EDI: The Three Letter Acronym That Can Kill Your Marketplace Onboarding

EDI.

Onboarding is often time the last thing you think about when building your marketplace. Here's the real problem with trying to attract brands. Particularly brands that have been around more than 20 years.

They got really good at wholesale, and optimized for it. Similar to that tree in your neighborhood which has become part of a chain link fence, now you can't tell where one platform begins and the other ends. It's just "the system".

If you are trying to onboard, and you need to do it fast, many brands will choose EDI by default. In fact, in my experience, the IT manager will start spouting out EDI document numbers faster than your head can spin in the first 5 minutes of the conversation.

Give them an API, however? And it goes to the bottom of the roadmap in their custom project bucket, never to be seen again. Your sales promises better be real good.

I bring this up because what people need to onboard is often dependent on what segment of the market you attract. Newer brands are more nimbler and have more flexible systems. Older brands don't. Which are you looking to bring?

Plan your marketplace onboarding strategy accordingly.