Are you an Australian fashion retailer looking for a boost for your growing business? You may want to check out The Iconic.
For Australian businesses on the up-and-up, you can't beat The Iconic marketplace as a place to sell, reach new customers and grow. With over $1 billion in sales over the last three years, and daily sales numbers continuing to climb, the exposure rivals Amazon.
But while selling on The Iconic is relatively straightforward, shipping is another story.
In this article, we’re going to explain everything you need to know about The Iconic, why you should sell through this marketplace and how to meet shipping and fulfilment demands that come along with selling on the iconic.
Launched in 2011, The Iconic is an online retail marketplace based in Australia. Boasting over 60,000 products, including clothing, accessories footwear, beauty products and more, this marketplace is a stronglocal rival for Amazon. It also attracts over 12 million visitors every month.
Like Amazon, The Iconic is what’s known as an online marketplace – an eCommerce website where hundreds of different third-party sellers sell through one centralised store, which is managed by the marketplace operator.
Selling your products on The Iconic means gaining access to a high-traffic, Australia-based marketplace. While The Iconic does take a small commission on each sale, there’s a lot to gain from the increased exposure.
The Iconic marketplace is great for Australian retailers – but the standard process for fulfilling orders isn’t exactly easy.
Here’s what the usual process looks like:
This is a time-consuming and error-prone process at the best of times – not to mention being simply impossible during the busy holiday eCommerce period.
Any order received by The Iconic needs to be fulfilled that same day. This is a condition of selling on The Iconic, or what’s known as a Service Level Agreement (SLA). It’s also how The Iconic keeps their own customers happy.
If you’re unable to meet these SLAs, then your seller rating will start to decline and your products will stop showing up in searches – but don’t worry, that’s where we come in.
If you’re an approved seller on The Iconic, you can use Starshipit’s automated shipping and fulfilment platform.
Simply plug The Iconic into your eCommerce or inventory management platform of choice (link this to Starshipit) and our technology will do the rest – including integrating with your couriers.
Here’s how selling works on The Iconic with Starshipit:
Automated shipping and fulfilment platforms save you time and money on every order. You can automatically print shipping labels, autocorrect invalid addresses, easily manage returns and keep your customers in the loop with branded tracking and shipping notifications.
Shipping and fulfilment platforms allow you to get back hours every week by automating common shipping tasks. One example of this is Starshipit’s rules engine, which enables you to automate the dispatch process, auto-assign orders to couriers and set delivery options.
Because The Iconic has such tight SLAs around delivery timeframes, you could create rules which assign all orders coming from The Iconic to the couriers you know will be able to meet those timeframes.
Do you sell across multiple sales channels/use an omni-channel sales approach? When you’re selling on your website and a marketplace like The Iconic, it can be difficult to keep track of your shipping. It gets even harder when adding multiple couriers to the mix.
Starshipit solves this by acting as the central hub for your shipping. Starshipit integrates with your marketplaces and eCommerce platforms, as well asyour various couriers. The best part is you can manage it all from one, easy-to-use dashboard.
Shipping overseas is the best way to grow your business. When you use Starshipit to manage your international shipping from The Iconic, you can automate the difficult parts of sending orders to customers in other countries. Starshipit integrates with your couriers and handles the paperwork (including customs documentation).
How you connect your eCommerce platform or inventory management system with The Iconic Marketplace depends on the platform you're using.
For example, Cin7 integrates directly with The Iconic. With Shopify, you'll need to use an API integrator/plugin, such as Adeptia Connect or Omnivore. Luckily, we have shipping experts on hand to help you every step of the way.
Australian Brands Alliance sells orders exclusively through their own website and The Iconic.
Once a customer places an order on The Iconic, the order moves through to Cin7 and then into Starshipit, where smart rules automatically assign a courier. Starshipit then writes back the relevant data to Cin7, and generates the shipping documentation – like picking slips and shipping labels.
This combination of smart automation software allows Australian Brands Alliance to meet The Iconic’s SLAs around delivery timeframes.
If you would like to try Starshipit for yourself, sign up for a free 30-day trial.
Automate your entire shipping process while delivering better experiences for your customers.
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