DISTRIBUTOR PROGRAM

Situation:

An energy customer, with numerous national sponsorships, was looking for a new vendor to take on their multiple programs. They needed a more flexible option than their current stocked program. They needed a mix of Just-In-Time decoration, promotional products inventory, management of their marketing materials and overseas sourcing for custom merchandise, all while keeping with their extremely stringent branding standards.

Execution:

We built a central landing page that allowed users to easily navigate to one of three online stores that were created for each channel of business.

• We built an employee store for the sales and marketing teams to purchase branded merchandise for events and customers. Beyond the promotional items and apparel, the store included marketing materials, tradeshow displays, literature, banners, signs and more. Budgets were loaded into sales team members’ accounts and managed by corporate.
• The distributor store was very similar to the employee store, but with a different user group and a few different product options. Distributors were able to access supplies, literature, marketing material, apparel and promotional items. Coop budgets were loaded into their online accounts.
• We created an incentive program for distributors to sell more products. In return, they redeemed points for name-brand retail merchandise such as bicycles, electronics and jewelry. It was similar to a frequent flier program, but it rewarded sales.

Success:

Our client managed the centralized program with ease. Their brand was protected, the product selection grew significantly and inventory liability was greatly reduced. They used many of the different features, including points, coop budgets, warehousing and distribution and JIT decoration, all centrally managed from iCoStore’s Client Portal.