Automation is the best friend of any e-commerce brand. Because the nature of your business is in real-time, it would be impossible to handle all the details manually. When looking at all the actions you should automate, consider those that have little to no variability. Automation works better for these kinds of tasks because they don’t require human intervention. Once you have this list, dig deeper to understand which tasks are the most time-consuming.
When you choose to automate, you need to do so based on the proficiency of technology. This typically equates to non-communicative tasks like record keeping and data entry. Whereas, automating things like customer service is less of a fit. Not every business is the same so it’s really worth it to look at unique needs and capabilities. To get you started, here are four areas that make sense to automate.
Cart Abandonment Follow-Up
Cart abandonment is a real challenge, with 78.65% of carts falling into this category. Thus, you are probably dealing with a high percentage of shoppers that never check-out. This is a source of lost revenue but there are still opportunities to get the shopper back. Automating cart abandonment follow-up could help improve your numbers here.
Create a series of emails that remind the shopper of his/her cart in the hopes that this nudge will get them back to your site. These emails can be automated and triggered by the action of abandonment. While not every customer will return, this is an easy way to tap into more revenue.
Inventory Management
How big of a thorn in your side is inventory? No matter the size of your inventory, it’s a complex area to manage. You have to track inventory to be sure that when an order is placed, the item is available. If you don’t, you are sure to anger and lose customers.
You don’t have to go it alone. There are many different software solutions that can automate inventory tracking and management. You can even set alerts to notify you when inventory is low or out of stock. Then you can update your site as needed so that every order can be fulfilled with ease.
Accounting Simplified
Accounting isn’t the fun part of running the business. It’s also not something that can be left unattended. Business owners can get frustrated quickly with the details of accounting. So, offer yourself some help and automate what you can. There are many software platforms that allow you to streamline efforts so that it’s not constantly hanging over your head. There are many programs that sync up to e-commerce stores so that every purchase or expense is noted in your ledger. Automation helps you stay on top of everything so you’re not inundated with invoices and receipts.
Purchase Follow-Up
While many customer service tasks don’t fit well with automation; this one does. It is similar to the cart abandonment email except, in this case, the customer made the purchase. There are several benefits to sending these types of emails:
- Ask the customer if they are happy with their purchase to gauge satisfaction
- Request the customer rate the transaction for use in your review section
- Offer other similar or complementary products in conjunction with what was purchased
- Send them a simple thank you for their purchase
These emails are easy to set up. They offer further engagement with a customer so they remain loyal and come back to buy more.
These four tasks have automation opportunities. Save yourself time and increase revenue with automation. You should also keep in mind other types of automation relating to merchant processing. A primary example of this, would be those pesky chargebacks. It can feel impossible to track, respond and contest disputes, however it’s a necessary part of running a business online.
Pinpoint Payments makes it possible with our chargeback management system that has a number of automated features, reporting and analytics to help you ease the load. Learn more about automation capabilities in payment features today.
