Updated On: 7th December 2023
In the 13 trillion dollar eCommerce industry, pioneers such as Amazon, Alibaba, and eBay have grabbed the first-mover advantage. Courtesy of this advantage, they continue to attract most of the market share, a sizable 38% for Amazon alone. Given this scenario, How does a new entrant create a space for themselves?
One effective startup strategy is exploring new markets where competition from these market leaders is lesser. Max Bittner did it by way of Lazada. The other is exploring lucrative niches within eCommerce. Niche-based marketplaces allow entrepreneurs to cater to the needs of a specific target audience. Specialized services help them to create a unique brand identity.
If you are keen on exploring profitable eCommerce niches, consumer electronics holds a sustained promise. The progression of technology continues to spur the demand for digital products – making the eCommerce niche promising for marketplaces offering these products. Take for instance, the success of NewEgg. The electronics eCommerce marketplace is the fifth most preferred eCommerce platform in the US – thus spurring an increased interest towards consumer electronics marketplace development.
In this blog get an in-depth analysis of a hybrid consumer electronics eCommerce business, and learn how to build a marketplace like Newegg, by leveraging consumer electronics marketplace development. We analyze the key drivers, features, and business practices that have propelled the success of the marketplace for Consumer Electronics.
Table Of Contents
- Success Journey of Newegg
- Business model analysis of Newegg
- Platform features behind Newegg’s success
- How To create a marketplace like Newegg
- How can team Yo!Kart help
- Final Thoughts
- FAQs
Success Journey of Newegg
Back in the early 2000s, the eCommerce industry was in a very different state of affairs. The Dot-com crash, as we call it retrospectively, had resulted in multiple eCommerce businesses dissolving their undertakings. In these circumstances, Commerce entrepreneurs were more than careful about their startup aspirations.
Despite these odds, Fred Chang planned to launch an eCommerce platform for consumer electronics in 2001. Interestingly, he chose the name “Newegg” to symbolize an egg’s immense potential, which leads to the birth of life. This confidence wasn’t misplaced, rather it was in recognition of key drivers of eCommerce. Amongst others, it was leveraging a globally connected supply chain, aggregating a fragmented offline industry, and driving pleasing consumer experiences based on robust technologies.
A well structured business plan bore results and the eCommerce platform gradually became a preferred website for sourcing information technology, gaming, and consumer electronics products.
By 2009, it grew to the second spot for internet-only retailers.
With a growing reputation and brand, Newegg saw potential in scaling its operations further. So, in 2011, Newegg adopted the multi-vendor marketplace model – inviting third-party sellers on its platform.
In another significant shift in 2019, it announced support for D2C brands. This initiative along with others underpins the evolution of Newegg from an online retailer in 2001 to a renowned brand in eCommerce – with dedicated multi-vendor platforms for both B2B and B2C users – and an extensive infrastructure offering services to brands.
Newegg’s success journey is a story of sustained eCommerce success built on dynamic strategies, business resilience, and robust technologies. Let’s analyze its strategies, operative models, value propositions for all participants, and key features that have propelled its growth.
Business Model Analysis of Newegg
“eCommerce is about so much more than offering low prices and shipping orders quickly. Now more than ever, services are at the core of the eCommerce value proposition. This is why we’ve invested so heavily in our expansive portfolio of services,” – Anthony Chow global CEO of Newegg in an interview on pymnts.com
Newegg operates primarily in the consumer electronics space. Due to the marketplace’s early days as a retail store for computer hardware, accessories, and electronic items – the target audience has been narrowed down, making the brand synonymous with such products.
The Newegg Ecosystem
Source: The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission
In this space, Newegg conducts its business following a hybrid business model. It has both B2C and B2B operations via mutually exclusive websites.
B2C Operations
Multivendor: Newegg conducts its B2C operations via Newegg.com, Newegg.ca, and Newegg global. It provides a platform for vendors to sell to the established customer base of the platform – It manages eCommerce operations of the marketplace while sellers manage inventory and sell products.
Inventory driven: Apart from third-party sellers, Newegg also continues to offer products via direct sales. According to the data released by Newegg, in the first quarter of 2021, approximately one in ninety out of the gross 37 million products were from Newegg itself.
B2B Operations
Newegg also caters to the B2B clients in its niche. The electronics marketplace conducts its B2B operations via Neweggbusiness.com. The B2B channel provides office and IT equipment to businesses of multiple industries. The marketplace also provides e-procurement partners for businesses with specific needs.
Suggested Read: B2B business models possible in eCommerce marketplaces
D2C Channel Support
A significant advantage of marketplace business is that it can scale expeditiously – and greater volumes bring in more business opportunities.
Newegg has leveraged this advantage to offer its services to businesses. This can help them to enhance their capabilities and add a Direct to Consumer or D2C channel effectively. It offers services such as shipping fulfillment, Customer support, marketing, staffing and analytics.
