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Performance · Channel strategy
Marketplaces feel cheap because the traffic is free and the invoice is a commission line. Own stores feel expensive because acquisition is visible. Both intuitions are wrong often enough to be dangerous.
On a marketplace you pay commission, fulfilment fees, storage, higher return rates and increasingly advertising to be visible at all, while owning none of the customer relationship. On your own store you pay for acquisition and technology, and keep the customer, the data and the pricing control.
Which is better depends on your gross margin, your average order value, your category's return rate, your brand's existing demand and how much marketplace advertising you now need to be found. That is a modelling exercise, and it usually produces different answers for different categories in the same business.
The answer is almost never 'only one'. It is a deliberate mix, with each channel doing a specific job.
Channel roles
Problems start when both channels chase the same customers with the same products at the same price.
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Reach customers who will never search for your brand, on products where the fee structure still leaves contribution.
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Full range, bundles, subscriptions, loyalty and the data that makes repeat purchase possible.
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Assortment, bundle and content differences that reduce direct cannibalisation.
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Deliberate movement of marketplace customers to direct purchase where regulation and platform terms allow.
How we run it
Two to three weeks, and it frequently changes the twelve-month plan.
Commission, fulfilment, storage, return rates, RTO, payment fees and advertising cost per channel, actual figures from your accounts, not published rate cards.
Contribution per unit on each channel by category, because a high-margin accessory and a low-margin bulky item behave completely differently.
Using brand search volume, marketplace branded-search share and, where possible, regional or timing tests to see what is genuinely incremental.
Which SKUs belong where, what stays exclusive to direct, and what pricing and presentation rules apply on each channel.
A twelve-month channel mix goal with quarterly checkpoints, so the balance is managed rather than allowed to drift toward whichever channel is easiest.
Why Globosoft
Reasons that hold whichever part of the 360° engagement you start with, and every one of them is something you can check before you commit.
Verified on the Shopify Partner Directory, with more than 100 Shopify ecommerce projects delivered for India, the UAE and beyond. We also build on WooCommerce, Adobe Commerce, OpenCart, headless and fully custom stacks when Shopify is not the right answer.
Consulting, design, engineering, integration and performance marketing report into a single roadmap. No handover gaps between a consultant, a developer and a marketing agency.
The growth engagement is an agreed percentage of the incremental sales we create above a signed baseline, not a recurring retainer that arrives whether you grew or not.
Sixty-plus people in our own offices in Kochi and Dubai, not a subcontracted network. Sixteen years in the industry and more than 400 projects delivered, from first-time startups to international brands, in India, the Gulf, Africa, Europe, North America and Australia.
Globosoft works as a growth partner, not a monthly line item. We agree a baseline, build and market your ecommerce, and take an agreed share of the incremental sales that follow. If your revenue does not move, our fee does not either.
No open-ended monthly fee for the growth engagement. The commercial deal is tied to sales, not to calendar months.
An agreed percentage of the incremental revenue we generate, measured against a baseline we both sign off before work starts.
Everyone in the room is paid by the same number: the revenue and contribution margin your store produces.
Questions
The questions that come up most often in the first conversation.
Dependence is a risk rather than a sin. The platform controls presentation, fees, pricing pressure and can launch competing private-label products. Brands with most revenue on one marketplace are one policy change from a serious problem. The sensible response is deliberate diversification, not abandonment.
Selling on your own store is entirely normal and expected. What matters is honouring platform pricing and promotional terms where they apply, and not using platform channels to solicit customers in ways their terms prohibit. We plan within those rules rather than around them.
Partially and slowly. Packaging inserts, product registration, warranty flows and brand recall all help, and platform terms restrict direct solicitation. Treat it as building recognition so the next purchase starts with your brand name rather than a category search.
There is no universal figure, it depends on your margin, category, brand strength and market. What matters is that the mix is a decision with a target and a quarterly review, rather than the accidental result of whichever channel required least effort.
Next
Keep reading across the 360° engagement.
Performance
Amazon, Noon and Flipkart ads run against contribution margin.
See detail →Service
Brand-owned commerce with subscriptions, loyalty and first-party data.
Explore →Service
Category, pricing, channel and launch planning built on unit economics.
Explore →Per-unit contribution on both channels, a cannibalisation estimate and a category-level recommendation you can defend.
Industry-wise ecommerce experts
Fitment lookup for parts. Live metal rates for jewellery. Slot delivery and substitutions for grocery. Prescriptions for pharmacy. Returns economics for fashion. Every sector we work in has people who have shipped it before.
Free ecommerce consultation
Tell us where you are and we will come back with a written view of the three things worth fixing or building first. No pitch deck, no obligation, and if the honest answer is that you should wait, we will say that instead.
Before you go
Tell us what you sell and which market you are in. We will come back with a straight answer, even if the answer is that you do not need us yet.
Message us on WhatsApp+91 7902 277 990 · India & UAE