Shopify Direct-to-Consumer (D2C) Strategy

Both new and established brands need to consider the viability of D2C for their business. Typical factors impacting this decision may include available investment, internal business priorities, market needs, organisational structure and willingness for change. CommerceCentric has worked with a number of high profile brands to complete extensive audits of their business in order to identify strengths, opportunities, threats and weakness impacting the ability to go D2C. Upon completion of this audit we can help your brand identify what actions you will need to take to make D2C a viable commercial success.

Many brands that we work with are either going D2C for the first time or enhancing their existing D2C solution. In both cases there will be a lot of competing needs that require effective roadmap planning. At CommerceCentric we have helped many brands design and implement highly effective roadmaps, resulting in highly successful project delivery from both a revenue and customer satisfaction perspective.

Brands taking their D2C business global will face unique country specific hurdles that will need to be accounted for in advance of any store build work. Some international countries such as China, Russia and Brazil will require some very specific planning given the relative complexities of selling to customers in these markets. CommerceCentric can work with your internal stakeholder group to identify D2C commerce hurdles, formulate a targeted international rollout plan and provide expert UX consultation on how to meet customer needs in these countries.

New and established businesses all over the world are seeing huge benefits from switching to subscription based business models. From a D2C perspective there are many important questions that brands may have about this new business model including:

• How do I transform my existing product catalog to support subscription sales?
• What value am I adding to my products that will encourage shoppers to switch to a subscription based model?
• Should I implement a calendar or usage based subscriptions model?
• What are the benefits from offering free trials and freemium based products?
• Should I tier my subscription product offering eg. basic, intermediate, deluxe?
• What backend technology changes do I need to make to bill shoppers on a regular basis?

At CommerceCentric we help brands to answer these and many other subscription based questions. We have extensive experience working with major international brands to identify subscription based opportunities, minimise risks and increase revenue. We have a deep understanding of all tools and technologies available on the Shopify platform to help your brand realise the potential of the subscription based business model.

One of the most overlooked areas for brands going direct-to-consumer is store legal compliance. There are a number of factors that brands need to consider in this area and brands selling internationally will face additional factors depending on markets served. It is very important that brands consider all possible legal requirements up-front, before going live as the cost of non-compliance and potential redesign is high. At CommerceCentric we work with internal brand teams to ensure that there is a coordinated understanding of requirements, sufficient documentation and alignment between all internal teams (marketing, sales, legal etc.) to ensure that shopper conversion rates remain high.

Our deep-dive D2C audit process shines a light on current issues and missing components in your team, tools or processes. We also uncover any previously hidden capabilities and sources of revenue, quantifying your digital maturity and identifying the next steps in your direct-to-consumer evolution.

Deciding how to take your D2C business to the next level on Shopify can be a difficult process. You will often have competing opportunities chasing the same limited resources. At CommerceCentric we can help you identify the most important revenue drivers to take your D2C business further. We also have a deep understanding of all Shopify technology available to help your brand achieve success.

Brands selling D2C are responsible for collecting taxes from shoppers. To do this accurately brands must ensure taxes are applied correctly to shopper transactions, tax inclusive / exclusive display requirements are compliant with international standards and tax invoices follow country specific display requirements. At CommerceCentric we work with global brands to identify store tax requirements, implement necessary Shopify configurations and align this with the most optimal shopper experience flow.

We recognise that any ecommerce business may need to outsource specific tasks or processes. We work with you to identify the appropriate strategies and opportunities where outsourcing makes sense and delivers benefits for your direct-to-consumer business.

One of the biggest advantages of going direct to consumer is that you now have a direct relationship with the shopper. By establishing this relationship you will have the opportunity to understand how customers interact with your brand, what they look for from the D2C experience and what marketing strategies offer the best ROI for your business.

Here at CommerceCentric we can work with you to map out the various data points for your D2C store, implement analytics tracking all the way through the sales funnel and setup sales reporting, enabling you to understand the full picture of your shopper. This in turn will enable you to implement specifically targeted D2C marketing campaigns.

When selling directly to consumers you will be responsible for all legal requirements related to handling customer data. Therefore It is very important for you to have good systems and protocols in place to ensure you are compliant with the various international data regulations. At CommerceCentric we can help you to put all the necessary frontend and backend procedures in place to manage this effectively.

Implementing the correct online payments strategy for your direct-to-consumer ecommerce business is an important decision that needs special attention. There are a number of questions that need to be considered in relation to this including:

• Understanding the correct payment mix to offer shoppers based on your brand profile, product catalog, average order value.
• Implementing a payment mix which is reflective of local market needs.
• Ensuring that payment methods implemented by the brand provide a good return on investment.
• Establishing good relationships with payment processors on favourable terms.
• Developing an effective operational plan to manage merchant and seller of record (MOR / SOR) responsibilities.
• Implementing strategies for managing payment risks including refunds, returns and chargebacks.
• Developing a plan to optimise recurring billing services.
• Configuration of payment services on the Shopify platform.

At CommerceCentric we can help your brand to implement effective payment strategies, by guiding you through all the required paperwork to ensure your payments implementation meets customer demand and is cost effective.

Implementing an effective pricing strategy is an important but often overlooked component of any D2C solution. At CommerceCentric we can help you to make a number of critical decisions in relation to your pricing strategy including:

• Deciding what currencies to offer on the online store.
• Deciding how currency pricing will be determined. EG. manually or via FX conversion.
• Determining how currency pricing will be displayed to shoppers in local markets.
• Ensuring the pricing strategy aligns with the channel to avoid conflict.
• Managing price discounting requirements.
• Developing a system to keep price lists in alignment with changes in the market (including competitor pricing strategies).
• Implementing effective pricing strategies for subscription products especially in terms of aligning prices with different subscription terms and offers

Going direct-to-consumer can often present challenges for established brands that had previously relied on retailers to manage their order fulfilment activities. Concerns typically raised by brands include:

• Onboarding of suitable carriers and warehouse partners to ensure quality products are delivered efficiently to shoppers.
• Ensuring that the order fulfilment process is trusted by shoppers, by providing good customer service tools, shipping options and flexible returns.
• Integrating fulfillment process into the online shopping experience.
• Understanding how to set up and manage fulfillers on Shopify.
• Complying with merchant and seller of record (MOR /SOR) fulfilment responsibilities including specific regulations related to importer and exporter of record (IOR / EOR).

At CommerceCentric we can help you to overcome these unique challenges by preparing your business for D2C Fulfilment operations. Our expired team will work with your brand to piece together all these important parts of the jigsaw into an actionable project plan, helping your brand to scale up quickly in a professional manner.