A catalog and an e-commerce-based website can be a powerful combination, according to Jonathan Bein in E-Commerce and Catalog: Fast Friends in Distribution. Bein recommends asking two key questions to achieve the best results from your catalog and e-commerce efforts.
First: If you already have a catalog or a website, what would be the incremental cost of adding the other? If you don’t have a catalog, and can’t afford a full-scale approach, Bein recommends considering “mini-catalogs” featuring particular product categories or applications to be sent selectively to relevant customers.
Second: What is the revenue benefit of having both? Bein says customers will ultimately purchase more when they have multiple channels to choose from because they can purchase when and how they want.
A multichannel approach also provides more opportunity for the distributor to reach customers in new ways. “Many companies use the Web to reach prospects and then use their catalogs to ramp up new buyers or to deepen wallet share with established customers,” Bein writes.
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