Ecommerce Issues

Ecommerce is no longer limited to choices of a shopping cart or a good-looking product. Ecommerce has evolved into Unified Commerce, and as new channels emerge and converge, your retail or B2B operation must continue to evolve along with this paradigm shift.

Even if you’re strictly Ecommerce today, you may have to ponder various issues that may emerge, specifically because you’re competing in a unified commerce ecommerce environment.

At GoECart, we are serious about solving problems for our clients. Below is a list of the top issues we solve to help our clients succeed in the highly competitive world of multi-channel commerce. Click on the links below to see how GoECart can help you address these issues.

Problem #1: My Current Ecommerce Solution is Not (Well) Integrated

Ecommerce today is like a symphony. It requires a carefully orchestrated collection of multiple components that all “play in tune” together. Instruments in this virtual symphony include Shopping Cart Technology, Order Management, Inventory and Warehouse Management, CRM, Shipping / Manifesting, Marketing, Merchandising, Reporting / Analytics, and others.

Unfortunately, the vast majority of ecommerce systems on the market today take more of a solo approach-they focus on Ecommerce Technology but then require web retailers to buy and integrate other components as add-on systems separately. Disadvantages of this multi-system approach to cross-channel commerce include:

• Expensive (initial cost of each system, PLUS subscription/ maintenance/upgrade fees)
• Difficult / expensive to integrate together
• Require extensive IT staff to support and maintain
• Insecure- migrating of data from system to system increases potential for errors and exposes considerable security risks
• Do not provide on-demand anytime anywhere access
• Do not provide 360 visibility into key business performance metrics

GoECart solves all these problems for merchants by providing an all-in-one, fully integrated ecommerce suite that empowers merchants to manage their entire business. GoECart includes all of the systems mentioned above (ecommerce platform, multi-channel order management, inventory and warehouse management, and CRM) and utilizes a single data source. This saves our clients thousands of dollars a year in licensing fees and integration costs associated with multiple systems, and eliminates the manual processes and considerable risks associated with migrating data manually.

Problem #2: The Features on My Ecommerce Store Front Are Lagging Behind

With the ever-evolving nature of the web and ecommerce, merchants face a constant struggle to keep up with the top online retailers who have the resources to innovate quickly and offer the latest technology bells and whistles to their customers.

At the same time, online shoppers have come to expect the sophisticated features they are already using on the larger sites like Amazon.com®, eBay and Walmart.com®.

These features include personalization, social media integration, intelligent site search and product recommendations, guided navigation, dynamic product customization, mobile device support, and others. These features are no longer “nice-to-haves” but are a necessity, and not offering them is sure to cause the merchant to lose business. GoECart provides the same powerful tools and rich features used by the Top 500 Internet retailers.

An example of a client leveraging some of GoECart’s advanced interactive product customization functionality is RollerWareHouse.com. RolleWareHouse partnered with GoECart’s professional services team to build a “Custom Skate Builder” tool that lets its customer interactively configure their own custom-made skates on the fly. Skaters can choose from millions of combinations to build skates to their exact specifications. The functionality is tightly integrated with the RolleWareHouse product catalog and real-time inventory. In fact, RollerWarehouse is able to give their customers guidance on the precise re-stocking date for the items that are current out of stock because they place all their vendor purchase orders via GoECart system as well. While most competing solutions are difficult to customize and/or prohibit changes to source code, GoECart 360 provides the ultimate in technical flexibility.

Moreover, GoECart’s commitment to rapid and continuous innovation ensures that our clients always remain at the forefront of ecommerce. Best of all, new features are delivered to the merchant automatically and seamlessly as they are available, so the merchant doesn’t need to wait for months to schedule software upgrades typical of other ecommerce solutions.

Problem #3: We Have Too Many Systems and Processes to Manage, Which is Hurting Our Growth, Margins and Productivity

With the competition to attract online shoppers more intense than ever, merchants have no choice but to offer products at competitive prices to win customer loyalty. This is while the costs to manage and maintain back office operations continue to rise. This leads to much lower profit and underscores the need for merchants to keep operations as nimble as possible.

At the same time, the need to provide exemplary customer service is still paramount. A recent study from Harris Interactive found that 86% of customers will stop doing business with an organization after a single bad experience. This underscores the need for today’s online retailers to ensure that the entire shopping experience goes smoothly.

