Guest Post: Three Key Indicators That You Need E-Commerce Integration

Enhance Your E-Commerce Business Through Jitterbit’s Integration and Automation Solutions.

In today’s retail landscape, customer experience is everything. According to PWC, 73% of customers name experience as a top factor in their purchasing decisions, behind price and product quality. Coupled with the forecast that the global e-commerce market will reach $6.3 trillion in 2023, it’s clear that consumers are demanding more seamless, omnichannel buying experiences. Merchants who implement strategies and technologies that facilitate better customer journeys will differentiate themselves as true leaders in the e-commerce landscape.

Businesses have a plethora of information to process and manage, from orders to product inventory to purchasing to support inquiries. However, this data often resides in disconnected systems and must be manually pulled and rekeyed into CRM, ERP, and other back-end systems. Not only is this manual data entry time-consuming, but it’s often error prone, leading to delayed orders, incorrect shipments, and dissatisfied customers.

A seamless customer experience begins with the right tools. Connecting applications and automating workflows across platforms allows for:

• Customers to access products through their channel of choice
• Businesses to eliminate manual processes that take up their employees’ time
• Customer, product, and inventory data to sync across applications for consistent visibility and forecasting
• Feeling like your e-commerce business is running on fumes? Here are three key indicators that it’s time to look for an integration solution.

#1 It’s time-consuming and labor-intensive to process orders.

Business owners are finding it more difficult to keep up with the influx of orders as they scale, and as such, are realizing there’s no way to keep pace using manual processes. Companies of all sizes often still rely on manual processes to handle orders, but this can be costly and ineffective. With automated workflows, businesses can increase the bandwidth of their employees so they can handle important customer inquiries and enhance the customer experience (rather than focusing on repetitive manual tasks).

Automation also increases the turnaround of shipping notifications and product updates so customers stay in the know about their deliveries and products of interest. Instead of dealing with back-order issues, companies with process automation can automate inventory updates across platforms, send tracking info to customers, and allow employees to access real-time order history. In 2023, automation will be a key focus and investment for many businesses, especially those in commerce and retail. In fact, for the third year in a row, 80% of Gartner clients report that they will increase or sustain hyper-automation spending.

#2 It’s difficult to keep inventory records updated.

Without a process in place for updating inventory records in real time, businesses run the risk of selling items that aren’t actually in stock, resulting in lost and frustrated customers. What’s more, a recent Shopify report found that 46% of consumers move to competitors who have the products they want in stock.

Whether businesses are using their own warehouses or 3PLs, it’s imperative for customer retention to keep inventory data consistent and up to date from back-end systems to front-end web stores and marketplaces. Automating the bi-directional flow of inventory between applications ensures that inventory data is consistent and up to date across departments and platforms.

#3 There’s no omnichannel buying experience for customers.

The buying journey is not linear. Customers expect a seamless buying experience whether they’re purchasing from a social media app, an online marketplace, webstore, in-store, etc. Consumers want to buy things when it’s convenient for them, which means that businesses must offer omnichannel options for browsing and buying, accessing product information, and getting support (when needed). With integration technology, businesses can keep their online channels aligned with their brick and mortar stores.

For example, customers who spend more time on social media will want to stay on those channels when they shop. Omnichannel integration means linking the social buying data to back-end systems, ERP, and CRM so marketing teams can be proactive with their social campaigns and anticipate those customers’ buying habits. Currently, 52% of e-commerce sites have omnichannel capabilities.

Ready to Integrate?

As consumer behavior continues to drive the commerce market, businesses must leverage integration technology to stay ahead of their competitors, drive revenue, and increase customer loyalty. However, none of this can happen without having a 360-degree view of data, a strong omnichannel presence, and automated workflows to eliminate manual processes and system disparity.