Dive Brief:
- Amazon is launching a new app store on Monday specifically for its third-party professional vendors in North America, the technology and consumer electronics publication CNET reported.
- Marketplace Appstore will help sellers handle pricing, inventory, advertising and other needs, and is intended to spur growth for the third-party sellers on Amazon, according to the CNET story. Seller Central, Amazon's main hub for third-party retailers, includes the Amazon Marketplace Web Service applications created by Amazon and other developers, and will house the new app store, according to an Amazon Services web page.
- To assure a smooth rollout, the resource will be gradually introduced to vendors, CNET reported.
Dive Insight:
Online marketplaces are growing rapidly and are projected to double in revenues by 2022. Merchants will be attracted to those that provide the most visibility and support. Amazon already has the traffic and visibility, and now it is enhancing the resources it offers its marketplace partners.
Amazon has been working to improve relationships with the developers of tools for sellers in an effort to provide sellers with software that could boost their business on the marketplace. One result of this is the Amazon Marketplace Developer Council, an advisory board which launched recently, according to eCommerce Bytes.
"Amazon provides the millions of businesses that sell in our stores with a wide range of tools and resources to help them grow and manage their businesses," said an Amazon spokesperson in an email to Retail Dive. "Many developers have innovated and created applications that complement our tools and integrate with our service. We created the Marketplace Appstore to help businesses more easily discover these applications, streamline their business operations, and ultimately create a better experience for our customers."
Among the software resources available for vendors on the Marketplace Appstore is Teikametrics, Tech News Spy reported. Teikametrics offers a multipurpose app which automates tasks like changing product prices, optimizing online advertising campaigns and conducting inventory forecasts.
For software developers, Amazon said the app store is in beta and currently by invitation only, although they can request an invitation on the Amazon Services web page. Interested invitees will submit requests that will be reviewed by Amazon.
EBay is another online marketplace enhancing its seller support. For example, last fall eBay rolled out two artificial intelligence-based image-recognition features to facilitate image-driven searches. EBay also has debuted an augmented reality feature for Android ARCore devices to help sellers figure out which U.S. Postal Service Flat Rate Box best fits their items.
