The modern entrepreneur looks very different today than a decade ago. Instead of working in fixed offices, many founders now run their businesses remotely. Sometimes from coffee shops, sometimes halfway across the world. In e-commerce, being able to streamline operations with the right digital tools has become essential to staying competitive and efficient.
Running online stores let you work from anywhere: your home, the beach, or any place with a stable internet connection. But freedom doesn’t guarantee success. Without the right systems in place, it’s easy to get overwhelmed or fall behind.
Fortunately, tools that streamline operations has made it easier than ever to simplify how your business runs. Use tools for automation and support to reduce manual work, reply faster, and make smart decisions from anywhere.
Let’s take a look at these top e-commerce tips in more detail.
1. Accept Multiple Mobile Payment Options
One way to streamline operations is by giving your customers multiple ways to pay for your products.
The e-commerce space works differently from physical retail stores, and in the digital realm, it’s unfortunately quite common for customers to abandon their cart for seemingly insignificant reasons.
One common reason why customers abandon their purchase is that their preferred payment option isn’t readily available. This can remove potential money from your business, resulting in reduced revenue and lost customer lifetime value.
To prevent this from happening, businesses must cater to their customers’ needs and create systems that appeal to them. One such way is by accepting multiple mobile payment options.
Nowadays, there’s a wide variety of payment gateways that users can use to buy online.
Set up your store to accept PayPal, Apple and Google Pay, and credit cards. This reduces friction and encourages more completed purchases.
By paying attention to your payment gateway system and setting up multiple modes of payment, you can create a system that benefits both your business and customers in the long run.
If you’re unsure how to go about setting up a proper payment gateway for your e-commerce business, read more on Westpac AU’s guide on the topic.
2. Automate Order Fulfilment and Inventory Management
One of the most repetitive and time-consuming tasks for eCommerce companies is fulfilling an order; that is, packing, shipping, and tracking it to ensure that the customer receives it.
Each step of the process can take up a lot of time. Fortunately, there are ways to cut down the hours spent on doing each of these steps.
For one, once your business starts to pick up, you can delegate a good chunk of the tasks associated with order fulfillment and shipping to inventory management tools. This frees up your time and allows you to focus on more pressing business matters. Some tools can even print out and generate shipping labels for you automatically, reducing manual effort and time.
Moreover, you can also keep a record of each order using fulfilment platforms online. Some good ones include ShipStation and Fulfil.io, but feel free to research other options to see what works best for your business model.
With online tools, you can track stock and inventory in real time. As a result, you make faster, informed decisions. This makes scaling and systems planning a much easier task, enabling you to operate at a more rapid consistency even if you’re on the move.
3. Outsource Repetitive Tasks to Virtual Assistants
At a crucial stage in your business journey, you’ll face a key decision: keep managing everything yourself or bring in a virtual assistant to help you scale efficiently.
The smarter way to go about things is by tapping into a network of skilled professionals to help you run your business. The good news is that the online world is ripe with capable individuals who can lend a helping hand to propel your business towards success.
Virtual assistants, or VAs for short, are skilled professionals who can perform a wide variety of tasks. They can be found on job sites like Upwork and Freelancer.com.
In particular, these people can take over repetitive and time-consuming administrative duties such as data entry, entertaining customer inquiries, and managing your social media account. Some VAs have specialised skills for eCommerce platforms, allowing you to leverage their skills on day one.
By delegating your operations to these individuals, you can free up hours of your workweek to focus on more important business matters. Your business can also perform much more efficiently with a VA working on the sidelines, keeping the entire operation scalable and responsive even in the face of increased demand.
Moreover, coordinating with these VAs is simple, as you only need an online messaging app like WhatsApp or Slack to reach them. That said, it’s essential that you properly introduce them to your business’s system and structure to ensure that they know exactly what’s expected of them.
4. Use Cloud-Based Collaborative Technology
Another smart way to streamline operations is by using cloud technology that your entire team can access simultaneously.
In the not-so-distant past, it was the norm for employees to work on spreadsheets and documents on their individual PC and pass the output to their colleagues through a USB drive or email.
With cloud-based technology, however, this back-and-forth exchange is virtually eliminated, speeding up the process of getting work done more efficiently by giving everyone immediate access to the document in real-time.
Multiple users can work on task assignments in one platform. This means they can edit things like documents, graphics, and code in real time, improving productivity and getting everyone on the same page more quickly and without much hassle.
Streamlining communications can create a more pleasant environment for the entire workplace. As a mobile entrepreneur, leveraging this technology can help keep your business moving efficiently even if you’re out of the office.
5. Harness the Power of Analytics
Data is a powerful tool that every business should leverage across every department. This is especially true for business owners, who often make major decisions on their business’s direction daily.
The beauty of owning a business in the digital space is the sheer number of data-gathering tools available across multiple platforms to gauge and track user behaviour. To name a few, Google Analytics, Shopify Insights, and Meta Pixel are some effective analytical tools that can provide a glimpse of user behaviour and buying patterns.
Knowing these data points helps remove the guesswork in making business decisions. It provides clarity on who your target market is, how they act when exposed to certain campaigns, and what CTA button most resonates with them.
Data can also be used to decide whether entrepreneurs should opt for plan A or plan B, reducing the need to allocate resources on a failing strategy and instead keeping your company agile and competitive.
6. Schedule Marketing Campaigns Ahead of Time
Scheduling your marketing campaigns in advance is a smart move for any mobile eCommerce business owner.
Content, whether through social media, email, or blog posts, is an essential driver for conversions and purchases online. That said, it can be quite tedious manually putting a post, typing an email, or posting a reel at a specific time each day across multiple marketing media channels.
Good news: marketing tools let you create, schedule, and batch-send content across all your business’s channels for better efficiency. For instance, email marketing channels like Klaviyo and Mailchimp allow businesses to create and blast emails. Moreover, Meta Business Suite can schedule social media posts on Facebook and Instagram.
When done right, scheduling these marketing posts can help maintain brand consistency and expand your customer reach, thus increasing the business’s revenue ceiling. This, in turn, allows your business to grow and flourish with a greater chance of success.
We hope these tips will help you in your entrepreneurship journey. Best of luck in growing your business!
What Is EcomBalance?
EcomBalance is a monthly bookkeeping service specialized for eCommerce companies selling on Amazon, Shopify, eBay, Etsy, WooCommerce, & other eCommerce channels.
We take monthly bookkeeping off your plate and deliver you your financial statements by the 15th or 20th of each month.
You’ll have your Profit and Loss Statement, Balance Sheet, and Cash Flow Statement ready for analysis each month so you and your business partners can make better business decisions.
Interested in learning more? Schedule a call with our CEO, Nathan Hirsch.
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