Hundreds of merchants said last week that they've been approved to use Walmart Fulfillment Services, which provides Walmart Marketplace sellers with warehousing and order fulfillment. The marketplace now has just over 82,000 sellers, up from 39,000 a year ago.

Google has struggled to beat Amazon at its own game, and now the search giant is marketing itself as the anti-Amazon to small merchants looking to build an online presence. Google has made changes including eliminating fees for merchants who want to list products in their search results, but its e-commerce sales are still small relative to the $295 billion generated by Amazon's marketplace last year, according to Marketplace Pulse.

Boston Dynamics has created its first single-task robot, Stretch, to move warehouse boxes onto and off of trucks and pallets. Stretch is billed as moving easily in small spaces and can carry up to 800 cases per hour.

Business-to-business buyers say their favorite channel is email, followed by telephone and face-to-face, according to a report by Merkle's B2B International. In addition, baby boomers, or those ages 58 to 75, spend the least time in the research phase of the buying journey at 8 weeks, while millennials spend the most at 13 weeks.

Distributors can use audience data to target buyers based on their stage in the buying cycle, job title and personal and business needs, writes Ken Stout of Data Axle. Organic outreach, paid programs, native advertising and branded content are all effective ways to reach buyers with personalized marketing, Stout writes.

Good feedback from a variety of sources is crucial if you're seeking to develop better behaviors and habits. If your job doesn't include a feedback loop, hiring a coach or other professional can help.

In this free NAW webinar on April 6, at 2 p.m. Eastern, Ian Heller and Jonathan Bein of Distribution Strategy Group and Alex Moazed of Applico will bring you the latest thinking on marketplaces. They'll evaluate the marketplace strategic options available to distributors, such as becoming a third-party seller on a merchant-owned marketplace, becoming a third-party seller on a marketplace not owned by a merchant, building your own marketplace, the imperative for an industry-owned marketplace, and opting out of marketplaces. Register now! Sponsored by Oracle Netsuite and Zoro.

During this 90-minute open discussion, you'll exchange ideas with a trusted network of C-suite peers in distribution. Companies belonging to this community are from firms between $100 million and up to $1 billion in annual sales. There is no formal agenda or speakers -- just you and more than a dozen of your friends in distribution discussing today's pressing issues. Last year, participants shared how they were protecting their employees during the pandemic and more. Don't miss this opportunity. Register today.

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