The Value of Internet Trading Networks

By Russ Mellott

Internet trading networks streamline processes associate with electronic commerce. Information flows through the secure Internet network, increasing collaborative opportunities and streamlining processes, enabling distributors to increase sales and improve customer service while reducing operating costs.

Advanced trading networks synchronize your inventory so you can communicate using your own item codes, yet still be understood by your trading partners. For example, your customer service representative can, from within their order processing screen, query your trading partners in real time to see the availability of the item you sourcing. They can then send a PO using item codes in your business system, and your vendor will receive it in theirs.

You can create trading relationships to extend your distribution network, eliminate your dead stock, and source another distributor’s slow-moving inventory at discount prices.

Beyond sourcing dead stock, establishing trading relationships with other distributors creates new sales opportunities and gives you access to billions of dollars of virtual inventory. Customer service improves too. In the past, sourcing products from other distributors required several lengthy phone conversations or multiple Web queries. With an Internet trading network, you can source items from multiple partners in less than a minute directly from your order entry session, vastly improving your customer service response time.

In this highly digitized world, participating in an Internet trading network makes smart business sense.

Russ Mellott is vice president of Activant. Find out more about Activant at distribution.activant.com or call 1-800-776-7438.