B2B2C, or Business-to-Business-to-Consumer, is a business model that combines B2B (Business-to-Business) and B2C (Business-to-Consumer) models. In this approach, a business sells products or services to another business, which in turn sells them to the end consumer. This model creates a mutually beneficial partnership where businesses can expand their reach and improve product access for consumers.
StoreAutomator supports two types of B2B2C business models:
- Running a Marketplace for Retailers: In this model, a company operates an online marketplace where various retailers can list and sell their products. This platform acts as a middleman, connecting retailers with a broader consumer base. The marketplace provider typically manages the site, handles transactions, and may offer additional services like shipping or marketing, while the retailers focus on supplying the products.
- Running a Reseller Network for Manufacturers: This approach involves a business creating a network of independent resellers or distributors to sell a manufacturer's products. The resellers purchase products from the manufacturer and then sell them to the end consumer. The manufacturer benefits from expanded market reach without the need for direct consumer interaction, while resellers enjoy access to quality products and support from the manufacturer.
Below we explain how a manufacturer can setup reseller network.
First step is set up a master account in StoreAutomator that includes all your products and create multiple reseller accounts under your master account to control the products they sell.
Adding Reseller Accounts
There are two ways to add a reseller account to your master account.
- Automatic creation. By providing a signup form to your resellers so the account can be created automatically when they submit the form.
- Manual Creation:
- Log in to your StoreAutomator master account
- Click on “All channels” and then “Manage your channels” in the upper left corner of the StoreAutomator dashboard.
- Click “Add channel” on the right upper corner and choose the “Reseller” channel and click “+Create”
- Fill in the information for your reseller account and check the “Create Reseller Account” box. If you want to include all the products that live in your master account Inventory level in your reseller account, check the “Include All Inventory” box. Click “+Create” to create the channel.
When the channel is created, an email will be automatically sent to your reseller for password setup to access their new account.
Managing Reseller Accounts
You will have full access to your reseller '’’s accounts settings and products. To access one of your resellers accounts:
- Navigate to “Agency”> “Accounts” in the bottom of the left side main menu of your master account.
- Click on the arrow on the far right side of the reseller account and select “Normal” to impersonate the account.
- To make a changes on any of the reseller’s account, navigate to All channels on your master account and select the reseller channel. Go to Channel settings>Common to access all of the channel settings.
When a reseller account is added, Etsy and Shopify channels are automatically added; resellers can connect these channels through API when they are ready. Click to learn how to connect the Shopify channel.
Product Management
At this stage your resellers Shopify and Etsy channels will not have any products. If you checked the box to include all inventory to your reseller account when you originally created the account, you will see all of your base products in the Inventory Level of your seller account. If not, you will have to manually push the products of your choice from your master account to the reseller’s channel.
To manually push products from your master account to your reseller account:
You need to go to All channels and select the reseller channel from your master account. On the Channel products page, change the status to show “Not in channel” items. Select the items you need to include in your reseller account and click on the three dots menu shown below, then select “Inclusion Status”> “Include” from the menu to include the items.
- Go to "All channels," select the reseller channel.
- On the Channel products page, set status to show "Not in channel" items.
- Select items to include.
- Click the three dots menu (below) select "Inclusion Status > Include"
- Click "Sync" to push items to the reseller account.
3. Click Sync to push the items to your reseller account. The items you selected will be created as base products in your reseller account that cannot be modified or changed by the resellers.
See example below on how a base product will look like to your resellers:
A base product will be locked to your resellers and cannot be modified by them. In order for them to add products to their channels they have to connect the channel via API first. Then they should create a customized version of your base product. To do that, they need to click on “Customize” to the right side of the product.
This enables them to make any changes to the products before creating them in their accounts. Any changes after creation will not be allowed. The first field is for the product name, the original name will be inherited here, however, the reseller can modify it if they want.
The reseller can check the box of Auto sku to automatically let the system assign a sku to their product’s variations (if it existed) or check it off if they decided to use their own skus. They also have a control over which variant to select or creation as well as an option to add an artwork, which can be an attachment that can be used by the supplier) for example, if you are selling candles, the art work would be the candle’s customized label that you need the supplier to print and attach to the candle.
When you click “Save” all of the selected items will be created and automatically added to your Etsy and Shopify channels of their reseller account. They can have a control of pushing the items to their remote Shopify website or Etsy by enabling or disabling the Sync switch on the Channel Settings>Common>General tab.