Value Proposition of Newegg
Newegg has successfully added value to all participants of the marketplace – the customers, sellers, and brand partners.
| Key Value Proposition For The Customers: | Key Value Proposition For The Sellers: |
| Niche-focused products | An extensive customer base for a specific niche |
| Content-driven marketing strategy | Data-driven analytics |
| Expansive tech-savvy community of peers | eCommerce services – API-enabled portal, shipping, marketing, and more |
| Competitive prices | Low commission rates |
| Support for effective selling |
Get the advantage of lifetime software ownership with one-time payment
Revenue Channels of Newegg
Newegg’s evolution from online retail to an eCommerce marketplace opened up multiple revenue channels – typical advantages of a multi-seller business. The following revenue channels are available with Newegg:
- Revenue from direct sales
- Revenue from commissions charged on third-party sales
- Revenue generated from services and solutions offered.
Features that have made Newegg Successful
A robust, purpose-developed platform is at the heart of eCommerce success. Newegg is no different, intuitive eCommerce websites are the engine that drives the growth of the leading marketplace.
Newegg has separate websites for their B2C and B2B operations with some mutually exclusive features and those that are common to both. These are integral to the respective domains.
Let’s analyze some of these quintessential features, starting with the ones, common to both.
Essential Features Common to B2C and B2B Websites
At its core, eCommerce allows business to be conducted over a digital platform. So some features are common to both B2C and B2B websites. Some key amongst those are
Intuitive buying experience: The Newegg website has been built with a focus on the buyer journey – to provide a frictionless buying experience fostered with features like one-click checkout, and more.
Robust performance: Considering the figure of 37 million products mentioned in this blog before, and the fact that marketplaces do tend to scale quickly makes good performance a key factor ensuring the success of Newegg.
Effective marketing tools: At the core of Newegg’s marketing is an effective content-first strategy. It has helped the marketplace immensely in creating a brand that is synonymous with tech products.
API-driven ecosystem: Newegg offers multiple tools to sellers to streamline selling. All these tools can be integrated with the help of APIs.
B2C-specific Features
Buyers in a B2C marketplace are end customers. Features in Newegg’s B2C platforms foster typical emotion-driven buyer journeys.
Embedded videos: Establishing a connection with the target audience has been instrumental in Newegg’s defining its brand identity. Embedded videos from influencers and product descriptions have allowed for effective marketing in the marketplace.
Crossell/Up-Sell tools: Strategies like Loyalty Schemes and shopping festivals allow for greater revenue generation and enhance the appeal of the marketplace.
B2B-specific Features
Features that facilitate key B2B requirements of high value and high volume purchases,
Flexible payment options: This feature aids high-value transactions by allowing the buyers to pay in part-payments. The payment can be split into 4 interest-free installments.
Request Quote (RFQ): B2B sellers follow a complex pricing strategy based on multiple parameters. RFQ helps them to stay open to negotiations.Bulk order discounts: To allow sellers to promote bulk purchases, there is a provision to offer discounts on bulk purchases from the platform.
Experience key features of eCommerce – encapsulated in a contemporary solution
How To Create a Marketplace Like Newegg
As discussed above, Newegg, at its core is a hybrid business with mutually exclusive B2C and B2B online marketplaces to manage the respective operations. This segregation has helped them to serve the customer according to their needs – on purpose-built platforms.
Entrepreneurs considering to create a marketplace like Newegg can consider this successful strategy adopted by the marketplace. If the objective of the marketplaces is defined from the start, each platform will have an exclusive brand identity – setting a course to achieve long-term business goals.
Moreover, Newegg operates in the retail sector and accordingly, offers features likewise. Some key features have been mentioned in the section above. But many more essential eCommerce features remain instrumental in its success.
There are two popular approaches to building a website like Newegg:
Develop from Scratch
eCommerce websites can be built by hiring a team. A process that requires resources and time. Moreover, identifying an ideal team to partner with requires research and – ideally, some development knowledge.
Use Turnkey Software
Alternatively, turnkey software can be used that would require fewer resources and significantly less go-to-market time.
Turnkey marketplace solutions are readymade software that allows one to create a marketplace, and launch it, without having to code.
While many eCommerce store solutions can also be turned into multi-seller platforms with the help of Plugins, marketplace software can power an eCommerce marketplace right off the bat.
How can Team Yo!Kart help
Team Yo!Kart offers versatile turnkey marketplace solutions and end-to-end customization services. Since the launch of the B2C turnkey marketplace software – Yo!Kart, in 2015, the team successfully delivered eCommerce solutions and services for over 5000+ online marketplaces around the world.
With the launch of the B2B version – Yo!Kart B2B, the team now has turnkey solutions for marketplaces on all business models in the online retail multi-seller industry. Both solutions have been developed from the ground up following extensive research and accumulative experience in the eCommerce space.
