Connect DIGITAL, a new International Housewares Association virtual event focusing on digital and ecommerce strategies for home and housewares suppliers, will be held Sept. 21 & 22.
Connect DIGITAL, exclusively for IHA members, will present four sessions each day from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. CDT, and attendees can register for one day or both days. Topics include insights on working with key online retailers; direct-to-consumer commerce; online marketplace control; digital content and media strategies; micro fulfillment; and global growth opportunities.
Aaron Conant, co-founder and managing director of BWG Connect, will moderate each session. BWG Connect is a networking and knowledge-sharing group used by brands to collectively grow their digital knowledge base and collaborate on partner selection.
Sessions scheduled for Tuesday, Sept. 21 include:
Advanced Amazon Strategy: Advertising, Content and Operations for Vendors and Sellers – Now more than ever, understanding Amazon and how to best fit it into the sales and marketing mix is table stakes. David Grill, director of advertising, and Rob Antolin, director of business management, at Orca Pacific, a Media. Monks Company will share advanced strategies for vendors and sellers looking to take their Amazon business to the next level, including new methods for capturing incremental growth on Amazon, advertising strategy, content strategy, fulfillment strategy, vendor negotiations and more.
The New Age of Retail Media: A Deep Dive on Paid Media from Amazon to Walmart – Adam Epstein, vice president, growth, at Perpetua, will detail the inner workings of retail media for multiple platforms from Amazon to Walmart. He will cover the strengths of the ad channels and when to use each one, as well as strategies and best practices for maximizing ROI. In addition, Epstein will share how a company can determine the right mix of both channels to stand out from its competitors.
MAP Policies and Controlling Your Brand’s Online Marketplace Sales to Drive Growth and Profitability Instore and Online – Brands are grappling with how best to maintain lawful control over their online marketplace sales. As they are quickly realizing, uncontrolled and unauthorized online sales can materially impair growth through lost sales, cause significant brand equity erosion and lead to a poor consumer experience inconsistent with their desired brand image. Daren Garcia, partner in Vorys, will discuss MAP, as well as strategies for maintaining lawful online marketplace sales control that will enable brands to stop unauthorized sales and drive profitable growth on Amazon and other e-commerce sites.
Right Foot Forward: Keys to Ensuring Sustainable DTC E-commerce Success – D2C e-commerce was viewed as a path to growth for many companies post-COVID. However, that road may not be as easy to travel as many brands thought. Ecommerce experts Jordan Brannon, president, Coalition Technologies, and Kelly Ferris, senior director of sales, BigCommerce, will offer key steps to take to ensure that a company’s initial and early forays in D2C e-commerce are successful, scalable and sustainable.
Sessions scheduled for Wednesday, Sept. 22 include:
The New Demands of the Digital Consumer and How to Minimize Spend and Maximize Performance – Brands can no longer afford to cut corners when it comes to their digital content development strategies for any of the channels where their products are sold. The cost and amount of time it takes to develop A+ content has become a significant bottleneck for companies across many different industry verticals. Cynthia Maller, head of CGI at Walmart, Art.com and Hayneedle; Alex de Vigan, CEO, Nfinite; and Adam Colasanto, director of consumer insights, Vizit, will focus on helping brands and retailers bridge the gap between traditional forms of photography and content creation with new methods of visual merchandising that can improve digital imagery and increase conversion rates.
New Era of Fulfillment: Why Drop Shipping and a Digital Age 3PL is Now Table Stakes – Brands that have traditionally sold their products to brick-and-mortar retailers often struggle to effectively manage marketing, merchandising, inventory planning and fulfillment operations of D2C channels. This leads to poor item revenue, unacceptably long lead-times from “purchase to porch” for the consumer and painfully high costs to fulfill (picking, packing, parcel shipping). Corey Apirian, CEO of Davinci Micro Fulfillment, will discuss strategies brands can use to leverage new solutions in the D2C fulfillment space to maximize the revenue of e-commerce marketplaces.
Beyond Amazon: Reviewing the Opportunity of Marketplaces Outside of Amazon and the Tools to Maximize the Potential – The global pandemic has pushed e-commerce to a whole new level that now requires brands to diversify their digital strategies outside of Amazon. Chad Epling, found & CEO, Mamenta, will cover the opportunities that other marketplaces offer, as well as the tools and best practices to ensure brands are maximizing their potential on the platforms domestically and internationally.
DTC Data and Holiday Predictions for the Housewares Industry – Q4 and the holiday season are just around the corner and D2C will be more important than ever. Udayan Bose, founder & CEO of NetElixir, will provide a data-driven discussion around real-time analysis of daily online sales metrics for the housewares category; current trends on shopper behaviors, conversion rates and e-commerce sales; understanding and adapting to the new pandemic personas; and driving factors and best practices for DTC growth.
Connect DIGITAL is free to IHA members. For more information on the agenda or to register, go to TheInspiredHomeShow.com/connect/connect-digital.
