The Missing Piece in eCommerce: Finding the right competencies

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Launching eCommerce in a large company requires a number of competencies. Usually, certain competencies are missing.  Sometimes this could hamper the project for months as it may be difficult to find people with certain expertise in a short period of time. We’ve decided to share our insight on the matter and tell you how customers of Divante deal with this challenge.

Strategic Competencies 

75% of companies that are implementing omnichannel successfully, have a written strategy.

A good strategy requires a study of the needs of customers, an in-depth marketing research and the ability to generate fresh ideas. Research can be outsourced to an external company, also the presentation of fresh ideas is a good task for an eCommerce Agency.

Thereafter, we get to the workshop where knowledge and ideas are confronted with the resources and capabilities of the company. The result of which is the creation of an eCommerce Strategy and a Plan, a cost estimate and timetable for the implementation.

IT Competence

IT skills are theoretically easy to outsource but in practice this approach rarely works. All of our customers who have an above average success, have at least some IT skills in-house.

You need people, who will be able to predict IT costs to co-create with the IT architecture providers. Even we created a special whitepaper describing how to create a budget for IT – designed for the technical staff of our customers.

A minimum of what you need is a Product Owner to work with the outsourced IT team. A good solution is to create a virtual team with the IT supplier. One or two developers on your side will control the quality, carry out urgent changes and make you feel safe.

HR Competence

HR expertise may seem least obvious but is still very crucial. The construction of the eCommerce department often requires the employment of completely different people than are working so far in the company. Especially in B2B companies. The “New Ones” tend to be younger, have little experience in corporate work, but expect a higher wage and have high requirements when it comes to the quality of management.

The motivation for these people is the opportunity to learn. By creating a virtual team with the eCommerce service provider, you can provide your employees an access to knowledge and mentors. Many of our clients employ people at their company at junior positions and then send them for a mentorship program with Seniors from Divante. This allows our customers to keep a relatively low cost and highly motivated employees,  while creating a flow of knowledge guaranteeing the safety of their business.

Marketing Competence

I’ve seen the confusion of the marketing department of a large company when it came to talking about marketing in eCommerce. The development of RTB technology, reMarketing, Marketing Auto and BigData meant that traditional marketers of branding were unable to cope with the new challenges. Of course, building a brand in eCommerce is extremely important but it’s not enough.

The solution may be employing a consultant, who will lay the foundations of the eCommerce marketing activities and will help recruit the right person.  We’ve had multiple occasions where we served as an Interim Marketing Manager to help companies establish their eCommerce marketing foundations.

Sometimes the solution is also to start a cooperation with an agency on the basis of a success-fee model. In this model, this agency takes on the strategy, allocation of budget and current work – by engaging itself for maximum ROI and being remunerated by financial results.

Logistical Competence

It would seem that logistics is a core-business for eCommerce companies. At the beginning, however, you’re not always ready to take up this challenge. There’re at least several companies on the market, that provide dedicated outsourced logistics for eCommerce.

In this case, you have to think in terms of what’s in the customers’ best interest. If you have concerns about the quality of your own logistics, start from proven logistics solutions and gradually increase your know-how learning from those solutions.

It’s worth remembering that many large companies take a strategic decision on  external logistics process. It definitely reduces the capital intensity of the project. External companies will allow you to keep up with new delivery systems and to ensure an appropriate level of customer service – often including a call center, complaint resolution, warranty, returns, creating images and descriptions of products.

Takeaways

Finding the right competencies for your company can take a lot of time and effort. Then putting all the pieces together to form a successful eCommerce team is often difficult. But if you develop an effective strategy combined with the right IT, HR, marketing and logistic competencies your chances of success in eCommerce increase significantly.

Contact us if you’re interested in learning how Divante helps their clients find the right competencies and how we tackle these problems ourselves.

Published September 30, 2015