Unfortunately, the reality for many merchants is as follows:

• Getting the online storefront and other sales channels to sync up with back office operations is a painful experience.
• Inventory /fulfillment systems are often completely separate from customer facing ecommerce and order entry systems, requiring manual exporting and inputting of data-and often keying in data manually!
• Customer inquiries from multiple channels and customer service operations are often dismal, and most “call centers” do not have access to real time data about customers or order status
• Shipping processes typically require using standalone systems, and managing returns is nothing less than a nightmare.
• Customers have shorter attention spans and less patience when it comes to challenges with shopping online. Even the smallest delay or problem during the shopping experience is sure to abandon their shopping cart and click over to a competitor’s site.

GoECart provides a single reliable system that helps merchants drive both sales and lower operational costs. In short, GoECart dramatically reduces total cost of ownership (TCO) for retail operations. The headaches associated with integrating separate systems are virtually eliminated. Data flows from customer to order to inventory to fulfillment automatically and seamlessly. Shipping and manifesting are also fully integrated. And real time access to the latest customer, order, and shipping information is always at the merchants’ fingertips on-demand, enterprise-wide from any internet connected device.

Problem #4: My Current Solution is Not Truly Multi-Channel

Most ecommerce systems and “shopping cart” packages provide technology that allows the merchant to sell to their customers via their own website using a traditional web browser. However, this fails to take into consideration that:

• Retailers sell through many other channels (brick and mortar stores, call centers, mail order catalogs, online marketplaces, multiple websites, etc.)
• Today’s always-connected and empowered consumers want to buy online using their preferred devices (PC, Mac, tablet, smartphone, etc.) and via a variety of browsers (IE, Firefox, Safari, Chrome, Blackberry)
• There is a significant challenge associated with getting master data to synch up with the other systems related to these customer touch points.
• Accurately syndicating products and inventory simultaneously across marketplaces like Amazon, eBay, Buy.com, etc. and efficiently processing orders and servicing customers from these channels remains a key challenge for multi-channel merchants.

GoECart enables true, multi-channel ecommerce (aka cross-channel, all-channel, omni-channel commerce). Merchants can sell not just via their web site but also through traditional channels (brick and mortar stores, call centers, mail order catalogs, pop-up stores, etc.) using a single unified solution. In addition, merchants can seamlessly post items from their online catalog to the leading online marketplaces (e.g., Amazon.com, Buy.com and eBay) and comparison shopping engines (e.g., Google Shopping, Shopping.com and Nextag®) to maximize exposure. Moreover, customers can purchase online using internet-connected devices they choose.

For example, GoECart client GameQuestDirect.com uses GoECart to syndicate its 10,000+-SKU product catalog across 15 online marketplaces across US, Canada and Europe.

Problem #5: My Current Systems Feel Old School, and They Are Difficult to Use

Sadly, with a focus on fixing software “bugs” and in the rush to get the new features out to merchants as quickly as possible, many software vendors make the usability of most ecommerce applications a low priority. As a result, most ecommerce and order/inventory management software is cumbersome, unintuitive, and difficult to use requiring merchants and their employees to undergo significant training costs and time.

GoECart recognized early on that the usability of the software and its graphical user interface would be key to our clients’ satisfaction and our success. Therefore, we have made a significant investment on making sure that the interface is both easy to learn and easy to use. At GoECart, we believe that a great user experience is the difference between an ordinary application and a revolutionary one. With every feature and component, we go to great lengths to ensure an enjoyable and productive experience both on storefront and on the back end. Highlights of the GoECart solution’s revolutionary usability include:

• Rich interactivity of a desktop application, but in any web browser on any operating system
• Intuitive information architecture making everything easy to find
• Addictively easy-to-use and clean meaningful interface
• GoECart Smart Technology, which remembers merchant’s preferences and choices all along the way
• Fast performance to get the job done quickly
• Lower training costs and faster time to productivity

GoECart 360’s “revolutionary usability” makes it the industry’s easiest to use ecommerce software. Many of our merchants have even said that the GoECart solution is actually “fun” to use. We take that as an ultimate compliment.

