e-commerce, b2bI’m trying to conceptualize starting up a B2B Ecommerce website, I just have one question that bothering me, how will I avoid companies from directly contacting each other and forgetting me as the middleman?
When you are starting out, you need to make sure that you are offering something that the companies cannot easily or cheaply do themselves. A potential USP could be in the information that you hold from the companies that is not in the public domain. It would require that you are trusted, secure and useful to the businesses.
If you share a little bit more about your concept (e.g. service/goods/commodities, high price/low price, sector, is it single country/ multi-country?) then you will get a better answer.
Companies like Amazon and eBay are your role models. They forbid traders from actively soliciting customers to buy directly from them in all transactions through their platform. Many traders do have their own e-commerce site, usually easy enough to find. Because they create trust for the consumer and opportunity for traders, this is a sustainable position.
When you’re starting out, you’re not going to have the advantages of eBay or Amazon, so how do you cross the gulf? If you’re in it for the long term, you need to build relationships with consumers that act as an effective marketing channel. That way, you’re always adding value to all but big brands.
One final note. Be very careful creating terms and conditions: it’s very easy for newcomers to fall foul of price fixing and antitrust regulation/legislation.
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