Choosing The Right Ecommerce Platform

Buy Now Pay Later (#BNPL) success has been driven by the consumer side, but it is increasingly its #B2B side that will be steering future potential. Let’s take a look. Getting paid is among the most critical problems companies face. Businesses fail, much more often, because of liquidity rather than the lack of capital. Bank lending cannot address this alone: According to Allianz (2019) the SME bank loan financing gap in the Eurozone is 3% of GDP or EUR 400 billion (vs 2% of GDP in the US). Things look much worse in emerging economies. So, what do suppliers do to sell? They provide trade credit to buyers, i.e. receive goods now but pay later in 30, 60, 90 days. Because lending is not always available, factoring (invoice financing) is one of the most popular ways that suppliers employ to improve liquidity: They sell their invoices to a third-party factoring company at a discount and get in exchange 80-90% of their value. Buyers pay the factoring company directly. In the end suppliers get the remaining amount of the invoices minus the factoring company fee. B2B BNPL can be a credible alternative. How it works: — Same logic and set-up as the B2C model — A provider integrates with the supplier and offers B2B BNPL as a payment option integrated at check-out — The provider does the risk assessment and provides the buyer installment payment terms — The seller gets upfront the total selling price — The provider controls the end-to-end flow (product, risk, integration, collections, etc) and manages default – it usually charges the supplier a % fee for these services The opportunity is enormous: estimates converge that #payments between businesses are on a global scale a $120 trillion market. A number of fintech providers are trying to build on the momentum: billie, mondu, Hokodo, iwoca, Tranch, Two, Playter are some of the most well-known. Even though the model is similar to its B2C sibling, there are some key differences: — Underwriting companies with much bigger amounts means considerably more risk — Customer journeys are much more complex in the business world with high KYC requirements, additional steps and an array of #software and systems (i.e. accounting, ERP) that come into play Which is why most of the competing players in the B2B space aren’t the big B2C names, but rather stand-alone fintechs focusing on the specifics of businesses (although synergies exist, i.e. Klarna has invested in Billie). B2B BNPL has the potential to revolutionize #business payments, but we are not there yet. Take-off depends on a number of factors with the following standing out: 1) Risk underwriting and fraud capabilities need to improve 2) Distribution via B2B software will be key 3) Marketplaces are top of mind 4) Focus on industries and verticals as a competitive edge 5) Emerging top players will be those addressing SME challenges in holistic ways beyond financing. Opinions: my own, Graphic source: greylock

The other night, I searched for rajma on Zepto. The top suggestion wasn’t Rajdhani, Tata Sampann, or any brand I knew. It was something called Daily Goods. I thought, “Yeh kaunsa naya brand hai?” Googled it. Turns out, it’s Zepto’s own label. That’s when it hit me. These apps aren’t just delivering brands anymore. They’re building their own. 📌 Swiggy’s "Noice" launched just months ago and already captured: → 3.4% of wafer sales on their platform → 1.9% of biscuit sales → 200+ SKUs across 13 categories → Sourcing from 40+ small-scale manufacturers 📌 Zepto is expanding fast with: → chyll (ice cubes, juices) → aaha! (snacks, cereals, batters) → Relish generated Rs 40 crore monthly sales; aiming for Rs 1,000 crore annual revenue by Mar 2026. 📌 BigBasket has already cracked the code: → ₹4,000 crore annual private label revenue → 35-40% of overall revenue share → Strong in-house brands like BB Royal, BB Popular, Fresho The maths is simple: Private labels = 25–45% margins Branded products = 15–25% margins By cutting the middlemen and pricing products as ‘fresh,’ these platforms make it easier for customers to pick them. Aur jab 10-minute delivery pe bharosa ho jaata hai, toh quality pe bhi automatically trust build ho jaata hai. In just 2 years, private labels jumped from 1–2% to 6–8% of Q-commerce sales. With perishables, that number could touch 10–15%. The strategy is: Start with essentials → Build trust → Expand into snacks → Dominate categories. Today, the app itself is the brand. And that’s the real shift traditional FMCG companies need to pay attention to. Quick thought: when you order from Blinkit or Zepto, do you still type brand names, or just pick what looks good?

