GoTradeLive Establishes North American Presence

Make no mistake—gotradelive doesn't want to get involved in your transaction.

Instead, it merely wishes "to be the connecting point," explains Keith Collins, chief marketing officer for the on-demand trading platform with the social feel of Facebook and the auction-like atmosphere of eBay. The UK-based company this week announced its push into North America with the opening of a Palo Alto, Calif., office, and the general availability of its U.S. service.

The goal of gotradelive is to give SMBs a competitive advantage when they sell, source, and promote products by letting them create private customer and supplier networks in the cloud through fully customizable tools designed to scale.

"When you're trying to sell something, you go through a qualification process, and every time that happens, seventy-five percent or more of the time, there is no urgency and no set timeline," Collins notes. "It can be extremely frustrating for the sales rep."

This is where the gotradelive platform steps in, intended for any company that "struggles with the problem of moving excess product" such as wine or agricultural suppliers. Users can set up events and bids and manage what products are sold, who they're sold to, and monitor activity and messaging right from the platform.

p>Some of the features included in gotradelive include:

• Social tools, allowing users to upload sales and marketing content, promote deals and buyers, and keep in touch with extended customer networks;
• Downward bidding and procurement management tools, which allow businesses to communicate with multiple suppliers;
• Customer and supplier network creation tools, allowing users to securely download contact database and add new contacts; and
• Currency translation, which allows users to bid, buy and sell internationally.

UK telecom company Voice Mobile, an early adopter of gotradelive, first used the platform in October 2011, when it recorded 24 live trading sessions within a 10-week span. About 1,500 trade partners were invited to each event, and, on average, 150 people participated in each deal.

Voice Mobile had been selling mobile phones to businesses on a contract basis, and, at the conclusion of each trade or deal, there were myriad handsets left over. It became a business challenge to move the excess product, and "the margin made on reselling the handsets was tiny," Collins explains. With gotradlive, Voice Mobile was able to grow a wholesale side of the business, and streamline its hunt for viable dealers in the process.

The gotradelive Freemium Business Model allows any company to reach and conduct business with other gotradelive companies. The premium version is $15 per month and allows a company to customize and brand its Web pages and communications. The company went live in Australia in February and has plans to enter China this summer.

---

Related Articles

Freemium Customer Care

Emphasizing personal service is key to success.

Tablet-Based Sales Give Wholesale Reps a Competitive Edge

An investment in a mobile sales force is an investment in your customer base.