Thought Leaders in E-Commerce: Darren Hill, CEO of WebLinc (Part 1)

As you know, I am deeply interested in personalization as it applies to e-commerce & Web 3.0. In this interview, Darren Hill and I discuss the subject at length, especially as it pertains to fashion e-commerce, another area of significant interest for me.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start with introducing our audience to yourself as well as WebLinc. Tell us what you do and what you’re focused on.

Darren Hill: I started WebLinc with my brother in 1994 when I was 18 and a freshman at college. Before we started WebLinc, we owned a small mail-order business, which was a traditional mail-order business for mailing out catalogs. >>>

Thought Leaders in E-Commerce: Eugene Laney, Head of International Trade Affairs at DHL Express (Part 5)

Sramana Mitra: Any other trend that you want to discuss?

Eugene Laney: I just want to point out a study where we looked at the trends in global e-commerce. Some of the more interesting trends pointed to the importance of finding a market. We noticed that a lot of the goods that are sold out of the US go to Germany and UK. We also saw what the demand for products in different countries was like. In places like China, they depend more on the reviews of products whereas in Germany and UK, they just do searches on the product price. I’ll definitely invite you to take a look at the Shop The World study because there are some very interesting trends that you can see within the e-commerce environment. >>>

Thought Leaders in E-Commerce: Eugene Laney, Head of International Trade Affairs at DHL Express (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: Essentially, what you’re saying is, there could be another third-party logistics provider involved that is handling all the fulfillment and inventory. You do the shipping part. At the same time, you still work directly with the website owners and not with the fulfillment players.

Eugene Laney: Depending on the needs of the customer, it can change. Even with large corporations, they may have a variety of providers based on their products.

Sramana Mitra: We’re talking about small merchants.

Eugene Laney: What I’m saying is the model is still the same. It doesn’t really change. You sit and figure out who can give you the best service and also who can meet your current needs. >>>

Thought Leaders in E-Commerce: Eugene Laney, Head of International Trade Affairs at DHL Express (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: What are your observations then? These small one or two-people e-commerce merchants who are sitting on top of third-party logistics providers, are they then working directly with DHL Express or is there another layer of third-party intermediary before you come in to the picture?

Eugene Laney: They’re very dependent on us.

Sramana Mitra: Who’re dependent? Is it the people who own the website or is there a layer between them and you that is a logistics provider layer?

Eugene Laney: In most cases with these small to medium sized businesses, the CEO is also the CFO and also has a variety of hats. A lot of times, we’re on phone calls with the person who started the business.
>>>

Thought Leaders in E-Commerce: Eugene Laney, Head of International Trade Affairs at DHL Express (Part 2)

Eugene Laney: We also have a hybrid model where we have customers working with e-commerce companies using those companies as their domestic mailboxes. You have an individual who might be in the UK and wants to purchase a number of e-commerce goods from a domestic-only retailer who sells through e-commerce. Their goods would then be consolidated in the US held by that e-commerce mailbox. Then that e-commerce company would then use DHL or other logistics providers to send all of that products to him. It’s like a consolidator type of model. Those are the new models that we see emerging now.

>>>

Thought Leaders in E-Commerce: Eugene Laney, Head of International Trade Affairs at DHL Express (Part 1)

E-Commerce is a global phenomenon today, and over the next decade and more, it will become more so. Eugene talks about the trend from the perspective of one of the top logistics vendors.

Sramana Mitra: Welcome to the Thought Leaders in E-Commerce series. Why don’t you introduce yourself to our audience and tell us what you’re working on. We’ll take it from there.

Eugene Laney: I’m the Head of International Trade Affairs for DHL Express here in the US. I have two responsibilities. One is to represent DHL Express here in Washington DC before Congress as well as US embassies. The second part of my role is export promotion where I work with our sales, marketing, and media as well as operations team to develop products and services to help SMBs as well as large corporations to >>>

Thought Leaders in E-Commerce: Suchit Bachalli, CEO of Unilog (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: We’re with you. One thing you’ll find is that our audience is a sophisticated audience. We know the space. I got your point that you are trying to provide something that is more comprehensive to the mid-market that can give a lot of the functionalities that is available in the higher-end of the market at a fraction of the cost. My question is, given that is your positioning, are you telling me that there is no other player in that market? That’s hard to believe.

>>>

Thought Leaders in E-Commerce: Suchit Bachalli, CEO of Unilog (Part 2)

Suchit Bachalli: If you look at Grainger or Staples, they spend hundreds of millions of dollars in building that ecosystem. That ecosystem is built brick by brick, block by block with a wide variety of software products. Now, let’s look at the SMB space, say someone who has $600 million in revenue. They’re a B2B wholesale distribution company and the type of company you’ve never heard of because their idea of marketing is a barbecue Sunday. These are companies that have $600 million in revenue and 40 locations nationwide. They have city counters where you can buy anything from valves to gaskets to electrical wiring. They sell to other businesses.

>>>