Bro, just integrate Stripe. It’s one API call.” Famous last words before you end up debugging webhooks, idempotency, and double charges at 2 AM. And that’s how I lost 2 weeks of my life debugging what looked like a 10-line API call. Let me explain what really happens when you implement payments 👇 Step 1: The Illusion - “Frontend Integration” You add a Checkout button, call Razorpay/Stripe API, user pays, frontend says “Success.” Money deducted. Job done? Nope. Because that “success” is just the browser’s response. If the user closes the tab before redirection — the payment still happens, but your app never knows. Lesson: Frontend != Source of Truth Step 2: The Payment Object You can’t just depend on the gateway. Every payment needs to exist in your own database first. When the user starts checkout, create a Payment object in your DB: Payment {   id: uuid,   order_id: xyz,   status: "INITIATED",   amount: 499,   gateway_payment_id: null,   user_id: abc } This lets you track the full lifecycle - even if webhooks arrive late or twice. Step 3: Webhooks - The Real Source of Truth When the gateway sends a webhook (e.g. payment_success), that’s when you verify, update your DB, and unlock what the user paid for. But gateways retry webhooks (sometimes multiple times). So you need idempotency — so the same event doesn’t trigger multiple unlocks. A simple rule: Use the gateway_payment_id as a unique key. if not exists(gateway_payment_id):     mark_payment_success()     unlock_user_access() else:     ignore_duplicate_event() Now your backend behaves deterministically - even under retries or duplicates. Step 4: Ensuring User Access After Payment This part hurts the most. Users expect instant access after paying. But your webhook might arrive a few seconds later. So here’s how to handle it right 👇 On frontend, optimistically show “Payment successful, verifying…” Backend gives access only when webhook confirms it. If webhook is delayed, show a loader or poll for status every few seconds. That 5-second delay saves you from massive refund chaos later. Step 5: Reconciliation & The Real-World Mess At month-end your finance team will ask: “We got ₹98,120 in the bank, but system shows ₹97,950. Why?” Now you’ll compare your DB -> gateway reports -> settlement bank entries (T+2 delays). Only then will you realize… Payment integration isn’t a feature - it’s an event-driven distributed system that happens to move money. 💡 The Moral "Just integrate payments" sounds simple - until you realize it’s about: - Async systems - Idempotency - Race conditions - Data consistency And human impatience 😅 It’s the perfect real-world test of whether your system design actually holds up. Next time someone says “It’s just an API call”… send them this post.

I audited a 9-figure eCommerce brand to increase traffic/ROI with SEO: (Here's my 23 notes from the SEO audit) The 23 "ROI" key points I noted: 1. Topical architecture is destroying the brand's SEO 2. Product pages are buried in a messy digital jungle 3. Internal linking distribution is hella' needed here 4. Navigation is weak for both customer/crawls 5. Google is unlikely to crawl "money" pages 6. Link "juice" distribution easily loses value 7. Search pages are indexed causing bloat 8. Poor query targeting for easy rankings 9. "Money" pages sit deep in the website 10. Trending commerce data is not used  11. Crawl budget is wasted on pages 12. Weak use of external link equity 13. Weak silo-depth and relevance 14. Inconsistent use of templates  15. Funnel templates are poor AF 16. Parameter crawling is a killer  17. Weak customer segmenting 18. Revenue will stay stagnant 19. Canonicals can get chaotic 20. Poor SERP intent targeting  21. Domain equity is not used 22. Traffic will stay stagnant 23. Weak theming is used ----- Your product pages can be hidden within a digital jungle 🌴 Information architecture (IA) helps bots and customers. IA is not easy and it's a balance between: - Brand requrements (BR) - Customer journeys (CJ) - Ecommerce trends (ET) - SEO recommendations (SR) IA is a part of SEO you can't automate. But it brings huge returns if worked on. ----- Here's the truth You will NEVER have a perfect IA. But I would focus on: 1. Building an agile IA-tailored strategy. 2. Build your IA using BR, CJ, ET and SR data.  3. Your systems and strategies must be tailored to the brand. 4. Fix your hierarchy and help the crawlers Information architecture is a powerhouse move for search engine optimisation. Should eCommerce brands work on their architecture? 📌 P.S. Better customer architect flows lead to better conversion rate - don't share this with your competitor ✌️ #Ecommerce | #SEO | #Shopify

