WM Technology: The Cannabis Business
To move upstream beyond its current Weedmaps marketplace, WM Technology, a seasoned cannabis technology business, is rebranding and extending its SaaS product. This B2B subscription-based suite, formerly known as WM Business, will now be referred to as Weedmaps for Business. It is intended to provide cannabis retailers and brands with an end-to-end solution. Cannabis businesses cannot operate as freely as their counterparts in other sectors due to governmental limitations and stigma. They need specialized technologies to comply with the disjointed legislation in the United States and Canada, from advertisements to payments and delivery. However, things get more complicated with more and more tools that they need. Weedmaps for Business aims to fill that gap. CEO Chris Beals said that the service is more integrated than its forerunner. According to him, this evolution is the result of the Business realizing "a need for a single set of solutions that would help retailers and brands with the lifecycle of how they engage, convert, and retain consumers—as well as how they acquire insights and analytics surrounding that lifecycle."
Connecting your CRM with your orders fulfillment and delivery management system is the biggest hurdle facing the cannabis industry. However, Christopher Fenske, chief strategy officer at California-based dispensary Jaderoom, acknowledged that a lack of integration was a problem for dispensaries. As a result, WM's recent acquisitions have evolved into a component of the suite: Sprout became WM CRM; Enlighten became the advertising-focused WM Adsuite & WM Screens; Cannveya became WM Dispatch; and CannCurrent became WM Connectors, which Beals likened to "Zapier for cannabis."
Problems that WM Technology wants to solve
Overall, WM Technology wants to help businesses and retailers at every point of the consumer funnel. For example, Oregon-based Dutchie recently introduced Dutchie Pay to assist dispensaries in accepting cashless payments. According to Beals, the cannabis industry is one where integrated suites are especially useful. The laws and regulations governing cannabis differ significantly from state to state and, in some instances, city to city because the industry is so intensely regulated. Beals claims that getting in front of actual high-frequency cannabis customers is one of the biggest obstacles facing cannabis brands.
The fact that "almost half of the cannabis consumers don't have a preferred brand" is another problem that WM hopes to help address. As a result, unlike other consumer items, cannabis does not exhibit the same brand ability to produce increasing premiums for brand affinity. However, that will change.
Improved benchmark data and analytics would also aid brands in maximizing their profitability. Weedmaps for Business already has analytics components, but the Business plans to add more to that section of the suite gradually. For example, they intend to begin including data on Share of Voice, suggestions of goods that appear to be attracting more consumer affinities, and information on skewed distributions by geography. They already have a lot of that data; they need to include it as they refine their analytical solutions.
