ChannelAdvisor buys Atlanta company

Online commerce consultant ChannelAdvisor is on the prowl.

After raising $30 million this year the Morrisville-based company today announced its third acquisition, inking a deal to buy Atlanta-based Marketworks for an undisclosed sum. The purchase widens ChannelAdvisor's reach among smaller sellers in the rapidly evolving e-commerce market, company officials said.

ChannelAdvisor develops software and marketing strategies that help retailers sell goods via Web channels such as search engines, comparison-shopping engines and online clearinghouses such as eBay, Amazon and Overstock. Marketworks does the same thing, but for much smaller sellers with less sophisticated accounting and shipping needs.

"This deal dramatically increases our market share," said ChannelAdvisor CEO Scot Wingo. "It gives us an entry-level product that we haven't had until now. So we have a real cradle-to-grave solution, where as before we only had adolescent and up."

Wingo said the online shopping market is increasingly complex.

Rather than heading straight to store or product-specific Web sites, consumers are turning more often to search engines and multi-brand marketplaces where they can locate, compare and buy from vast selections of goods. That means retailers and manufacturers must to look beyond their own Web sites to generate sales. About 75 percent of online commerce happens via these indirect channels, according to market tracker FBR Research.

Wingo said the evolution of online selling heightens the need for specialized commerce coordinators, which link online sellers with buyers.

"Consumers now start their buying online through search engines like Google and Yahoo, comparison shopping engines and marketplaces like eBay," Wingo said. "That's the trend that is the wind in our sails. It's where our software comes in to help them understand how to get their products into these channels."

With the acquisition, ChannelAdvisor will oversee $2.5 billion in merchandise on an annual basis, up 57 percent from $1.6 billion. The deal expands the company payroll to 340 from 300. Most of the new workers are in Atlanta.

ChannelAdvisor will keep Marketworks' Atlanta office and consolidate the company's two European offices into existing operations in England and Germany.