Online business is a kind of games full of competition that challenges even the best entrepreneurs. But does everyone always have to start their business by setting up an online store? There are alternatives.
The use of e-commerce platforms is certainly cheaper, and beginning entrepreneurs do not always have adequate capital, especially since in the first phases of business we focus more on studying customer opinions and demand for our products than on marketing or sales techniques.
In Poland, the most popular are: Allegro and Amazon, but who to choose? The Poznan-based platform or the giant that entered Poland in January this year?
A few questions will help us decide.
These two platforms are only seemingly similar, but in fact they have a lot in common
Amazon is a powerful marketplace with 300 million users in 100 countries. Allegro is a Polish company with 12.3 million customers and 117 thousand registered sellers. Interestingly, Allegro is ranked 10th in the world in terms of marketplace, while being the most popular platform of this type in Poland.
Another interesting difference is the presentation of products. On Amazon it is the product that is the most important, we do not have the opportunity to see the range of seller, but we can compare prices of the competition. Allegro, on the other hand, puts the seller at the center, allowing you to see the entire assortment of the store, which also gives us more freedom in promoting our offer.
Another important difference between the two platforms is the cost. Amazon charges for each transaction, even if we are basic account holders (per item £0.75), the professional account is charged once a month and is £25. Allegro offers newcomers a cheaper deal, and in practice it is 1000 free listings. Once these are used up, commission is charged at 6-10%.
So, which platform should you choose? The choice is not clear-cut; it depends on what market you want to focus on and the cost of using the platform, which you should estimate before making a decision. You should also look at what each package offers: for example, a great advantage of Allegro is the free PayU service, while Amazon offers us Fulfilment by Amazon, i.e. logistics solutions thanks to which we do not have to deal with shipping and storage of goods.
Allegro is certainly a cheaper solution and has an established position in Poland. Amazon gives us the possibility to reach e-consumers all over the world. We suggest Allegro as a great option to start with.
Long gone are the days when Facebook was just a social networking platform used to communicate between users. Almost every entrepreneur now has a website on Facebook, where they can reach potential customers, inform them about news, promotions and direct contact.
This is great not only for beginners but also for experienced entrepreneurs. Facebook certainly dominates over typical online stores in terms of the ability to quickly check the opinions of real users. Nothing motivates like a satisfied customer, so when we develop our Facebook business website, it will become a great springboard for our store
To set up a Facebook store, all you need to do is:
Main photo: Karolina Grabowska/pexels.com
