Merchants
Advantages of using Resellers
Carefully choosing your resellers, affiliates, distributors or partners can efficiently and cost effectively increase your customer base and expand your growth potential.
Resellers are a quick and easy way to expand your business to new territories locally, nationally and even internationally without the expense.
Increase brand awareness through a network of resellers who will all promote your business and bear the cost of their own marketing reducing your marketing costs.
Strategic resellers and partners can open the door to new vertical markets which may otherwise be inaccessible or require significant marketing investment to enter.
Benefit from an army of additional sales staff without the hassle of employment contracts, expense of wages and office space.
How to become a merchant
Register your merchant profile on The Reseller Network
If you have an existing reseller program then registering your company profile is the first step to growing your business through a network of resellers, affiliate, distributors or partners. If your business does not have a reseller program yet you will need to create one first.
Choose the right resellers
It is likely that you will be many companies wishing to resell your products or services however you must avoid the temptation of approving them all in the quest for maximum growth for 2 reasons. Firstly there is little sense in approving a reseller who does not generate sales or at least enough sales to make it worth your while. You also need to make sure that the companies you approve share the same values as your business and will not damage your brands reputation.
Agree terms & start growing
You need to ensure that you are suitably protect by the terms of your reseller agreement but you also need to ensure that there is sufficient opportunity and reward for your resellers to make it worth their while too. Once you have agreed your terms give your resellers everything they need to get started and watch the sales come in. Support your resellers It is in your interest to support your resellers and make sure they have everything they need to continue growing your business. If you are unable to supply their demand they may loose interest in selling your product or switch to a new merchant who can meet the demand.
Choosing the right reseller
Select suitable companies or individuals
It is important that your resellers and partners share your values and belief in the product or service you wish to offer and that they have the ability to protect the brand and supply the service or product in the manner that meets your standards. They must also have the ability to generate sufficient reward for you and themselves.
Determine potential
It is important to find out as much information about a company or individual that wishes to resell for your business. You should treat it almost as if you were interviewing a candidate for a sales job, find out their back ground and also how they plan to sell your product. It is important to make sure that you both have an understanding of what the targets are and how they will be achieved. Unlike an employee there is likely to be no cost so it has less impact on your business if resellers under perform, however there is little sense in retaining resellers if there is insufficient value from their sales.
Company Logo
Make sure you upload your logo. Your logo is your brands identity and at a glance distinguishes your profile from your competitors. It also makes it easier for resellers who are searching for your profile to find you.
Company Description
Keep your company description short and concise. The first 3 lines appear in the Browse Merchants search results and will also show in the New Merchants Email to all relevant resellers the first Monday after your profile goes live. It’s important to summarise what’s special about your business to grab resellers’ attention and encourage them to view your profile.
Description of Reseller Opportunity
Once a reseller is viewing your profile and your opportunity you have their attention however, to make maximise reseller interests you should keep the description of your opportunity concise and include:
Product details including unique selling points
Overview of the type of reseller opportunity
The type of resellers you’re looking for
Where geographically you’re looking for resellers
Keywords that resellers will search
The incentive for resellers to join your program
A call to action to hit ‘Send Interest’ to contact you
As well as ensuring that your profile includes all the necessary information, you should also format the text to make it easy to read and insert some images to make it look more appealing to resellers.
Add Your Products
Whether you sell physical products, virtual products or services, you should add as many of your products with as much detail as possible. Resellers who are looking for specific products often search Browse Products and each product you add is another search result for Resellers find. More products equals, more search results, more views and more sales for your business. Unlike other marketplaces you can list products for information purposes only and sell offline in your normal way or you can enable your approved resellers to order and pay through The Reseller Network. However you choose to work there are no product listing fees and no commission on the sales generated. If you do sell your products online and they sell well they may even feature as Trending Products increasing reach and sales even further at no cost.
Profile Images
Profile images such as Product Images, Photos, Banner Adverts, Logos, Marketing / Promotional Collateral really enhance your profile and increase the level of interest from prospective resellers. The more images the better. You can upload images in jpeg, gif, png format and they can even be animated. We’ll resize the images automatically if necessary so it’s really quick and easy to significantly enhance your profile.
Profile Videos
Videos are a powerful and effective ways to communicate your message. If you use videos within your business share Product Demonstrations, Adverts, News, Events, Customer Testimonials, Tutorials, Webinars & How To videos through your Profile Videos page.
