Bolt’s $ 75 Million Funding to Help Online Retailers Improve Online Sales, One Click at a Time

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Conclusion: Lock helps online retailers deliver familiar and seamless one-click checkout so they can better compete with Amazon as online shopping reaches unprecedented rates. The company announced new funding of $ 75 million co-led by General Atlantic and WestCap, with support from existing investors at Activant Capital and Tribe Capital. Bolt also recently welcomed Bob Buch as Commercial Director to lead key aspects of the organization.

E-commerce sales are setting new records almost daily this holiday season. It’s no surprise that Adobe found Cyber ​​Monday to be the biggest online shopping day in U.S. history, generating $ 10.8 billion in online sales. In contrast, Sensormatic Solutions found that shoppers’ visits to physical stores on Black Friday fell 52.1% from a year ago.

Bolt helps online retailers compete and earn more sales

Retailers who rely on online sales to generate a higher percentage of their revenue find it difficult to maintain brand control, increase conversion rate, and retain customers. A proven ecommerce strategy to keep these challenges in balance while competing with the retail giants streamlines the payment experience. Customer experience, and more specifically the payment experience, has become a new area where small retailers can earn sales against larger competitors online.

Amazon’s 1-click payment is the gold standard. He is so respected that even B2B online retailers emulate him as closely as possible. Online retailers are turning to a remarkable startup, Bolt, who invented a unique payment experience that rivals Amazon’s 1-Click. What makes Bolt’s innovative approach to payments so unique is that it delivers the simplified shopping experience on Amazon without sacrificing the essential capabilities retailers need for their sites. The following is an example of a Bolt One-Click Payout.

The company has been strongly adopted by mid and large online retailers including Forever 21, Hyperice, Swiss Gear, and Burt’s Bees Baby, among others. With $ 60 million in funding announced by the company today, the company has raised more than $ 215 million to date to develop its product and reach more customers.

Before the news, I sat down (virtually) with Bolt’s new business manager, Bob Buch. He recently joined the Bolt team to lead a wide range of strategic projects focused on growing the business. Here is the abridged transcript of our conversation:

Louis Colomb: Thank you for telling me about your decision to join Bolt as Chief Business Officer. You have a fascinating experience that currently includes the role of lead mentor for StartX, the startup accelerator at Stanford, which sounds fascinating. After holding many C-level positions and advising startups, what do you see in Bolt and their future that made it a company you wanted to join?

Bob Buch: I chose to join Bolt because they are perfectly positioned to bring value to every online ecommerce business. Bolt has proven technology and scale that helps all digital businesses excel in e-commerce, specifically streamlining the payment experience. Bolt capitalizes on the intersection between e-commerce and fintech, where there’s a lot going on right now. This is one of the main things that drew me to this opportunity. The pandemic is the existential event no one could ever have predicted, redefining every aspect of retail, accelerating retailers’ investment in digital channels, and excelling in the checkout experience.

Louis: Bolt’s mission to help retailers reinvent themselves and successfully launch digital channels is especially needed this year. How do you know that an ecommerce strategy delivers a great customer experience?

Bob: Okay, they have to and that’s what is happening to traders and consumers out of necessity today. How consumers react to feedback can tell you a lot about the customer experience. I told you I was working with Zappos. I had this revelation. I met them once and they told me the most interesting thing. We were trying to figure out who their best clients are. When you are marketing you are always more interested in knowing who your best customers are and then we will help you find more.

So they said, “The only indicator more than any other that someone was going to be one of their best customers was someone who had successfully executed a return.” This is the most important point with e-commerce, it is: “Am I going to be able to return it?” “Will I forget to return it?” “Is it going to be painful involving the UPS store and two post offices and duct tape and boxes?” I think Zappos made the comeback so easy. They were one of the innovators of the free return. Once people realized how easy it was, no lost receipts, just being able to print it out and send it back and that it was free, they were like, “Why don’t I always buy from Zappos? And I’m just going to buy three different sizes, try them on and send back the ones that don’t fit. “

Louis: How do you see Bolt being able to capitalize on improving the payment experience?