Yo!Kart
Yo!Kart is a customizable and versatile turnkey marketplace solution that has been developed by analyzing the growth drivers of established eCommerce platforms like Amazon. The solution has result-driven features for the Admin to manage efficiently, vendors to sell effectively, and buyers to experience eCommerce intuitively.
Furthermore, the versatile solution has been tailored by an in-house team to find application in a range of marketplaces from startups to enterprise-grade marketplaces for Fortune 500 firms.
Yo!Kart comes pre-integrated with multiple business APIs and 23+payment gateways out of the box. It is also self-hosted and comes with complete source code ownership with a one-time payment. There are no sign-up, transactional, or any hidden charges thereafter.
Apart from the aforementioned points, there are multiple other key points that make Yo!Kart favorable to build a marketplace like Newegg. Some such key highlights of Yo!Kart are:
- Multiple features and modules built-in
- Supports downloadable digital along with physical products
- Tested scalability: Can support unlimited products.
- Inbuilt Blogging module and multiple other marketing features
- Versatile architecture – compatible with most third-party APIs and software.
- Extensive customization and after-sales support by an Agile team.
- Low overheads for businesses.
Learn all features offered by Yo!Kart
Yo!Kart B2B
Developed on the same lines as its B2C sibling, Yo!Kart B2B shares the same DNA. It, therefore, offers the same Agility of customizability, scalability, and maximized ROI.
The development of this solution has been underpinned by years of accumulative experience – acquired via customization services offered to B2B companies. The result is a solution with multiple B2B-specific features.
The B2B solution can be ideal for building a marketplace like Neweggbusiness. It provides a platform for manufacturers, distributors, service providers, and other businesses to conduct online B2B commerce seamlessly.
Some key elements that are offered built-in with Yo!Kart B2B, and integral for B2B marketplaces like Neweggbusiness are:
- RFQ module with extensive features to host 2-way negotiations
- Bulk – order discounts and Minimum Order Quantity
- Part payment option for buyers
- Option to sell services with products – (AMCs, maintenance contracts, installation, and other similar services can be offered alongside consumer electronics)
- Direct communication between sellers and buyers
Learn more about the Yo!Kart B2B advantage
Customization Services
Both Yo!Kart and Yo!Kart B2B come with efficient extensive customization services.
This can help businesses to plan a tailored solution in the market, meeting requirements effectively – with a solution that is purpose-built to drive their strategies.
Moreover, integrations and customizations can be done to cater to the specific needs of the target audience. For instance, for overseas operations, region-specific payment gateways can be integrated for more traction with the customers.
The need for customizations can be at the launch of the business, but importantly, there can be requirements down the line, after the business has been operating in the market – viz. enhancements based on user feedback.
Ecommerce Customization Services – Launch, Scale, Or Pivot With Complete Control
Final Thoughts
Newegg has done well to identify a niche and consistently focus on it. Its effective marketing strategy has allowed building a connection with the target audience, fostering a community, and establishing a brand that buyers identify with, especially in relation with the products on offer.
Furthermore, the marketplace has had success by continuously evolving itself and offer more to its target audience.
While both Yo!Kart and Yo!Kart B2B have been enriched with features that make the building of marketplaces like Newegg easy and cost-effective.
Versatility and support from an in-house team make them ideal for businesses to navigate the evolving eCommerce industry scenarios.
Moreover, hybrid business models can be supported with exclusive turnkey solutions – right at the start or over a period of time. Powering your entire eCommerce business with a singular source can help to achieve harmony across platforms, fostering a positive brand identity.
FAQs:
Q1. Is it right to start a consumer electronics eCommerce business?
Response: Choosing the right domain to start your eCommerce project will depend upon your business goals, both short-term and long-term. All things considered, the consumer electronics niche is expected to flourish at a steady rate. According to Global Market Insights, the sector will keep growing with a CAGR of 8% till 2027. The fundamental reason for the same is the continued R&D, steady consumer demand, and limited shelf-life of products in this category.
Q2. How do I choose the right Consumer electronics marketplace builder?
Response: The success of your eCommerce platform hinges on giving all platform participants the right set of features to conduct their activities. These features are both generic and specific according to the niche and the business model followed by the eCommerce business. Furthermore, the platform needs to be robust, scalable, secure, and high-performing for better experiences for the users.
Q3. What is the business model of Newegg?
Response: Newegg operates with a hybrid business model i.e. it has individual platforms for both B2B and B2C buyers. With exclusive set of features and marketing strategies, it caters to specific needs of both businesses and end consumers.
Q4. How can team Yo!Kart assist in consumer electronics marketplace development?
Response: YoKart is a readymade multi vendor software that comes with a range of features, catering to the needs of all primary platform participants. Furthermore, the solution is robust, highly scalable, and available with just a one-time priced packages. Thus to build a consumer electronics marketplace like Newegg, all one needs to do is give the team a call to schedule a demo. Installation will be covered by the team as well.
