Marketplace sellers operating across multiple channels experienced strong holiday season sales, with revenue up 25% between November 01 and December 31, 2023, according to eDesk. The big winners were sellers operating across multiple channels, who are also challenged with the increasing costs of doing business.
Analyzing like-for-like order and service data from sellers operating across more than 45,000 marketplace and webstore channels for the entire 2023 holiday period, eDesk is reporting year-on-year growth across most seller segments. While total sales across the industry were up by 25% versus the same period in 2022, some channels fared better than others.
Merchants selling on Amazon saw growth of 24% in that channel and saw Amazon retain its market dominant position. eBay, the second-largest marketplace by revenue, delivered lower GMV for merchants this year with sales down 2% across the board. Walmart’s revenue for sellers grew by 17% with the biggest wins on this channel achieved by higher volume merchants.
The number one driver of growth for sellers in the 2023 holiday sales period was a diversified marketplace strategy, according to the data from eDesk. Merchants selling on multiple marketplaces, specifically through the 400 marketplaces powered by the Mirakl Connect platform, achieved a whopping 35% year-on-year sales growth. Mirakl Connect now boasts 11,000 pre-qualified sellers who can easily sell and service customers on multiple retail marketplaces via a single application.
These topline sales numbers are fueled by a combined increase in order volumes (up 15%) and order values (up 9%). However, as merchants scale across multiple marketplace channels, the cost of doing business is also increasing. More channels means more management overhead. Customers are spending more, but have higher expectations on service, with many merchants seeing increases of up to 24% in service desk tickets in the period.
Commenting on the results, eDesk’s founder and CEO, Ray Nolan said “We’re delighted to see our customers, who are now operating across over 65 geographic markets, continue their rapid expansion. The cost to service this growth is an ongoing challenge for merchants.
We’re delighted that with our exclusive integrations with platforms such as Mirakl, ManoMano and Walmart, our customers can actually reduce their customer service costs, while still supporting growth.
This is in large part due to the rapid adoption of AI enablement by nearly 70% of our customer base over the last year. We expect that 2024 will see continued marketplace channel diversification coupled with increased adoption of AI-powered customer service, which makes this possible.”
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eDesk provides a comprehensive customer support help desk for eCommerce. eDesk’s AI-powered customer service software is used to support customer queries across more than 45,000 online stores and marketplaces globally.
eDesk enables online sellers to consolidate query, order, and customer data in a single smart inbox; from where you can more effectively support customers with the full power of next-generation AI.
With eDesk, merchants can reduce the chaos associated with selling and managing customers across multiple channels such as Amazon, eBay, Walmart, Mirakl, ManoMano, BOL.com and more.