Bob: That is Bolt’s mission is to help all other retailers compete with Amazon at this level. It starts with the cash register. Let’s face it; there is a very variable degree of fluidity in terms of different payment experiences. Improved one-click checkout between brands and digital retailers, combined with unified e-commerce platforms, will create a network effect between merchants. Each new merchant who signs up to Bolt capitalizes on the accumulated experiences of all the other merchants who are currently on the platform, thus creating an e-commerce experience effect. Payment and shipping information is already there. The merchant has 50 million consumer accounts supported during one-click checkout, all thanks to the experience effect.

Louis: How does Bolt use machine learning to improve the customer experience by reducing fraud?

Bob: When I first spoke with Ryan, one of the things that got me excited about what he was doing was the machine learning aspect of the fraud. I just hadn’t thought of this before, the way you fill out a form, the behavior of your mouse pointer. There are so many signals where you can learn how scammers do it and how normal humans do it and pick up on those signals and, over time, improve your ability to detect fraud. You can track things like mouse pointer movements and how quickly someone fills in a field and whether it has been copied and pasted or if it has been typed in by hand. This is both about making sure you don’t exclude real buyers and calling them in, there is probably nothing more frustrating when you are trying to buy something and your credit card is on you. calls and says to you, “Is this you?” And you’re surprised and say, “What? …” Bolt aims to make buying less difficult for consumers and merchants.

Louis: How do you see e-commerce maturing? In what direction will it mature and speed of change given all that has happened this year? How quickly is that going to change in some areas based on what you see?

Bob: I’ve never seen a velocity rate like this in my career, ever. You read the transactions in space every day and the pace of transactions and innovation happening is breathtaking. I think there is an interesting dynamic playing out. Of course you have this big Goliath figure with Amazon, don’t you? And I think a lot of people were like, “Okay, that’s going to be the death of all the other stores.” I think he’s settling in now, “Okay, that’s going to kill a lot of stores.” Amazon will not be able to compete with brands because people love brands. They are loyal to the brand. Brands do this by making great products. I think these brands will resist selling these products on Amazon. When you look at what works well on Amazon, it’s like sheets. Anything you can reliably ask your Alexa to rearrange and feel like it will work, I think that’s what Amazon will be best at. The other interesting dynamic is on the quayside side. Bolt has customers who use BigCommerce, Magento, and Salesforce Commerce, for example, which further accelerates the experience effect. I am convinced that open ecosystems are the future of e-commerce integration.

Louis: What are your other thoughts on the evolving state of e-commerce and how, from a contextual perspective, do you see it evolving over time?

Bob: On the one hand, independent retailers battling with Amazon are creating an opportunity for tech vendors like Bolt to help them compete and band together. I think that’s where Bolt’s experience effect comes in. Once a merchant joins Bolt, they can verify people’s shipping and payment information faster and with less friction than if the consumer had to enter them every time. Online retailers who introduce new, innovative and fast-selling products to Amazon often find that Amazon begins to emulate them with their products. It’s the same with Facebook. I ran a company that was an integral part of the Facebook advertising ecosystem and where we innovated, and then Facebook said, “We love what you created. Here is a price. Here is a bunch of customers and now we’re just going to build it ourselves. ”It’s the same as the Amazon playbook.

Louis: What are the main goals for 2021?

Bob: Yeah, so I think it’s going to be a pivotal year for us. I think there are two things we are doing. I think number one, I think with the deal with Authentic Brands Group and the launch of Forever 21, I think we have firmly planted a flag in the ground that we can support and improve corporate marketers. It’s a change and something that we want to turn into a trend. I think it’s a big piece. I think another element has been found to also support a mass merchant market and make it easier for merchants to get what they want from the Bolt checkout, we need to unbundle. Therefore, I think we had a lot of different features in the checkout. There’s the fact of having your payment credentials stored, this piece that I talked about and that I’m particularly passionate about. I think unbundling is going to be a key theme for us this year that is going to allow us to serve a lot more traders, both businesses and smaller ones, with a much faster time to market and then we can develop our relationship with those merchants there.

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