Profile Documents
The profile documents feature enables Merchants to upload documents that help engage and support resellers. You may wish to upload documents such as Product Catalogues, Wholesale Price Lists, Reseller Agreements, Marketing Material and Support Literature for example. You can control who is able to view and download each document by selecting one of the following; Not Visible, Visible to Everyone or Approved Resellers Only. Supported file types are *.pdf, *.xls, *.xlsx, *.txt, *.csv, *.doc, *.docx, *.ppt, *.pptx and up to a maximum file size of 10MB per file.
News & Promotions
Sharing News & Promotions is one of the most proactive ways to reach our resellers who opt in to receive these weekly emails. Through your profile settings we know which of our Resellers are relevant to your profile and any articles you share are automatically emailed to these Resellers at no extra cost. Promotions are emailed to resellers every Wednesday and News is emailed every Friday. The more you share, the more reach and therefore the more business you generate. However, the more interesting, relevant and engaging your articles the better the engagement so share quality articles for the best response.
Examples of what you can share:
News – New noteworthy events or stories such as; Press Releases, New Product Launches, Awards, New Partnerships or Acquisitions etc.
Promotions – Anything that is not ‘News’ including; Special Offers, Incentives, Product Information, Resellers Wanted and anything else that is promotional.
Profile Questions
If you would like to prequalify reseller interests you can use our dynamic profile questions to create a bespoke questionnaire for resellers to complete registering their interest in your profile. Questions can be answered by free text boxes, drop downs, radio buttons and tick boxes. You can determine whether each question is mandatory or optional. By creating questions you can get all the information you need such as; where they are located, their website, which product(s) they are interested in etc. all at the point of contact.
Invite Contacts
Invite your existing Resellers to join and connect with you on The Reseller Network so they can receive live notifications of all your updates, news and promotions. If you sell your products on The Reseller Network your approved resellers can buy and review your products. You also receive 1 Day Free Credit for each new Follower, Interest & Connection which means each of your resellers that joins and connects with you earns you an extra 1 Day
Free Credit.
Respond Quickly To New Reseller Interests
You will receive an email notification subject ‘New Reseller Interest’ as soon as a reseller registers their interest in your opportunity. It is important to respond to reseller interests as soon as possible even if just to acknowledge them and let them know you will contact them soon. If you do not respond to reseller interests quickly they may lose interest or contact your competitors! Approve & Decline reseller interests accordingly.
Monitor Your Profile Stats
Monitor your profile stats to track the number views, interests, approved & declined resellers. Use your stats as you would with something like Google Adwords, if your profile is receiving a lot of views (clicks) but is not converting interests then update and tweak your profile accordingly increase the conversion rate.
Promote Your Profile
To help you link and promote your Merchant Profile easily, we’ve provided a selection of icons below to suit most websites. Simply copy and paste the code for your chosen icon into your website to link directly to your profile.
Get Free Credit
Resellers can engage with Merchants in one of 3 ways;
Send Interest – To apply to become a reseller.
Connect – For existing resellers who want to connect.
Follow – For resellers who want to follow your updates.
Merchants receive 1 Day Free Credit for each new Interest, Connection and Follower. The more active you are the more reach and engagement you receive, which in turn reduces the cost and increases your return on investment.
Click ‘Invite Contacts’ to invite your existing Resellers to join and connect with you and receive 1 day free credit for each connection.
By clicking ‘Promote My Profile’ and adding one of our icons and a link to your profile on your website you will also benefit from an additional 3 Months Free Credit.
Increase Your Reach
Browse Merchants results are sorted in order of most recent login. Every time you login to your merchant profile your profile becomes the first result in Browse Merchants so logging in from time to time will increase your exposure at no cost. Reseller profiles also have a news feed providing real time updates from Merchants who match their profile. Each time you update your profile, add images or videos, post news or promotions, upload documents or approve resellers the update appears in the resellers news feed where they can engage with you directly.
There are also several proactive ways that you can increase your exposure and the level of interest in your opportunity such as:
Featured Merchant Logo on Scrolling Banner
Banner Advert
Definitions of Merchants
The term merchant is most commonly associated with affiliate marketing however on The Reseller Network it covers any business wishing to grow through strategic relationships. We have outlined a few of the most common types of merchants below.
Manufacturer
A manufacturer is a company who manufactures or produces their own products. This encompasses all products including technology, software, food, textiles and much more. Manufactures tend not to sell directly to consumers and instead develop wholesale or distribution channels to take the products to market. Typically this means that manufacturers only take bulk trade orders.
