Nationwide Marketing Group’s eXchange platform recently hit a major milestone in its relatively brief history. In the past few weeks, the platform crossed the 2,000-order mark as adoption of eXchange continues to grow exponentially throughout the membership.

First launched in 2015, the Nationwide eXchange platform has evolved over the past seven-plus years into an elite ordering system that simplifies and streamlines the way the group’s independent retailers can purchase product. Leveraging over a dozen different approved distribution relationships and myriad vendor partner programs, the platform provides NMG Members one-click access to over 33,000 SKUs, with more being added regularly.

“Our goal with eXchange has always been to give our Members the ability to save time and money when they’re looking for particular products,” Randy Derr, director of distribution and eXchange, said during a recent Independent Thinking Podcast interview. “Everything we’ve done from making certain updates to the platform, to growing the pool of product offerings – it’s all about serving our Members and providing the best possible ordering experience for them.”

In its first year, Members placed 90 orders through the system. It took nearly seven years for the platform to hit 1,000 orders. And to date in 2023, more than 660 orders have been placed – with a few months still remaining. All that is to say, adoption and use of the platform has increased tremendously over the past 18 to 24 months.

It’s not just Member adoption that’s on the rise, though. The number of vendors and the amount of offers available on eXchange has also increased drastically in the past year.

“We’ve grown from about 6,000 offerings about a year ago to more than 36,000 today,” said Derr. “And that list will just continue to grow and grow and grow based on what we’re ingesting from our vendor partners that we’re integrated with.”

Derr credited the recent surge in use to, of course, the increase in offers and expanding into product verticals outside of consumer electronics and appliances. But he says it also has to do with a number of recent upgrades that have been made to the platform that were born out of direct feedback the team had received from users. In particular, the eXchange shopping experience has been revamped to require fewer clicks to search for product and ultimately place orders – and the team’s data shows those changes have, in fact, paid off.

“I look at the metrics on a regular basis,” explained Derr. “And user adoption has grown exponentially. The number of sessions has grown exponentially. The number of orders that are being placed through the website have grown exponentially, but the amount of time that a session lasts has dropped dramatically.”

More orders. Less time.

And Derr also noted that the eXchange team will continue looking for ways to improve the ordering process and make the website even more user friendly.

As for that 2,000th order? The honor there goes to the team at Jetson TV & Appliance in Southeast Florida.

Want to learn more about the Nationwide eXchange platform? Visit www.nationwideexchange.com (login required, use your MemberNet credentials).