In today’s competitive e-commerce landscape, customers can access numerous options for the same product online.
This abundance of choices enhances their ability to make informed purchasing decisions and negotiate for the best deals. As a result of this evolving e-commerce paradigm, business owners must adopt forward-thinking strategies and innovate beyond traditional approaches.
Consequently, there is a growing need to infuse more innovation and digital transformation into e-commerce business operations. For business owners navigating this dynamic environment, adhering to the best practices outlined below is essential.
Leverage the power of strategic pricing to increase the returns on your product inventory and maximize the potential of your SKUs. Embrace the opportunity to entice your loyal customers with compelling offers and incentives, affirming your commitment to providing exceptional value to your premium buyers. Seamlessly cultivate customer loyalty, foster enhanced satisfaction, and drive deeper engagement through personalized experiences. Harness the potential of customer referrals to bolster your brand’s presence and attract more foot traffic to your business.
Uncover the keys to unlocking these achievements by establishing a thriving e-commerce enterprise that resonates with a broad audience and fosters sustainable growth.
What are the essential practices to make your e-commerce business thrive?
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Order management
Order management is the first practice you must streamline and sort. List down ways you want to receive orders from your buyers. Now, this could be from an e-commerce website, social websites, or communication channels.
Check which source is cheapest, reliable, traceable, encrypted, and scalable. You can incorporate chatbots and AI features later on your e-commerce websites. This is just one example.
Make more customizations to how you receive orders or make the ones for your suppliers. That brings us to our next point.
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Vendor or supplier management
Your vendor or supplier management must be transparent, streamlined, and effortless. Bring automation and approval-based workflows here. Do not let any other purchase order go to waste.
Follow either the FIFO or LIFO concepts while managing your inventory through your suppliers. Check which supplier is the most cost-effective and optimize cost per unit or order regularly.
- Risk management
Shipping is a very crucial part of your e-commerce business. Whenever your goods are in transit from one location to another, they may be at risk from multiple external factors.
Such factors can include:
- Theft
- Fire
- Rotting of stock
- Contamination
- Misplacing of inventory
- Natural calamity
- Road/flight/railway accidents
Opt for getting cheaper van insurance and other comprehensive coverage for your logistics operations to indemnify yourself and your employees. Go back to the original financial situation when such accidents or mishaps occur. Pay only a small amount for a fixed period. Check the premium amount and the sum assured carefully.
Hire an insurance agent before buying an insurance policy for your goods, van, car, or other resource. Read and compare the quotes of multiple policies beforehand. This helps you in making sound and financially stable decisions.
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Compliance management
Your documents and business paperwork must be on time and remain updated. File declarations and return them to the government or registrar on time. Share important documents with shareholders for necessary approvals at once.
Invest time and resources into a PDF editor that will allow multiple users to review important documents. It makes managing, editing, updating, and auditing legal documents easier for admins and auditors.
Then, you no longer chase each person to vet the document. Moreover, you store these documents on a unified platform.
Make the documents and knowledge accessible to your team anytime, anywhere. It removes the constant need to follow up, especially when deadlines are near, to update the compliance requirements.
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Payment gateways
What is the next step after you want to make an order and complete the business documents management? It’s about allowing payments from both sides of the e-commerce business.
The payments must be secure, flexible, encrypted, and traceable without breaching customer or vendor data.
The delivery of funds must be on the same day. Transactions must have double or triple layers of authentication. Constant notifications must appear on both ends to notify the party of credit or debit.
The gateways must allow cross-border payments when you want to go global with your e-commerce business. Each payment gateway you choose must also provide a self-generated invoice.
This helps in filing for returns later on to access tax benefits.
Incorporate payment gateways into your e-Commerce store. This makes purchases fast and smooth. It also influences the buyer to make a purchase immediately.
- Online branding and marketing
Have you thought about how you want to launch your e-commerce business? That will require you to invest time and energy in branding and marketing it organically. Don’t worry. We are not suggesting going haywire on paid campaigns.
Rather, list your business in famous marketplaces. Try free business listing as much as possible. Gather more reviews on those sites from your regular customers. Offer them discounted coupons in exchange for genuine and honest reviews.
Do a barter trade with influencers to get more traction online and come across as a trustworthy brand.
Create various social media handles, especially where you can find more target buyers. Post there regularly to show your market presence without having to spend a fortune on paid campaigns.
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Delivery services
Cover shipping not only from the vendor’s side. Tie up with retailers and wholesalers. You need to invest in their spaces to decrease the storage cost of your goods.
That way, you can timely manage to deliver goods to the market and raise prices when required. Go for shared warehousing services when it comes to the distribution of goods near the buyer’s locality.
Otherwise, open a drop-shipping business where you do not have to invest in inventory management. The vendors will store the required stock and you bring majorly the orders to them.
However, you must have a system in place where you track the delivery rate, quality of delivery, and delivery TAT. That way, you know if the delivery services are fruitful and effective for your end buyer.
Optimize your shipping and e-commerce operations with professional best practices!
Looking to increase the profit margin of your e-commerce products but unsure where to begin? Check out the above post for comprehensive guidance on optimizing your operations. From order and risk management to delivery services and document management, these best practices can help you streamline your processes and boost profitability.
It’s important to have all these management functions integrated into a single centralized software or platform. Consider investing in an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) or Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system that offers a wide range of features and modules. Before making any purchases, conduct thorough market research to ensure that the tools and resources you select are the best fit for your business. By doing so, you can effectively automate your supply chain, as well as your drop shipping business, on a larger scale.