Innovation isn’t about making what you sell better; it’s about selling something better. Most often when people think of the objectives of digital transformation, they focus on production optimization or cost reduction. But I would argue the real value comes from transforming the way you provide and capture value to customers. 𝐓𝐡𝐫𝐞𝐞 𝐞𝐱𝐚𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐧𝐞𝐰 𝐛𝐮𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐦𝐨𝐝𝐞𝐥𝐬: 𝐃𝐢𝐠𝐢𝐭𝐚𝐥 𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐯𝐢𝐜𝐞𝐬 Manufacturers have traditionally sold physical products; however, with the increasing popularity of digital services such as software or cloud-based solutions, many manufacturers are now offering digital services as well. These digital services can be anything from providing access to a web portal for customers to tracking performance data for their equipment. By selling digital services, manufacturers can not only increase their profits but also gain a better understanding of customer needs which they can use to refine their products and services accordingly. 𝐒𝐮𝐛𝐬𝐜𝐫𝐢𝐩𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 & 𝐀𝐬-𝐀-𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐯𝐢𝐜𝐞 The subscription business model has become increasingly popular among manufacturers as it allows them to offer customers more flexibility when purchasing their products or services. Instead of customers buying a one-time product or service, they can subscribe on an ongoing basis instead which means they get access to the latest updates and features without having to purchase a new product each time. 𝐎𝐮𝐭𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐞-𝐁𝐚𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐬 This type of contract typically involves setting an agreed upon outcome that both parties agree on before signing any agreements. For example, if a manufacturer agrees to provide hardware maintenance for its customers for a certain number of years then it will receive payment once those conditions have been met instead of upfront payments like in traditional contracts. In such arrangements, manufacturers assume more responsibility for delivering results; thus increasing their risk but also allowing them to capture more value from customers if successful. ******************************************* • Visit www.jeffwinterinsights.com for access to all my content and to stay current on Industry 4.0 and other cool tech trends • Ring the 🔔 for notifications!

Load Balancing: Beyond the Basics - 5 Methods Every Architect Should Consider The backbone of scalable systems isn't just about adding more servers - it's about intelligently directing traffic between them. After years of implementing different approaches, here are the key load balancing methods that consistently prove their worth: 1. Round Robin Simple doesn't mean ineffective. It's like a traffic cop giving equal time to each lane - predictable and fair. While great for identical servers, it needs tweaking when your infrastructure varies in capacity. 2. Least Connection Method This one's my favorite for dynamic workloads. It's like a smart queuing system that always points users to the least busy server. Perfect for when your user sessions vary significantly in duration and resource usage. 3. Weighted Response Time Think of it as your most responsive waiter getting more tables. By factoring in actual server performance rather than just connection counts, you get better real-world performance. Great for heterogeneous environments. 4. Resource-Based Distribution The new kid on the block, but gaining traction fast. By monitoring CPU, memory, and network load in real-time, it makes smarter decisions than traditional methods. Especially valuable in cloud environments where resources can vary. 5. Source IP Hash When session persistence matters, this is your go-to. Perfect for applications where maintaining user context is crucial, like e-commerce platforms or banking applications. The real art isn't in picking one method, but in knowing when to use each. Sometimes, the best approach is a hybrid solution that adapts to your traffic patterns. What challenges have you faced with load balancing in production? Would love to hear your real-world experiences!

The fee you never see, but every merchant pays. Every time you tap a Visa, swipe a Mastercard, or spend with Revolut, the merchant doesn’t actually receive the full payment. A small percentage, sometimes less than 1%, sometimes over 3% is taken as the Merchant Discount Rate (MDR). It’s the cost of accepting card payments, and it powers the entire payments ecosystem. What makes MDR interesting is that it isn’t a single fee. It is a bundle: 🔹The interchange fee goes to the bank that issued your card (like Chase or HSBC). 🔹The scheme fee is collected by the network, Visa, or Mastercard, for running the rails. 🔹The acquirer markup is kept by the processor (Adyen, Stripe, Worldpay) that settles the transaction for the merchant. MDR may sound small, but scale changes everything. In Europe, regulators capped interchange at 0.2–0.3% to protect merchants. In India, Visa and Mastercard were pushed to cut MDR further to encourage digital adoption. In the US, where fees are higher, retailers have fought costly legal battles against the networks. For a café owner, MDR can decide whether a coffee is profitable. For Amazon, Netflix, or Uber, trimming even 0.1% can save millions each year. And when Revolut or Wise say “no foreign transaction fees,” they’re really absorbing or reshaping the MDR and FX costs to win market share. To put it in perspective: On a €100 card payment in Europe, the merchant might receive around €99.70. About €0.20 goes to the issuing bank, €0.05 to Visa or Mastercard, and €0.05 to the acquirer or processor. That missing 30 cents may look trivial. But multiplied across billions of transactions every day, it becomes the engine of modern payments. If regulators forced Visa and Mastercard to lower MDR globally, who do you think would win most? merchants, consumers, or fintechs? #Payments #Fintech #Banking #Visa #Mastercard #Revolut #Adyen #MerchantDiscountRate #RoanDollmann

