The e-commerce sector in Amsterdam hasn’t stopped growing in the past few years. Each year, more people place more orders than the year before. Because of this continuous growth the e-commerce sector in Amsterdam is a very attractive market to begin in. This is due to the fact that it’s fairly easy to start selling products online and the market is big enough (and will keep getting bigger).
But, there’s always a certain limit. At the beginning, the annual growth of an e-commerce business will be exponential. However after a period of time this growth flattens out. Entrepreneurs in Amsterdam will have to look at different opportunities to keep on growing.
1. Expand your product range
The first opportunity to realise further growth is to expand your product range. It’s also probably one of the easiest ways, since you can simply add different categories to your navigation menu. Let’s say you sell a wide variety of supplements in your online store. Like protein powders, fish oil capsules, multivitamins and so on. Your costumers mostly come from the fitness industry and you’ve build yourself a well-known and popular brand.
You could consider adding lines of clothing and/or equipment to your product range. Especially when people love your brand already they will automatically love your other products as well. In addition to that it will also bring you ‘free’ promotion of your brand. People will wear and use your products in the gym, so many people will see your logo. This is a great way to fuel further growth for your e-commerce business as well as raise brand awareness. However if you don’t have an own brand but you’re a reseller of other brands, you could still add clothing and/or equipment of those brands. The margins will be lower but you will still be able to realise a growth in revenue.
2. Expand your business across the border
Our second opportunity isn’t something most entrepreneurs think about, but in today’s society it is relatively easy to expand your business across the border. Think about it: the Netherlands only has around 17 million inhabitants. Germany, for example, has well over 83 million inhabitants. Not even mentioning the several other countries in Europe like Belgium, France and Spain.
Especially with the help of marketplaces like Bol.com and Amazon it is very easy to offer your products to people in different countries. Simply register as a merchant, upload your product range and pay a small fee for every sale through these marketplaces. But, there’s a catch.
If you’re planning on selling your products in Germany, a Dutch or English text will obviously not suffice. People in Germany have a preference for products that are offered in the German language. So, if you want to be successful in Germany through Amazon you’re going to have to translate your texts. Luckily there are translation agencies with in-house native linguists that can do this for you.
Entrepreneurs in Amsterdam
If you’re an entrepreneur in Amsterdam then you’re in luck. There are many translation agencies in the Netherlands and Amsterdam itself, but Amsterdam’s leading translation agency has to be Translation Agency Perfect. They have in-house native linguists with many years of experience, so you get top-notch quality at a competitive rate. Their translators will make sure your texts, such as product descriptions and marketing texts, are 100% correct and will convince people to buy your products.
3. Co-operate with other businesses
Another way to further grow your business is to co-operate with other businesses. There are multiple ways to do this. For example, you could exchange links with another online store to boost each other’s rankings in Google. This could help get you to that number #1 spot on a competitive term.
You could also co-operate with a business that is similar or a good addition to your own online store. For example, if you sell supplements a good co-operation would be with an online store that sells fresh and organic products. With every order you could send a discount code from the other store and he or she would do the same for yours.
Last but not least you can co-operate with local businesses. For an online store in supplements a good co-operation would be with local gyms or other sports clubs. They could sell supplements like protein powders in their cafeterias.
What suits best for your business?
By now you have 3 new ways of growing your e-commerce business to unknown heights. The only thing to do now is deciding which way, or even multiple ways, suit your business the best. Let us know in the comments what your favourite is and what you’ve done in the past to grow your e-commerce business!
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