced Services
Toyota Material Handling

Stu Peterson
VP, Inventory Management & Supply Chain
RC Willey

Linda Taddonio
Founding Partner
IQ Acceleration Inc.

Joe Thomas
Sr. Product Owner, Catalog MDM
Genuine Parts Company

Barbara Winters
VP, Principal Analyst
Forrester Research Inc.

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Around 41% of United States-based small businesses with websites are increasing or significantly increasing their 2023 budget for ecommerce platforms. Meanwhile, only 26% are decreasing their budgets in the face of economic uncertainty, says a new report from research firm Thrive Analytics.

Small firms are spending more on digital technology to improve the customer experience and boost sales. The data and analysis is based on metrics pooled for an online panel of about 9,5000 small companies, according to Thrive Analytics.

2023 Ecommerce Platforms Report

Analysis of the top ecommerce platforms and the retailers that use them. Includes over 10 charts, a list of the leading platform vendors and analysis on where companies have invested in platforms and the latest trends in platform technology.  

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Small companies invest in digital

Nearly half of the small businesses with websites have ecommerce functionality, representing approximately 10 million small businesses in the U.S. Only 15% of small firms are planning to drop services they obtained during the pandemic, according to Thrive Analytics.

But small companies also face ecommerce challenges such as struggling to keep up with new technology, payment processing issues, and difficulties in managing content and utilizing multiple vendors for services.

To address these challenges, Thrive Analytics says, small businesses plan to prioritize investments to upgrade basic functionality, such as:

• Payment improvements
• Monitoring performance
• Expanding delivery options

“Small businesses are recognizing the importance of ecommerce technology to stay ahead and capture a larger market share,” says  Thrive Analytics managing partner Jason Peaslee.

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Sign up for a complimentary subscription to Digital Commerce 360 B2B News, published 4x/week. It covers technology and business trends in the growing B2B ecommerce industry. Contact Mark Brohan, senior vice president of B2B and Market Research, at mark@digitalcommerce360.com. Follow him on Twitter @markbrohan.

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