Actually, No. At first they do seem similar but really apitap is something new and different. A marketplace site like Amazon, or similar ones, portray an overall image like they are the seller throughout the entire shopping and buying process. If you asked the average consumer that shops on Amazon who it was that they bought from recently, most would have no idea. They would simply say they bought it on Amazon. The actual merchant’s name is barely mentioned and lost in the shuffle under the marketplace’s branding and self-promotion. The problem with this is that it costs merchants two of the proven key factors of success, customer loyalty and repeat business. apitap thinks there’s a better way. We looked to the glory days of retail shopping to see what was missing between then and today. Quickly it became obvious … Malls. Some would ask, “Isn’t that the same as a marketplace?”. Not really, in practice. A mall is centered around the businesses in it where online marketplaces are centered around themselves. Many would say that there is no such thing as an online or digital mall, that everything is a marketplace. It’s unfortunately true, and that’s the problem … until now.

Shopping Malls brought many benefits to retail stores that stand-alone locations couldn’t provide. From combined foot traffic and shared promotional events to increased brand awareness and repeat sales, businesses that positioned themselves in a mall were able to, on average, enjoy an increase to sales, traffic, and profits. That’s why so much commercial real estate is devoted to turning an individual location into a “shopping and entertainment destination” with several businesses presented together. Each business inside it has their own identity, but collectively they serve as a better choice for consumers to visit for convenience and selection than a stand-alone location.

We’ve taken what was best about mall, or destination, shopping and brought it to the digital age for merchants to sell at. Just like the neighborhood mall you have nearby, apitap’s goal is to bring thousands of merchants together under one “roof”. Each one has their own storefront and presence inside it that consumers can browse and shop at. With it, merchants can promote and advertise themselves directly to consumers, just like a physical storefront. This way when people want to buy again, or tell their friends, they can say I bought it at “This Store” in apitap. Customers can even follow merchants they like, to be notified immediately when new products, specials, or events become available.

For merchants, working with apitap is like getting a new store location, and operated the same way. It’s just a digital one, and we provide you with the built-in tools to make it succeed. We combine online, in-store, mobile, and social marketing and sales tools together into one Unified environment, because a merchant really needs all of these for their business to be successful today. That’s the main reason why we are not a marketplace, because our goal is our individual merchant’s success instead of our own. We don’t gouge merchants with high commissions and hidden fees. We work with existing service providers, instead of forcing merchants to change to new companies in order to get the most benefits from the marketplace’s system. We also don’t create our own stores that sell goods in direct competition with our merchants.

Our focus, like with many of the things we do, is to bring business back to the merchants and to help them succeed because we know their individual success will carry over to our own. We seek to build lasting and profitable relationships with our merchants, for both of us. That’s the difference with apitap, and why we are something new and not like anyone else.