Problem #6: I Am Paying Too Much for Multiple Sub-Par and Disjointed Systems

True, there are many inexpensive, low-end solutions on the market that cater to merchants who seek a quick fix to get an ecommerce shopping cart/online store embedded into their website. While these tools maybe good at helping merchants get started with ecommerce and gain early traction, they are typically inadequate to scale the business. This is because they were never designed to deal with increased complexity that follows higher volume and competition.

Further, it’s not uncommon to see that many multi-channel retailers are still using out of date tools that are literally bursting at the seams. GoECart not only gives merchants the full suite of modern tools required to sell effectively across all customer touch points today, it also provides exemplary customer support and full range of value added services to help ensure their success. Even if the merchants had access to the so called “best-of-breed” technologies, they rarely work well together and merchants are never able to truly leverage their full potential.

GoECart on the other hand includes the complete toolbox required for merchants to succeed in the same integrated suite, so merchants can run their entire business using a single application. This makes GoECart an unbeatable value for a merchant’s ecommerce investment.

GoECart client GameQuestDirect.com consolidated its operations from three outdated systems (AspDotNetStorefront®, Dydacomp® MOM, and FedEx® Ship Manager) by upgrading its ecommerce operation to GoECart. BeyondHealth.com moved to GoECart from NetSuite. While, EuroParts upgraded from Network Solutions and StoneEdge Monsoon Commerce. And, the list goes on.

Problem #7: My Systems Are Not Available “On-Demand” and I’m Still Using Legacy On-Premise Software

While the rest of the world is moving to the cloud, many merchants are still using multiple disjointed in-house applications that require an expensive IT footprint and staff for daily/weekly management and maintenance. Worse, some of these systems neither web based nor “on-demand.” This invariably leads to:

• Inability to securely access the site’s administration functions remotely
• Inability to handle spikes in seasonal web traffic and transactions
• Slower and error prone web pages especially during peak times
• Customers abandoning purchases due to frustration or lack of trust
• Lack of access to timely information and key performance indicators (KPIs) required to make critical business decisions
• Lack of availability of IT staff to rapidly respond to issues with the site

Since GoECart is a highly scalable, on-demand software as a service (SaaS) solution, it is available anytime anywhere. Benefits of the SaaS delivery model include:

• Saves retailers money associated with IT staff and data center challenges via fully outsourced solution.
• Saves time by eliminating many of the typical maintenance tasks associated with licensed software.
• Enables shared administration and collaboration from any place in the world.
• Provides accelerated access to the latest innovations via frequent and seamless software upgrades for life

In addition, GoECart’s on-demand technology architecture provides the ability to scale up or down on demand in order to handle spikes in traffic and transactional volume. And the solutions state-of-the art technical infrastructure, world class hosting facilities and content delivery networks ensure that it can comfortably handle the load even during the busiest times of the year.

Problem #8: I Don’t Have the Visibility to All Key Metrics Needed to Make Intelligent and Timely Business Decisions

Sadly, many retailers today have to rely on drawing and compiling mission critical information about their business from multiple systems using a variety of legacy tools and operations. These tools run the gamut from specialized reporting tools to complex web analytics packages to spreadsheet software add-ons , etc.. This makes it hard for merchants to get an accurate picture of their business.

GoECart’s robust reporting capabilities are built-in natively within the application so our merchants always have access to all the vital statistics and key performance indicators (KPIs) across all channels about their business at their fingertips.

GoECart’s reporting capabilities go way beyond the basics to provide merchants with an intelligent, 360-degree view of their business. Highlights of these features include:

• Interactive graphical dashboards and drill-down reports on demand-about orders, inventory, customers, vendors, profitability, and website traffic. Merchants can view top customers, customers by geography, sales by geography, average order value (AOV), top search terms, repeat orders, orders by status, orders by vendor, and much more.
• Reports to help you understand customers and potential customers in depth, such as the ways visitors navigate your site-complete click stream analyses such as entry pages, exit pages, search terms used, and more.
• The ability to track the number of unique, new, and repeated visitors.
• The ability to view reports for specific timeframes-including day, week, month, quarter, and year and compare them to other time periods.
• Data to help you better optimize your marketing, merchandising, procurement, search engine optimization (SEO) and promotional campaigns.
• The ability to track and optimize shopping cart abandonment rates.

With GoECart, you will never feel like you are flying blind. We provide a variety of advanced third-party web analytics options (e.g., Google Analytics, Omniture, etc.) for merchants who want to drill down even deeper.