Taku Murahwi

Toronto Startup Ecomtent Secures $850,000 to Revolutionize AI-Powered Ecommerce Search: Toronto startup Ecomtent has secured a pre-seed funding round led by MaRS Investment Accelerator Fund (IAF) to helps sellers and retailers prepare for the AI-driven future of ecommerce search. Ecomtent participated in Techstars Future of Ecommerce powered by eBay last year and the $850,000 funding round included Techstars and eBay Ventures. Ecomtent’s technology enables sellers […] The post Toronto Startup Ecomtent Secures $850,000 to Revolutionize AI-Powered Ecommerce Search appeared first on Fintech.ca. --- Toronto Startup Ecomtent Secures $850,000 to Revolutionize AI-Powered Ecommerce Search was first posted on September 10, 2024 at 5:00 am. ©2022 "Fintech.ca". Use of this feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this article in your feed reader, then the site is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me at [email protected]

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Who says fast-track expansion has to be difficult? 🚀 When Oats Overnight needed a larger facility for its rapidly growing DTC brand, they weren’t sure how to time the investment. Should they spend more today to unlock better margins or wait until real estate costs come down? They used Drivepoint to pinpoint the perfect moment to capitalize on the opportunity for a bigger space. And the results? 📈 $4M EBITDA increase 📈 $20M Series A 📈 98% forecast accuracy Check out how Oats Overnight unlocked this growth in the full case study: https://lnkd.in/gPhbxHHD

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We’re working on next years Leader’s Guide to be published in January and are seeing a lot more categories begin to have very differently performing apps. If you’re thinking about changing out components of your commerce experience, we can give you some insight on what others in your peer group (platform, industry, etc) are using and how it’s performed. Reviews are so valuable to helping customer get confidence to click “add to cart”, but you would be surprised to learn how often they don’t load from some vendors before the shopper moved off the screen.

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It is EOFY sale time and it is now or never when it comes to getting smart about retailer discounting. My advice: 1. Review the performance of 2024's EOFY sale -> What discounting strategy did you offer? -> Was trade profitable? -> Isolate orders where the discount was applied, were they profitable? -> Was CAC lower in June 2023 than May 2023 and July 2023? -> The new customers you acquired, did they shop again? -> If the new customers shopped again, did they use a discount code? -> How many customers did you re-activate, did they shop again? -> Did you sell a majority of core, seasonal or aging inventory? 2. Review the performance of your recent May 2024 Click Frenzy Mayhem sale -> What discounting strategy did you offer? -> Did you meet the goal? -> Was trade profitable? -> Isolate orders where the discount was applied, were they profitable? -> Was CAC lower in May 2024 than April 2024? -> How many new customers did you acquire? -> How many customers did you re-activate? -> Did you sell a majority of core, seasonal or aging inventory? By following these two steps and answering the above questions you should be able to determine if the discounting strategy met your objectives in the both the short and long term. Please don't repeat a discounting strategy that did not meet your objectives! What's the point other than generating cash flow and less money in the bank to invest.

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"It's table stakes for merchants to be everywhere customers are" - Harley Finkelstein, President of Shopify Finally a definition of omnichannel that I agree with -- from the lens of the consumer. Shopify & Target announced a partnership to allow select merchants to offer their products on Target Plus, the retailer's third-party marketplace. Why is this such a huge announcement? 1️⃣ It is a stamp of support by two of the largest commerce players that omnichannel is the future You need to be wherever your customers are. 2️⃣ Target brings the power of discovery to Shopify merchants. While Shopify has incredible enablement tools -- it is in the best interest of the merchants to support discovery channels outside of the extremely expensive Meta. Otherwise Amazon will continue to be the beneficiary of brands seeking discovery for their products. 3️⃣ For Target, this partnership provides their consumers with access to top brands that have cemented their success in the DTC world like True Classic & Caden Lane 4️⃣ DTC should not be thought of as separate to retail. They are both shopping experiences for the consumer that should speak to one another. 5️⃣ It cements the importance of marketplaces for both retailers and brands as key growth channels going forward. --- If you still think omnichannel is just a buzz word, you're wrong. If you still think retail & DTC should be thought of separately, you're so behind. Omnichannel is now and the future of how consumers will shop. Brij is building the solution that will help you connect consumer touch points across every channel you sell through. #shopify #target #omnichannel

