Why your brand's e-store is pretty much dead

Way too many brands have thrown money behind creating their mono-brand e-commerce sites, probably envisioning their e-stores to become utopian islands of their brand experience among the sea of multi-brand mediocrity while also escaping the crocodiles of seller commissions. 

Smartphones, appliances, apparel brands.. you name it, most have burnt their fingers without realising when exactly to pull the plug. The business case for maintaining a <yourbrand>.in often degenerates into becoming an emotional one at best. 

Here's why. 

1. The funnel starts before the funnel actually starts 

Single-brand e-tailing violates one of the fundamental value creation principles of e-commerce: CHOICE. How many brands make up your wardrobe? Why must your shopping cart (a microcosm of your larger brand choices) look any different? There's enough & more research out there which proves that the multitude of funnel-entering starts with a category intent rather than brand intent ("I need a pair of black denim vs. I need XXX brand SS20 denim). Travel price comparison websites like Trivago is reason to believe that multiple tabs opened is just a less-than-optimal user experience. 

2. Your loyal customer likes the anonymity of online shopping to cheat on you 

The classical definition of loyalty is something that applies to less than a handful of global brands today. Affinity can best describe what you used to pride yourself calling 'loyalty'. Comparisons are a fundamental stage of online shopping and limiting choices, will prove to be fatal for any brand. 

3. Are you equipped to handle the expectations? 

Why are we kidding ourselves. The customer's expectations of fulfillment, delivery, returns, exchanges etc are defined and dictated by the global big boys. She has no reason to expect anything less of your third-party run e-store. Logistical screw-ups end up becoming the bane of the Online Reputation Management teams. Every time your e-store crashes during a flash sale, you saved paying a commission to the big bad wolves, but you drove a knife through your brand's belly. What business are you really in? Is your core competence creating great product or running a tight e-comm supply chain? Don't kid yourself here, and ask some hard questions. 

There's an opportunity cost to that exclusivity and effort, is that hurting you? 

The consumer expectation of the shopping experience will be ruthless. There's zero tolerance for a less than ideal experience and the big boys specialists have set the bar too high for brands to play catch up in a commercially productive way.

Understanding your key proposition to the consumer (assortment, discovery etc) and knowing when to have a cold, hard look and bow out of the race, is critical to success and survival of your brand online. Knowing when to build an army and knowing when to create an ally is after all the key to conquest.