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~ Clicktime.eu ~

discounter, which is why we focused on visibility. We wanted It is one of the reasons Clicktime.eu decided to expand to
to let people know where to find us and then we could one country at the time. ‘At first, we decided to only sell
always offer lower prices on our own web shop. That way, cross-border within the European Union. That was what our
the marketplace could function as a real traffic generator.’ logistics was capable of and the way we were able to manage
our customer service. While we were adding more coun-
The expansion of Clicktime.eu did not end with selling on tries, we reviewed both processes. Currently, we are working
different Amazon marketplaces. ‘When we embraced our with a logistics partner that can provide us with the easiest
marketplace strategy, we decided to set foot in countries solution for shipping and clearing small products to the US.
abroad by implementing our products on the two or three Along the way, we have learned about dealing with custom
most popular, well-known marketplaces of that country,’ clearance, taxes and the demands of the marketplaces con-
explains Trias. Doing so asked for a lot of knowledge, cerning logistics. I believe it has been, and still is, a natural
technical skills, resources and perseverance. ‘We succeeded way of growing. We are finding ourselves in a position of
by carefully, one by one, implementing countries. For us, this processing every package smoothly cross-border, as we know
multiple-marketplace strategy means we could minimise we can do this very well. This is one of the main advantages
risk by spreading our chances over several platforms. The of learning on the job,’ states Trias.
different implementations helped us prepare for different
marketplaces in new markets.’ Selling in different countries asks for multilingual cus-
tomer service too.
Platform potential ‘We have set up a
“ IT HAS BECOME MUCH
In today’s e-com- partnership with
merce market, the Salesupply, who as-
potential of market- sist us in performing
EASIER TO PROVIDE
places is enormous. It well in our customer
is a relatively risk-free service department.
way to target cross- We now have native
ALL PLATFORMS IN ALL
border audiences, even translators who can
overseas. If you are help us clarify pos-
willing to invest, plat- sible cases. As with
forms like Amazon logistics, we are going
can, almost complete- COUNTRIES WITH ALL through this learning
ly, take care of your process that helps us
you want to have over PRODUCT INFORMATION IN get better at what we
business. ‘It depends
do every day,’ Trias
on how much control
the products you sell concludes.
and the way you sell THE LOCAL LANGUAGE.” International prod-
them. We want to uct listings
keep as much control As a marketplace
as possible, meaning seller, Clicktime.
we take care of the whole sales process,’ says Trias. eu experienced first-hand what it is like to be in control of
creating your listings and optimising them. ‘That is far from
She thinks Amazon is the most difficult marketplace to be easy. Having only one hundred stock keeping units (SKUs)
successful. ‘As a company, you must perform extremely well, makes it doable. However, we have over 30,000 SKUs in our
all the time, to meet Amazon’s demands. While it is raising assortment, of which 10,000 are generally in stock. While
service-bars every time, we must comply to them, making we can upload them in bulk to the marketplace platform,
sure we can meet these too. Therefore, you need to analyse we still need careful preparations for them to work as we
in advance and decide which technology you use, which desire,’ explains Trias. ‘We want to be able to continuously
CMS, how you set up your logistics and what not to do.’ update our database on all marketplaces. Our IT department
has created a generic translation solution. We still have to
Self-improvement do the labour and create all content, but it has become much
While expanding to more countries, and currently on more easier to provide all platforms in all countries with all prod-
than thirty marketplaces, Clicktime.eu always remained in uct information in the local language.’
charge of their own business. They barely outsourced their
platform activities to marketplaces. ‘It is helpful knowing Marketplace’s place in the market
these platforms can offer such services but being in control Based on their experiences, Trias concludes Amazon has
is something we definitely prefer.’ three main advantages. ‘First, it is good to be present on

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