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Warmup Ventures is pleased to announce its investment in Nitro Commerce. Nitro Commerce is rapidly advancing towards their goal of improving conversion rates for over 100,000 homegrown brands. Their innovative approach to integrating e-commerce and digital advertising, coupled with their custom intelligent data driven offerings caught our attention. Nitro stands out as more than just software; it serves as a bridge of expertise, enabling brands to tackle challenges such as anonymous visitors and intricate marketing strategies. Committed to reshaping the future of Indian e-commerce, they focuse on creating not just tools, but also partners, champions, and growth engines for brands that are defining the future landscape. We are eager to support and contribute to Nitro's innovative journey as they continue to drive progress and transformation in the industry. The funding round was led by Cornerstone Venture Partners , along with participation from DHOLAKIA VENTURES, Lead Angels , India Accelerator, and individual investors like Arjun Vaidya and Kunal Khattar . “Fuelling the E-Commerce Revolution: Nitro – Empowering Brands, Shaping Tomorrow”. We are confident in Nitro’s potential to drive substantial growth in the Indian e-commerce and D2C market Rajendra Lora Sharad Bansal Yogesh Chaudhary Umair Mohammed Atyab Mohammad Shamail Tayyab Pratik A. #WarmupVentures #MicroVC #NitroCommerce #Investment https://lnkd.in/dPeMQ9-f

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Custom stacks can lead to two very real problems: depending on custom development and increased tech debt. Combined, your pace slows and ultimately, your trade-off is innovation and growth. That’s why Mejuri went from a fully custom stack to Shopify. Before Shopify, Mejuri was on an entirely custom stack: custom ecommerce, payments service, and middleware that was built to connect their custom ecommerce site to their point of sale system [POS]. This led to a ton of challenges. They were spending too much time building and maintaining 3rd party integrations to coordinate channels, data, and functionality between systems. With limited resources and team members, the trade-off of building custom features was they were not able to address their mounting technical debt. Addressing those issues in-house, slowed down their pace of innovation making them unable to deploy features as fast as they needed to. That’s the ‘invisible’ cost component with a custom stack. You spend an inordinate amount of time building custom features at the cost of innovation. Brands can avoid that with Shopify. Shopify is a natively unified ecommerce and POS system so everything just works together really really well. It doesn’t require middleware or integrations. Your customer, order, and product data flows to both channels from a single source of truth. It’s simpler and allows you to move faster. Hear about from Mejuri yourself. Rohit Nathany, the Chief Digital Officer sat down with us to talk about the pain points they faced on a custom stack. As Rohit says, what better way to simplify than to have a unified ecommerce and POS solution? See the full interview here: https://lnkd.in/eyCSdVgf

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The most frustrating part of Uber, Lyft and all food delivery services is: Timing IS part of the product. I.e. right before I pay for the Uber when it says “1 minute away” then, post payment, it says 15 minutes - it’s no longer part of the offering I’m looking for. The product isn’t “well our job was to simply get you there.” - taxis did that already. #startups #founders #entrepreneurship

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🚀 "Stepping into retail? Your product's shelf life is the real MVP!" A game-changing insight from my latest chat with Anthony Standifer, Co-Founder & CMO of mSEED group, on the ExpertCPG Commerce Podcast. In our recent episode, Anthony highlighted the critical importance of product stability, especially as consumer brands transition from kitchen to retail shelves. His advice is invaluable for brands aiming to maintain 'first day freshness' months after hitting the shelves. As someone deeply entrenched in the Amazon space, I see countless brands focus solely on branding without considering the logistics of product longevity. Anthony’s approach, focusing on durable formulations suitable for retail environments, is a lesson in meticulous product development. What challenges have you faced with product stabilization, and how have you navigated these to ensure top-notch product quality on retail shelves? 🎧📺 Listen or Watch the Full Episode here: https://ecpg.us/4diQW3j #CPG #ecommerce #amazon #podcast #productdevelopment #retailstrategy

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1000 carts ready to check out. 1 small bug. How much could that cost your store? Your Shopify store is scaling. More traffic starts to surge. And they head to checkout. It feels like everything’s going right… until your checkout stops working. ・The cart freezes. ・Discount codes fail. ・Payments don’t go through. 70% of shoppers abandon their carts due to a frustrating checkout experience. Why does this happen? → When your store scales, Liquid ( Shopify’s templating language ) can struggle under the weight of weak coding. → Checkout often breaks because they rely on dynamic calculations, such as discounts, taxes, etc. But you can fix it! 1. Audit your Liquid code. 2. Shift calculations to JavaScript. 3. Every second counts. A delay can cost you a sale. 4. Simple Fewer steps mean fewer drop-offs. 5. Clear payment options and security cues build confidence. If your e-commerce store is facing any type of issues you can reach out to us, and we can fix your website for free. Contact Information: Phone: +1-646-927-1970 Email: [email protected] #alysammy #shopify #webdevelopment #webdesigning #checkout #websitebug #checkoutbug #itagency #liquidcode #javascript #websitecheckout

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Shopify's CVR outpaces other ecommerce platforms by up to 36%. I'm predicting that their latest acquisition is going to push this even higher. #Shopify acquired Checkout Blocks - letting brands on Shopify Plus make their checkout pages work harder. These are normally cart-based strategies, but since customers drop off at every step in the purchase flow, it's going to be really interesting to have these tools to use at that last step. Things like: - AI upsell recommendations - Shipping information banners - Brand images and copy - Gift messages - Delivery notes - Email address validation Think this is going to be meaningful? https://lnkd.in/gEJS45XA