Distributor
A distributor is part of the distribution channel and is effectively the link between manufacturer and retailer. A distributor will receive and distribute bulk orders between a manufacturer and a retailer. Historically a distributor would have only handled physical products however with the evolution of the internet there are now distributors for products or services such as flights, hotels, financial products.
Vendor or Supplier
Vendors and suppliers are effectively the same supplying products or services to resellers and distributors in the channel. The term vendor is very common with in the IT and technology channels however it applies to suppliers of any product. Typically a suppliers and vendors will supply products or services owned or manufactured by another company to resellers. As with distributors and wholesales they usually purchase goods in bulk and redistribute smaller quantities to a network or VARS, resellers and distributors for a profit.
Affiliate Merchant
An affiliate merchant is a company that wishes to drive traffic to their website or sales off their product through ads and links placed throughout a network of affiliates. Merchants will normally pay affiliates a commission for every visit to the website or every sales conversion. A merchant may run their own in house affiliate program or they may use an affiliate network. To manage affiliates in house a merchant would either develop a bespoke application or purchase affiliate tracking software to monitor sales and commissions. Traditional affiliate networks charge merchants a membership fee and also take an additional commission from every sale so it is much more cost effective to manage affiliates in house.
Wholesaler
Wholesalers are effectively both a reseller and a merchant because they buy goods from manufacturers or distributors and then resell the goods to retailers. A wholesaler will typically purchase goods in bulk shipments and redistribute the products to retailers in smaller quantities. Historically a wholesaler would operate out of a large premise such as a warehouse in order to store stock before distributing it to retailers however it is also now common place for a wholesaler to act as a broker without physically handling stock, the term for this is drop shipping.
Definitions of Resellers
The term reseller is actually very broad and covers many different methods of earning revenue off the back of a product or service which is not owned or manufactured by you. Here are a few examples of different types of reseller relationships.
Reseller also known as VAR (Value Added Reseller)
An individual or company proactively selling a product or service owned or provided by another company for a profit or commission. Resellers may take stock or they may simply process orders through a website or by phone. Often a reseller will not need to be involved beyond the point of sale enabling them to focus on generating sales and maximising profits. There is no standard reseller program and each company will have its own terms, conditions and method of remuneration. Some companies will offer bespoke terms on a case by case basis so it is advised that a reseller contact a merchant to negotiate terms.
Affiliate
Most commonly affiliates solely drive web traffic from one website to another and are remunerated per visit or per sale. If you have space on your website for a link or banner then becoming an affiliate is a great way of earning additional revenue without increasing your work load. Affiliate marketing is not proactive so it is important to bear in mind your existing customer demographic when choosing a merchant or product to promote on your website. Both affiliates and merchants can monitor the performance of link/banner.
Retailer
The term retailer includes both online and offline retailers. Retailers typically purchase a quantity of a product(s) to resell through a shop or website for a profit. Retailers can sell any type of products from food and beverage to technology making it one of the largest industries globally.
Partners & Channel Partners
Larger vendors commonly use the term partner or channel partner. Partners are still effectively resellers and in most cases there is little or no difference between them. As with VAR’s partners would certainly be proactively selling. Partner channels also tend to be technology related and as result some technical knowledge of the products or services may be required although it does vary between vendors. Opinions are split however we believe that a resellers primary purpose is generating new business so therefore where ever possible the technical side of the business to the vendor.
Referral Partners
Referral partners are effectively another type of affiliate however unlike traditional affiliates it is possible to pass leads by email, telephone or in person. Referral partners are typically remunerated with a commission although this may either be per lead or per sale. Acting as a referral partner is ideal for an individual or company that doesn’t have the product knowledge or resources to really get involved but does periodically come across opportunities.
Drop shipper
A drop shipper is effectively a retailer who sells products without actually taking stock. This is typical for online shops who can easily take an order through their website and then pass the order details to the manufacturer or vendor to ship the product directly to the customer. As with a normal retailer a drop shipper will purchase a products, mark them up and resell them for a profit.
A “Reseller” is any company who sells a product or service not owned or manufactured by themselves .Our resellers include Resellers, Retailers, Distributors, Wholesalers, Affiliates, Entrepreneurs & Agents.
Both merchants and resellers can be online or offline businesses.
We help Manufacturers find new Merchants, Vendors, Distributors, Wholesalers, Affiliate Merchants & Franchisors, resellers to expand their sales channels and we help resellers find new products or suppliers that can add value or increase revenues.
We offer additional value though our Resource Centre which provides free useful articles and reselling products that we deem useful in business.