Bol.com | Everything needed to boost your online selling

This article gives you everything you need to succeed with Bol.com. From target markets and features such as price stars, to how you can best incorporate Bol.com into your online marketing strategy and reach your audience.

Bol.com and the price stars hierarchy

Price stars

Bol.com utilizes a price stars scoring system for their ads ranging from 1-5 stars. This number is assigned to your prices via Bol.com and determines your rank compared to other sellers.

This ranking system gives you an overview of the competition and shows exactly how competitive your prices are or if they need to be adjusted to stay attractive and move up the ranks.

Simply put, your item is competitive if you rank 4 or more stars. If you get 5 stars, then your price is the most competitive compared to the market as a whole.

In your sales account, you have an overview of the price valuation of your items and can see what price you can advertise on in order to get a better price valuation. Including each price stars rank and relevancy for your items:

Pro tip: Items with 1-price star are not visible on the marketplace which means your product price deviates too far from the relevant market price.

Winning the Buy Block

Bol.com's yellow Buy Block is the center of attention on every page. 97% of customers end up purchasing their items from the Buy Block and the fact is that retailers who hold this position will earn more than competitors.

So how do you win the Buy Block? In addition to your price and price stars ranking, Bol.com takes multiple factors into consideration such as your delivery times, reviews, customer satisfaction ranking, and other conditions.

Your price and price stars ranking are the quickest factors to optimize and are the ones you have the most control over, especially with a repricer and marketplace integrator.

A Buy Block position is never guaranteed. For popular product categories with multiple sellers, it can be very difficult to attain this position.

And while you may not be guaranteed to win the Buy Block all of the time, you can definitely increase your chances by optimizing your ads.

Keep your price competitive on Bol.com

Our repricer is one of the few on the market that allows targeting for a specific price stars rating. This way, your price will never go higher than the boundary set by the selected price stars.

A further explanation of the feature can be found in our Help Center.

4 advantages of using the Bol.com Repricer in your strategy

1. Competitive prices equal more clicks and conversions
If you advertise at a competitive price, your ad will be viewed and purchased more often. Regardless of your industry, the higher the price stars, the more often your ads convert across all categories.

2. Increased conversion boosts your ad position
Looking long term on Bol.com, increased conversion rates lead to a better position for your ads/items. This means more sales boost your items higher in the search results. This makes your ads more visible so that it ultimately sells even better.

3. A higher ranked item increases your chance of the Buy Block
Coupled with a reliable, fast delivery record and merchant score, a high conversion rate will lead to a higher ranking.

All this determines whether or not you get featured in the Buy Block. And this is where you want to be because 97% of customers end up purchasing their items from the Buy Block. This is making it worth optimizing your items and ads to move higher up the ranks.

4. Higher ranking Bol.com ads = better Google ads for free
The higher your ranking on Bol.com, the more relevant your items will be perceived on Google and promoted via Google Ads at no extra cost.

This is a benefit that certainly pays off, attracting up to 50% more customers coupling Bol.com and Google Ads, according to a whitepaper by Bol.com.

Drive growth by efficiently displaying your items

How often are your articles viewed? How do your delivery times and sale prices compare to the competition? These are important questions that need to be asked and the answers can be found in your sales account or data management solution, helping optimize your offerings to the needs of your audience.

The following tips will help you drive growth even further and jump ahead of the competition.

Advertise volume discounts

If it's not possible to permanently lower a price and stay competitive because of shipping costs, a volume discount may be a solution.

With a volume discount, you incentivize customers to buy more in one order, and can quickly build up larger sales. Ads that offer a volume discount can sell up to 30% more according to Bol.com.

Bulk sales can be relevant for many items but there are legal restrictions depending on which regions you are selling in. Check out Bol.com’s partner platform for all the details.

Engage in promotions

Promotions are a powerful way to increase your visibility and sales via Bol.com with two main avenues to choose from:

1. Participate in promotions as part of larger Bol.com holiday campaigns such as Black Friday or Mother's Day where Bol.com makes a pre-selection of items to advertise based on relevance to the customer.

The advantage of participating this way is that the promotions are very visible to customers across the marketplace and are promoted by Bol.com. You can find more information here.

2. It is also possible to independently create a promotion, whereby you determine the duration and range yourself. These promotions are highlighted using a promotion label and in most cases, Bol.com also uses additional resources to boost your visibility.

Bol.com also incentivizes promotions. Check out their partner platform to see how much commission or discounts you could receive on your promotional offer.

Put your articles in the spotlight

Do you want to stand out with a new item or draw attention to your best sellers? Then, link search terms your target audience uses directly to your items. This will help you rank higher in the search results and stand out from the competition.

Watch this video for more info.

Is Bol.com the right fit for your eCommerce strategy?

Bol.com is an effective and established marketplace for businesses of all sizes.

For online retailers and advertisers big and small, Bol.com can be a lucrative marketplace to add to your marketing mix. And if you advertise and sell a significant amount of products online utilizing a repricer and optimizing with a marketplace integrator like Channable, you can boost your ads across the board.

Channable can help give any online shop a boost in winning the Buy Block and a higher price stars rank. With real-time price adjustments, our all-in-one marketplace integration makes it super simple to set up, optimize and manage sales and ads. This will save you time automating updates for all your items and maximizing profitability.

Would you like to learn more about the benefits of introducing a Bol.com repricer to your business? Contact us today to get started.