We are thrilled to announce that BigCommerce has chosen Cymbio to lead its merchant-to-retail connections. This partnership will enable BigCommerce merchants quick and seamless integrations to hundreds of retailers – automating their day-to-day operations from A-Z, including product data syndication, imagery, mapping, taxonomy, inventory syncing, orders, billing, tracking, returns, reports and more. Cymbio connects to both brands’ and retailers’ internal systems, enabling strong collaborations, quick scaling, and overall sales growth for both merchants and retailers.
Our VP of Marketing, Jolene Amit, had the pleasure of speaking with Sharon Gee, BigCommerce’s VP, Revenue Growth – GM of Omnichannel, to discuss the new partnership and what’s needed for a robust omnichannel strategy.
Jolene Amit: It is truly incredible to partner with an amazing company that is proud to support its customers in all levels of growth. BigCommerce cares about its customers, and it shows. They are helping merchants access additional sales channels, and we couldn’t be more proud to be a part of it! Sharon, can you share BigCommerce’s vision?
Sharon Gee: Our vision is to be the best platform for merchants of all sizes who are growing and establishing a business to succeed in omnichannel commerce. We want to help growing businesses succeed with an omnichannel strategy. BigCommerce is proud to be a partner-first platform focused on omnichannel, investing heavily in infrastructure and platforms that enable merchants to take advantage of both native and partner-powered channel solutions, directly within the BigCommerce Control Panel. It will also make it seamless and easy for their merchants to leverage a scalable solution stack to meet whatever the brand’s goals are.
Jolene Amit: What does it take to execute a successful omnichannel strategy?
Sharon Gee: We know that to have a successful omnichannel strategy as a merchant, you must be where your shoppers are. If you are a fashion brand whose target is on Instagram vs. a hunting and fishing company, you might use different channels to reach your target market. BigCommerce needs to support merchants with a partner solution that fits all different types of businesses. As an omnichannel commerce platform, we have to create the right partnerships that make it possible to help our merchants get what they need to deliver a seamless omnichannel shopper experience, from channels, to advertising, to operations and fulfillment partners.
Jolene Amit: How did BigCommerce go from being an eCommerce platform to supporting customers through an omnichannel experience?
Sharon Gee: The demand came from the merchants themselves. It has always been in our DNA to be an open platform. And the only way to support the open ecosystem post-Covid is to support the merchant in their needs and provide solutions to help them grow their business.
Jolene Amit: Why partner with Cymbio?
Sharon Gee: We need to have partners meet all different types of merchant use cases. As the best version of an omnichannel platform, we have to partner with companies who make it possible for merchants to get what they need to deliver a seamless omnichannel shopper experience, no matter where they are on their growth journey. There is no way we can do this without a platform-level approach to partnership. In order for merchants to execute an omnichannel strategy, they need platform-level API enablement to handle the complex processes of marketing, operations and fulfillment methods. Brands will benefit by supplying solutions that are as near-native as possible to our full merchant base – which includes everything from SMBs to globally established retailers – regardless of their omnichannel maturity.
Jolene Amit: What are the important aspects of choosing partners? How do you identify the right fit?
Sharon Gee: It starts with the shopper experience. What do our merchants need to deliver a seamless omnichannel shopper experience? Our merchants voice their needs, and we search for the absolute best solutions that exist in order to help them with those needs and achieve their growth goals. We provide a clear solution stack for merchants’ needs to meet their demands, we work to make these integrations as seamless as possible, and we clearly define who the leaders are in each space.
Jolene Amit: What are the current retail trends?
Sharon Gee: We are in a very unique time where the internet is privatizing. There is so much investment in “attention commerce.” In the new privacy climate, there is a lot of investment going into keeping customers on-site (e.g. on Facebook and Instagram Shops) and creating content to not just keep customers on social platforms, but to keep them coming back, too. If you are a merchant and have your own D2C site, you need to know how you can syndicate these channels and bring traffic back to your website. You may get a higher LTV (lifetime value) for a shopper on your website than on a 3rd party channel (e.g. Walmart) but they might not have discovered you if they didn’t find you on Walmart or whatever the retail channel might be, so a hybrid customer acquisition strategy across channels can be really useful. There are three major themes we see influencing this space:
- Data privacy is creating an “attention commerce” phenomenon, marked by the privatization of the major channels on the internet.
- In a privatized post-third-party cookie world, being able to syndicate your product data to appear within 3rd party channels (to drive traffic and conversion on those channels) is more crucial than ever.
- There is a huge need to deliver a consistent, omnichannel shopper experience, by unifying channel, operations, fulfillment, and value chain post-purchase to drive loyalty.
Jolene Amit: What is the biggest value with Cymbio?
Sharon Gee: There is no such thing as separate advertising and marketplace channels anymore – they are all merging, and the ability to syndicate quality merchant catalog data to these channels is more important than ever.
If we can connect merchants to any channel they desire, then we are creating endless growth opportunities for each merchant. Our merchants want to connect with new ads and retail channels easily. And, partners like Cymbio can provide the opportunity to start selling on new channels to grow digital sales, fast.
I also see an opportunity to address multiple personas needs across D2C, digital, native vertical brands, and manufacturers that are selling D2C for the first time. It’s a great opportunity for manufacturers to own their products in the market. Omnichannel syndication can’t grow without simple and automated retail connections, and we believe Cymbio is a partner that is well positioned to support these with our merchants’ retail relationships. If you cannot power and integrate with your current merchants’ systems, you’ll be in trouble – merchants want easy integrations. If we can offer pre-integrated systems to manage the whole business, we are in a good position to provide the best solutions for our merchants.
Jolene Amit: So, what’s next?
Sharon Gee: Data privacy (post-Covid and post-third-party cookie deprecation) is at a unique point where the internet is privatizing. So much investment in retention commerce is kept in the walled garden of the privatized app. We must ask ourselves how content is being surfaced on channels to keep consumers where they are.
If a merchant is spending more time on private apps, how do you syndicate data to those channels to get the most lifetime value? Merchants tend to get the highest value on their own D2C, but would potential customers discover their brand or become familiar with it if they didn’t come across it on other channels?
Channels bring the power back to the brand. If brands are not on these channels, their competitors will be. Selling on new channels increases sales, brings merchants in front of new customers, builds brand strength and recognition, acts as a marketing channel, and naturally expands the merchant’s reach.
The more locations your target market sees your name, the more likely they will become acquainted with your brand.
Jolene Amit: And Cymbio connects your brand to multiple retailers and automates the day-to-day, simplifying your business’ daily tasks. The best part is that you won’t have to choose between channels! Thanks Sharon for your time today.
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