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This is huge for not just sustainability but also good business. Returns are real and need the same attention as new arrivals. #returns #circularity #supplychain #reverselogistics #supplychainsustainability

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Canada Post strikes aren't just a local carrier issue. It's much more concerning than that🤔 👉eCommerce and Retail Impact: SMBs that rely on Canada Post for affordable parcel delivery are facing disruptions, especially during the holiday season. This is in no way ideal. 👉Rural places will get the worst hit: Rural and remote areas, where Canada Post is often the only mail service, will feel the greatest impact. 👉Economic Ripple Effects: Canada Post is a major service provider, and a prolonged strike could lead to significant financial losses for businesses. The ripple effects might also hit other sectors relying on timely shipping. 👉Increased Costs for Consumers: The need to switch to other couriers could raise costs for consumers and businesses. For example, courier services like Purolator and UPS charge higher rates than Canada Post's flat rates, which might make everyday transactions more expensive. 💡The way out? Get a backup carrier before it's too late. Q4 is not when most businesses think about switching carriers. However, in this situation, having a contingency plan is a great idea. At ShippingChimp we help ecom businesses ship without surprise fees, complex contracts, or sky-high costs. Let’s talk. #canadapost #canadapoststrikes

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The team and I have some great news for Shopify brands managing wholesale! We just launched the Wholesale Sales Order Beta and are excited to show you how larger merchants manage their wholesale channel seamlessly. Here’s how we’re helping them: - Manage committed vs. uncommitted inventory - Streamline allocation and fulfillment within sales orders - Leverage our proprietary Blocks feature for operational flexibility - View detailed financial summaries for payments & discounts Want to understand how it can work for your brand? Reply to this post. #Wholesale #InventoryManagement #Retail

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What do you get when you cross an Instacart with an Uber? Big trouble for DoorDash. Instacart is now the 2nd biggest online grocery platform. They’re a monster in a rapidly growing market. So why wouldn’t DoorDash want a piece of the action? The tech, infrastructure, and model or virtually identical. DoorDash’s move into grocery has been slow and steady. But it has quietly carved out 11.6% of the grocery delivery market. That on top of its 66% share of the restaurant delivery market. So what’s Instacart’s grocery delivery countermove? A virtual blitzkrieg into DoorDash’s own market. Through a partnership with DoorDash rival Uber eats. Instacart’s customer base, Uber Eat’s infrastructure. Maybe think twice before betting against Instacart. If you haven’t taken Instacart seriously yet…. Now might be a great time to start. ——— 🔹Driving retail velocity in Kroger, Whole Foods, Albertsons, Costco, Walmart, Sprouts, and More 🔹DM me or book an appointment for help! hashtag #ecommerce hashtag #retailmedia hashtag #retailvelocity hashtag #retail hashtag #cpggrowth hashtag #instacart hashtag #cpg hashtag #tradespend

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🎄 Day 6️⃣ of Relo case study December! 🎄 'How BUBS Naturals increased repeat revenue by 40% using Relo ' 🔍 Strategic area - Replenishment ⚙️ Relo integrations - Klaviyo + Shopify ⭐️ Results - 40% increase in repeat revenue, 20X ROI “It was so quick. Relo provided a simple integration and easy setup to allow us to scale retention in EXISTING FLOWS. Best part is that it started working immediately and we saw results from day one!” TJ Ferrara, Co-Founder Check out the full case study here - https://lnkd.in/d9_earVF #Ecommerce #FMCG #CPG

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Posted one week ago about building a consumer software / CPG community here in Atlanta. The list that was 10 names long 7-days ago, is now almost 40 people and growing. I ask that if you know of anyone, please keep referring them. I have spoken to hundreds of consumer founders over the past 3 years, there is one common theme, they have no one to ask questions to and lean on for advice. At Hatched® Dating we do not view other consumer software / CPG companies as competition but friends. We can grow together! #consumersoftware #consumer #consumerproducts

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A >$30B bid for Japan 7-11? Alimentation Couche-Tard is a $55B+ convinience chain based in Quebec (operates ~17k stores around the world including Circle K, On The Run). It made a $30B+ offer for Japan’s 7-Eleven (22k+ locations) — would be largest foreign takeover ever. Food selection in the stores is on par with sit-down restaurants anywhere else in the world. Entire racks of fresh sushi and onigiri (aka “them triangle rice thingies”). The hot food (teriyaki, udon, soup, tempura) is delicious and perfectly packaged. I’ve subsisted entirely on 7-Eleven meals in previous Tokyo trips. No deal is imminent but if Couche-Tard takes over, please do not mess with the existing brand. It’s too damn good. *** PS. Japan 7-11 more a mini-supermarket than convinience store (alsp why it’s so much better vs. non-Japan stores). Speaking of subsisting off a brand, I did the same with Trader Joe’s frozen Indian for a while…wrote about the marketing of that chain here: https://lnkd.in/dwbiTfFW

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