BNPL for Businesses 💡 New players are emerging in B2B factoring who effectively absorb much of the cash flow burden and risk away from the suppliers by acting as a critical intermediary – and technical infrastructure – between the payer and payee. So-called “B2B BNPL” companies embed themselves in the supplier’s sale process and offer quasi-instant net terms to end customers. Suppliers get paid 100% of the invoice up front (minus the fee, ~2% of invoice per month) and are not responsible for collecting payment. The BNPL company therefore manages all credit decisioning, bears default risk, and manages collections, while making the net terms process easier and faster for end customers. By outsourcing the net terms process to a B2B BNPL company, suppliers are able to significantly decrease the administrative burden that accompanies decisioning credit and collecting invoices. This benefit can be disaggregated into four phases: Absorbing default risk, improving Credit Decisioning, improving Checkout and Managing Collections 👨💻 In the long arc of technical progress, B2B transactions will inevitably shift from email, phone, and even faxed invoices to software and digital payment rails, embedded instant, flexible financing could be a trigger to accelerate payments digitization. We can focus on distribution for B2B BNPL of four types: 🔹 Marketplaces: B2B Marketplaces embed B2B BNPL at checkout for all their brands. 🔹 eCommerce: Many manufacturers are opting to sell directly to their end customers through their websites. 🔹 Distributors: Since distributors are getting continuously squeezed by manufacturers trying to improve margins, they’ve had to significantly improve offerings and services. Embedding terms may improve customer satisfaction and purchasing, particularly if coupled with ‘smart’ software that allows distributors to anticipate customer reorders, automate upsells, and optimize pricing. 🔹 Offline-Friendly: For ‘offline’ sales, the rep can send customers a payment link where they fill out basic company information so that the B2B BNPL co can assess the credit and offer terms. Apart from point of sale, startups attacking B2B financing can specialize by vertical to build more specific features and become more intelligent in risk assessment. While we’re beginning to see startups address demand for better B2B financing, it is a large and global opportunity, and we’re in the early innings 🚀 We predict there will be several geo-specific companies, taking into account local differences from payment methods to tax reporting. There are also many related areas fertile for innovation: the checkout experience, AP/AR automation, and moving transactions to marketplaces. Source: Greylock - https://bit.ly/3SmvnpK #Innovation #Fintech #Banking #OpenBanking #EmbeddedFinance #API #FinancialServices #Payments #Loans #Lending #BNPL #Financing #Invoicing #B2B #SaaS

Test your top product pages on mobile incognito to spot hidden UX blockers Most eCommerce customers will never see your site on desktop. They browse, compare and buy on mobile. Yet too many brands still optimise their sites with a desktop-first mindset. A simple 5-minute check can reveal costly UX issues: Open an incognito window on your phone. Search for your top product or category. Click through to your own site. Try to add the product to cart and move toward checkout. Note every point of friction, pop-ups, slow load times, buttons that don’t fit the screen, confusing navigation. Why this matters: Incognito removes cookies and saved logins, so you experience your site as a new customer would. Even small blockers, a broken filter, an oversized modal, a payment step that doesn’t load, can kill conversions. Google’s algorithms increasingly reward mobile UX, meaning these fixes help both SEO and revenue. You cannot optimise what you have not experienced yourself. Question: When was the last time you tested your own checkout on mobile, start to finish? #ecommerce #UX #SEO

Small, regional consumer brands and FMCG companies are rising in popularity. These companies are growing faster than their larger competitors due to factors like innovation, adaptability, the rise of quick commerce, and better product alignment with the younger generation, Livemint reports, citing Emkay Research data. On the other hand, constant price hikes and a dependence on general trade is making it difficult for larger companies to grow, the report further says. Small and mid-sized firms like Iscon Balaji, Dermabay, Moi Soi, Zoff Spices and Bindu Jeera are garnering a lot of interest. While some are in the process of raising private equity funding, others are being approached by investors for minority stakes, Ratna Bhushan reports for The Economic Times. According to Dermabay’s co-founder Dr. Divneet Kaur, the skincare company aims to drive innovation and scale its presence by raising ₹5–7 crores from angel investors and family offices. Noodles and ready-to-cook meals company Ceres Foods is in the midst of raising its first institutional round of ₹30 crores. Achieving profitability with limited resources, the funds will be leveraged towards the growth of its Moi Soi range, Director Deb Mukherjee shares. So, what’s causing a surge in these deals? Fireside Ventures’s co-founder Kannan Sitaram says, “Quick commerce and e-commerce have reduced the advantage of legacy brands on distribution and availability.”   ➡️ Why are investors and consumers showing more interest in niche and smaller FMCG players? Share your take in the comments section. Sources: Mint: https://lnkd.in/g6WEk9pg The Economic Times: https://lnkd.in/g_PEZGdA ✍: Dipal Desai 📸: Getty Images Are you an industry expert looking to build your presence on LinkedIn? Fill this form to receive additional support, resources, and opportunities from LinkedIn’s editorial team: https://lnkd.in/gi6FR9cZ