Popular Dispensary Ecommerce Platforms for Cannabis Retailers
As a cannabis retail business, simplifying operations is perhaps the most important way to help you focus on growing and becoming profitable. With a reliable Dispensary e-Commerce System, you can rest easy and stop worrying about the day-to-day. Here, we discuss what these crucial pieces of tech are, why you need them, and give an overview of some of the most popular dispensary ecommerce platforms.
What is a Dispensary Ecommerce Platform?
Simply put, a dispensary e-Commerce platform helps list your inventory and merchandise on an online store. This online store can be on your website or a public marketplace like Leafly.
Ecommerce platforms provide your customers with the ability to browse and order any product in your online inventory. Once orders are placed, you get notified, and customers can pick them up at your dispensary, or have them delivered.
Amazon is the world’s leading ecommerce platform for all other retailers outside of cannabis. Naturally, your dispensary or cannabis brand can sell and ship anything that is federally legal using the conglomerate Amazon.
This is due to the federal illegality of cannabis, as cannabis businesses are prohibited from shipping via USPS, FedEx, or UPS like traditional retailers. But dedicated cannabis ecommerce systems pick up that slack for your dispensary.
Why Are Dispensary Ecommerce Platforms Important?
Although the online ordering of cannabis products has been legal for some time, this type of dispensary sales saw a massive increase during the COVID-19 year of 2020. After being deemed an essential business, many businesses in the cannabis industry were forced to move their operations online.
More tech-driven solutions have since been embraced in almost all sectors, as this is now the main way to interact with potential customers. And while many other industries have struggled since, legal cannabis is recession-proof and was even deemed an essential business during the pandemic year of 2020.
Dispensary ecommerce platforms shined in 2020 and continue to do so, furthering the importance of this software for cannabis businesses. With Ecommerce Platforms, customers can browse your inventory from anywhere, which can lead to a significant increase in sales while improving their shopping experience,
Additionally, ecommerce platforms can reduce dispensary lines and integrate with your POS system and other business operations. When your lines are reduced and your day-to-day operations are running more smoothly, this can boost your bottom line.
Key Features of Your Dispensary Ecommerce Platform
A good dispensary ecommerce platform will give you invaluable insight into your inventory management and sales. It should provide a seamless online shopping experience for your customers.
New dispensary ecommerce platforms have been helping to address fundamental inefficiencies in inventory management that plagues the cannabis industry. Here are some additional key features of a good dispensary Ecommerce Platform:
- Trackable customer data that provide insights on individual consumers and how to best serve them.
- Customer contact information to grow your digital marketing opportunities.
- Real-time data tells you what products are the most popular (or not).
- Categorize products by category for efficient ordering and an optimal user experience.
Additionally, your dispensary ecommerce platform streamlines your workflow ecosystem and communicates with your POS, as well as your state compliance software.
Examples of Dispensary Ecommerce Platforms
Dispensary ecommerce platforms have become increasingly more crucial for the daily operations of most cannabis retailers. As such, more new players are entering the space.
Leafly and Weedmaps are two of the most popular of these platforms. These two have been the go-to for many in the cannabis ecommerce market for years. However, many other platforms have attractive options to offer.
Platforms like iheartJane and Enlighten garner praise from industry leaders for impressive features like their integration and user functionality. Here are seven examples of these kinds of dispensary ecommerce platforms.
Dutchie
Any list of dispensary ecommerce platforms would be incomplete without a hat-tip to Dutchie. Many cannabis tech experts consider Dutchie as an industry standard for good reason.
More than 2 thousand U.S. dispensaries use the Dutchie online marketplace daily, according to the brand’s website. That translates into about 75,000 orders per day.
Dutchie offers its platform users speedy functionality and some of the most control over their online menus listing in the dispensary ecommerce space. The Dutchie brand also has some of the best customer service reps in the cannabis industry, effectively resolving existing problems and preventing new ones.
I Heart Jane
Over 1,700 dispensaries and brands use I Heart Jane, according to a press release from 2020. This impressive ecommerce dispensary platform helped these cannabis businesses sell over $2 billion in products in 2020.
I Heart Jane has been recently making improvements on their brand portal as well as their digital merchandising models, according to their website. These improvements are aimed at strengthening dispensary relationships with customers and promoting local sales.
Enlighten
The Kentucky-based Enlighten has been getting notoriety thanks to its SMARTHUB platform. The platform can help integrate information across multiple providers. The brand says its SMARTHUB platform also pushes automatic, standardized updates about inventory based on customer touchpoints.
Olla
One of the main selling points of the dispensary ecommerce platform Olla is that you can fully customize your menu directly on your website. You also won’t have to display your menu with Olla’s branding.
Strain
Strain offers centralization of many of your business operations in one simple place. The brand aims to eliminate other software to put your retention tools as well as sales and marketing tools all in the same place.
Strain helps cannabis retailers build mobile apps, all with your dispensary branding. In addition to offering real-time product menus, Strain provides your customers with discounts, their order history, loyalty rewards, and exclusive offers.
Green Marimba
Green Marimba offers a variety of online retailer support services, including ecommerce for dispensaries. They offer gives operators the option to integrate their ecommerce systems with other platforms.
Some of the brand’s integrations aren’t cannabis-related. As such, Green Marimba may be a good choice for firms that own dispensaries and are also involved in other industries. Additionally, this option provides compliance advisory services through a team of cannabis-focused attorneys.
Bottom Line: Dispensary Ecommerce Platforms
Dispensary ecommerce platforms give you an additional revenue stream outside of your physical establishment. Some cannabis retailers believe that if they list their menu online that it could reduce foot traffic to their store.
On the contrary, dispensary ecommerce platforms expand your customers’ options and give them another way to shop. Nearly all retailers who adopt dispensary ecommerce platforms see a boost in their online ordering. And unlike your downtown dispensary, customers can shop your online cannabis retail store at any time, from anywhere – not just when you’re open for business.
How Much Can Clutch Do for You?
If you’re building a cannabis retail business and need an ecommerce dispensary, you may also need a website to host the online retail operation for your customers. If so, Clutch Creative Co. can help.
We assist medical dispensaries and adult-use cannabis retailers from across the country set up their websites for success. We offer turnkey dispensary websites, custom cannabis web design, marketing, and dispensary SEO.
Clutch delivers all of the necessary digital tools to help your dispensary or marijuana brand. Building your website is as important as coming to work on time every morning, and this fact will only continue to become more and more true.
Ready to chat? Get in touch with Clutch today and schedule a consultation. We’d love to hear from you!
