How Small eCommerce Stores can Declutter Their Operations

Running an eCommerce store becomes easier if you use eCommerce software. An eCommerce software is usually hosted in the cloud and gives business owners anywhere, anytime, access to a full suite of tools for setting up and running an online store.

Operating an eCommerce store is a great way to reach a broad customer base and create sales, whether startups or have a small eCommerce store already. The cloud-based software application helps you open an online shop, manage inventory, process payments, and manage logistics. 

Choosing the right eCommerce software is crucial for any eCommerce store to be successful.

An eCommerce software is the backend of a business’s online store and allows your store to operate. It empowers the owners to create a website for selling products quickly, manage inventory, accept and process payments, and manage fulfillment. 

The software is often cloud-based and supports third-party apps to integrate accounting, customer management, and inventory software into the solution. 

The idea behind an eCommerce solution is to make it easy to sell online, irrespective of the number of products you have.

Online business works pretty much the same way an offline/ retail store works. But, on a broader scale, you can break it down into three main components or work processes:

Here’s an example of how most of the computerized eCommerce platforms possibly work. Though, not all eCommerce systems work the same way.

Receiving Orders

The customer places an order through an eCommerce platform (website or an online portal such as Amazon, Etsy, etc.), and the order is automatically recorded in the order management system. Then, the seller would take note of it. 

Processing Order Information

It’s a complete workflow from order placement to delivery. The steps involve picking, sorting, tracking, and shipping. 

Order processing can be fulfilled in three significant ways. It includes – Warehouse fulfillment, dropshipping, and third-party fulfillment. You can choose from the following depending on your business size and need.

Shipping

Here, the delivery process is carried out. All the logistics play an essential role in this step for ensuring timely delivery to the customer. It’s usually done after packing. But, before you do the shipping, you must figure out the things like shipping carriers, shipping cost calculator, shipping labels & sizes, etc.  

Read more: What is Order Management?

eCommerce software is specially designed to handle all aspects of running an online store from one dashboard. It has evolved over the years, offering business owners many useful features. Let’s have a look at five of them.

Manage Products

A significant benefit of using eCommerce software is the ease at which you can add and remove products from the online store. The eCommerce software is specifically designed to manage SKUs – including colors, sizes, and quantities – automatically updating available quantities as orders come in and products are shipped out. 

Also, there is the ability to get an in-depth view of how products are selling and what an inventory looks like for the year or a moment in time.

Built-in Order Management

The quickest way to lose customers is by taking too long to get the product into their hands. Hence, efficient order processing and shipping are essential. eCommerce software manages and tracks orders from their placement to when they land on the customer’s front door.

Handles the Details for you

Calculating taxes, printing a shipping label, or tracking an order, eCommerce software is always up to the task. The software is developed to handle all aspects of running an online store, including notifying customers about the order’s status.  

Speeds up Checkout

Speed is essential while selling products online. If a customer goes through a slow and clunky checkout process, he is more likely to abandon the sale. Most cloud-based eCommerce software has streamlined checkout forms making it easy for customers to complete their purchases.

Built-in Marketing and SEO Tools

Many eCommerce software apps were developed with search engine optimization and social media in mind. Developers know that the higher a business shows up in search, the better its sales will be. 

Many eCommerce software has built-in SEO optimization and marketing tools to help small business owners. It increases the chances of your product to show up higher in search.

Read more: Top Benefits of eCommerce Automation

The best eCommerce software depends on your individual choice, business goals, and needs. Let’s have a look at some of the eCommerce softwares for better understanding:

Orderhive

Orderhive is one of the top eCommerce softwares with a unique feature of automation helping diverse eCommerce companies to manage their daily routine tasks easily. Just toggle it on, and you can automate anything. 

You can add triggers and design based on your conditions to automate Orderhive, and it would manage everything on your behalf. Orderhive is an all-in-one solution that takes care of the entire eCommerce business in the best way possible, right from getting the order to delivery with your choice of carrier.

Shopify

Shopify is the one of the best eCommerce software for many online sellers. Its robust platform provides a comprehensive set of tools for multi-channel selling. You can sell directly through your website, on social media, in person, via third-party marketplaces, or from anywhere you can think of.

Also, you do not need a greater technical expertise or money to launch and scale your business using Shopify.

Wix

Wix is easy to use with its drag-and-drop functionality. It’s a website builder with added eCommerce features, so you need some extra tweaks and customizations to sell products online. Wix is free for basic sites, but you need a paid subscription to take advantage of its eCommerce tools. 

BigCommerce 

BigCommerce mainly targets enterprise-level tech companies. The platform is robust and comprehensive, making it powerful enough to handle enterprise needs, but too powerful for anything smaller. Also, it is rigid when it comes to customization.

BigCommerce supports cross-border sales, social selling, SEO, and third-party marketplaces. 

Magento

Magento is a highly customizable eCommerce software used for larger, established businesses to build technical resources and maintain an online store. You also need to find a third-party hosting provider that adds to both the software’s complexity and flexibility.

Magento is not recommended if you want to sell across multiple channels. It requires a lot of leg work to integrate various selling channels and international payments.

WooCommerce

WooCommerce is the eCommerce add-on of the popular blogging platform and content management system called WordPress. Its eCommerce features aren’t tightly integrated and require the use of third-party apps and plugins. 

Your store would usually become a hodge-podge of disparate systems, and if anything breaks, you are in for a complicated fix. 

Read more: Top 10 eCommerce Software – Detailed List

Small businesses have many options while talking about electronic commerce. But, if you want to have more control over your eCommerce business, then having an eCommerce is the way to go. For example, signing up with marketplaces that let you list your products in a hosted storefront, like Amazon, eBay, and Etsy.

Investing in eCommerce Software is worth your money if you want your website, want to have control over your online store, and want a simple, easy-to-use solution. Plus, it’s more fruitful if you want help in marketing, keep all the profits, and simplify your operations.

That’s how small eCommerce stores can declutter their operations and flourish.