Powering scalable onboarding for a new shopping platform

As commerce companies go, Tabby is unique in that it identifies as a flexible payment solution for shoppers, but also has its own online shopping platform. 

Tabby’s financial technology works in conjunction with its platform, which features products from 30,000 retailers across virtually all categories.

When the company first looked into launching a new shopping platform, figuring out how to onboard global sellers efficiently was a major consideration.

Every brand and retailer houses product data in a different system of record, and this information isn’t stored in a consistent format.

To overcome those challenges, Tabby needed a scalable way to import data from multiple sources, standardize product attributes to its preferred specifications, and enrich that data to drive better performance.

Instead of spending time, money, and development resources creating the necessary infrastructure in-house, the company decided to partner with Feedonomics from day one.

“We wanted a [platform] that would help us do all of that without having to build an internal system, because it would take too much time,” said Dina Hedayat, Senior Content Specialist at Tabby. “We wanted to launch our shopping platform as soon as possible, so if we had to wait and invest time in building our own tool, then it would delay this process significantly.”

Since the relationship began in December 2022, Feedonomics has enabled Tabby to onboard sellers faster and take on more brands and retailers than expected, including those with nearly 3 million SKUs.

“Feedonomics has been making things significantly easier for us,” Hedayat said. “It’s quick to onboard certain types of merchants, especially those who have a large number of items. It’s also very sustainable. We only have to work with a merchant once, and with the transformers and all the tools that you have, we don’t have to keep on redoing work. So it’s making life easier, and [helping us complete projects] on time.”

Scalable onboarding with a flexible platform

Feedonomics simplifies the onboarding process for Tabby in several ways.

• Its feed management platform ingests seller data from one or many sources and then consolidates that information into a single feed.
• This feed is optimized according to Tabby’s preferred structure, which includes specific data requirements for size, color, category, and other product attributes, as well as English and Arabic versions of each field.
• Once in the proper format, Feedonomics exports the seller’s catalog to Tabby’s servers so it can be listed.

After working with fulfillment systems for years in the ecommerce space, Hedayat understands how tedious inputting, tracking, and verifying large amounts of data can be without technology built for scale. So when she considers the varying data quality, file types, and file sizes each Tabby seller provides, Hedayat believes the onboarding process “would have been impossible without Feedonomics.”

“I don’t think we would have been able to take the number of merchants we already have right now if it wasn’t for Feedonomics,” she said. “If the tool itself wasn’t easy, there would be loads of people waiting to be listed.”

With Feedonomics powering the operation, Hedayat said most brands and retailers onboard and start selling on Tabby’s shopping platform in just a few days.

Feedonomics’ data management platform automates numerous processes, but Hedayat said “the premium service” she receives from the team has a big impact on the fast turnaround times.

“One of the main things I do love about Feedonomics is the feed support,” she said. “The team is super helpful. And even if the issue that we’re facing is not solvable by Feedonomics—like, it’s a merchant issue—the team always helps us understand what’s going on, and even how the merchant can fix it.

“Every month or so, we face a completely new problem, and we immediately raise a ticket, and the response rate is very, very fast.”

Even though Tabby manages the relationship with each brand and retailer, Hedayat said Feedonomics is always there to consult her on how to rectify different situations, including those that involve a seller’s existing platforms or systems.

“When you get Feedonomics, you’re not just getting a tool,” Hedayat said. “You’re getting a whole team that’s going to help you out, that’s going to make life easier, that’s going to be super helpful, even if it’s, like, regarding an integration with Shopify. If I want to know the steps, and I don’t use Shopify, the team provides me with screenshots and steps on how to do things. So yeah, [the service component makes] Feedonomics more than just a tool.”