Statistics released by IBM in 2021 revealed that most eCommerce businesses across the world had implemented business process automation in response to the challenges posed by the COVID 19 pandemic. The statistics further revealed that 19% of the remaining businesses planned to implement BPA within 12 months.
So, what makes BPA so special for eCommerce businesses?
Business process automation allows eCommerce businesses to use technology to do repetitive tasks. Besides, BPA enables eCommerce businesses to handle complex cases, like an automated incident response. Because of this, it has become much easier to run eCommerce businesses. Different automation tools have streamlined other eCommerce businesses processes. From onboarding to sales, accounting, finance, and shipping, these processes have become a breeze—thanks to BPA. Besides, we cannot forget to mention the impact business process automation has had on customer experience.
Now, there are different ways to automate eCommerce businesses. Let’s look at each of them in detail.
Automate inventory management
Automating inventory management gives eCommerce businesses much-needed flexibility. For instance, your business will have several products with different stock levels at any time. By using automation technology, you can ensure that the back-end of your business is always up to date with what’s happening at the front end. This way, whenever somebody places an order on your site, it automatically reorders from distributors or suppliers, ensuring no out-of-stock situations.
Automate accounting and invoicing
Another great benefit of BPA for eCommerce businesses is faster payments and more accurate financials (especially important if you run a marketplace). Besides these two benefits, automation also helps improve cash flow by letting you know how much money you have as soon as a transaction is complete. This way, you can plan and know exactly when to order from vendors or distributors. In addition, automation also ensures that there are no billing mistakes at any given time.
Automate advertising and marketing
In the past, eCommerce businesses used traditional marketing techniques to attract customers online, including social media campaigns on Facebook and print ads in local newspapers or TV channels. However, more customers started turning to Google for answers to their questions about products they were interested in buying—which meant business owners had to start spending more money on SEO so that they could rank higher organically.
Nowadays, BPA for eCommerce businesses allows companies to reach their target audience more effectively by suggesting the best keywords for SEO and social media campaigns. This, in turn, helps eCommerce businesses increase traffic to their websites without spending much money on advertising.
Automate customer experience management
Customer experience management is one of the most important aspects of any successful eCommerce business. After all, no matter how great your products are, if you manage to frustrate your customers during the checkout process or never get back to them when they need help with their orders—you can kiss your chances of making profits goodbye.
The experts from Tricension, business process automation services provider say that BPA for eCommerce businesses has allowed companies to stay ahead of these issues by offering customer service tickets via chatbots anytime a customer needs help—and that too 24/7/365. Moreover, automation technology has also improved the SEO of companies by automating content marketing and social media management—so that eCommerce businesses can focus on different aspects of their business simultaneously.
Automate abandoned carts
Almost every eCommerce business has had to deal with abandoned carts at some point or the other. Before, this was quite frustrating for companies because they never got paid for services rendered. However, with BPA for eCommerce businesses, this problem is a thing of the past! Nowadays, when someone abandons their cart on your website—a notification pops up on your phone (or email) asking you whether you’d like to politely remind them about their abandoned cart and give them another chance to complete the checkout.
Automate reviews
With BPA for eCommerce businesses, it’s easy to automate product reviews. This way, companies can make sure that every customer is happy with their purchase and motivate them to leave positive feedback after they receive their orders.
Automate returns and exchanges
It has almost become a norm these days—for customers to find something they like online and then return or exchange it in the store because it didn’t fit properly or the color was different from what they expected (most retailers don’t offer this service). However, BPA for eCommerce businesses makes it possible for companies to avoid such issues altogether by sending customers accurate orders right off the bat!
Automate shipping and logistics
Another area where automation has made life easier for eCommerce businesses is with regard to shipping and logistics. Whether it’s making sure that customers get their orders on time or handling all returns and exchanges—in every case, automation ensures that companies streamline the process to make things as smooth as possible for all parties involved.
Bottom Line
In short, BPA for eCommerce businesses is a blessing in disguise! It not only saves time and money but allows these organizations to stay ahead of the competition by providing great customer experiences. So all you eCommerce business owners out there: get ready to reap the benefits of automation technology today. This is because such technologies enable companies to save money (by cutting costs), focus on different aspects of their a business simultaneously (rather than working exclusively with one thing at a time), and provide exceptional customer service (without having to hire extra staff).
