Benefits Of Automating Manual Processes

As per Statista, the eCommerce industry was whooping worth $3.535 billion at the end of 2019. 3 years and from then, there is no sign of growth slowing down in the coming years. 

In such a booming sector, where businesses have plenty of opportunities for development, workflow automation is a clever move for a firm to boost its operations. Online Web stores operate 24/7 and only automating key processes can eliminate manual process that is time consuming and keep the business running when your staff isn’t present.

Learn what workflow automation is, what are its benefits, and the most useful ways to automate your business processes.

What Is Workflow Automation? 

Workflow automation allows businesses to streamline their processes. It is a valuable tool for businesses that help them save time and money, identify repetitive tasks, automate routine tasks, replace any manual processes that could be better handled by software, apps, or tech, and thus, run the business more efficiently.

Across all departments of the business, there are many tasks that can be automated. From inventory management to email marketing or higher level order management, more efficient and less error-prone automation can improve routine processes, leaving business owners to focus on their core competencies.

Benefits of Automating Manual Processes

We Shall automate eCommerce operations that we do manually because Automated Process clearly Outshines a Manual Process. 

·       Clarity – clear and complete understanding of how the process works. 

·       Higher efficiency – Automation provides higher efficiency and improve employee productivity that minimises errors, takes lesser time than humans, and completes mundane tasks in seconds.

·       Data and task accuracy – No human, no human error. No chances of incorrect data handling and lesser negative customer service due to human error.

·       Better customer experiences – SLAs can be met best with consistent workflow automation, making happy customers.

·       Reduced time and costs – Automation facilitates time and cost savings.

·       Productivity – Employees work can be reassigned to do high-value work when mundane tasks get automated. Efficient allocation of resources will therefore rise your Business productivity.

·       Insight – Get deep insight into your processes with analytics, reports, and audits, thereby aiding business decision-making.

·       Growth and scale – It is effortless to scale in response to an increase in demand. 

·       Transparency – Automated status reports keep all remote workers and stakeholders in the loop, increasing transparency. 

eCommerce Tasks that require Automation 

·      Customer Experience and Support automation

1. Track and reward your engaged customers to boost retention. Send targeted marketing to shoppers with a certain order value or the number of purchases. 

2. Sync your customers to a relevant email list with your CRM system for strategic and targeted Email marketing.

3. Send follow-up emails after a sale to gather valuable feedback.

4.  Analyse, tag, and segment customers on basis of buying behaviour, age, gender, or order value.

 ·      Marketing and Workflow Automation 

1. Create posts, videos, and content that engages your audience for effective social media marketing and then use tools to automatically schedule your social media posts, and when and how they’re distributed.  

2. Generate valuable leads by nurturing customer journey touch-points with help of tools that collect real-time data on customer behaviour.

·      Purchase Order Automation

Get purchase orders raised according to incoming sales automatically. When a sale reduces your stock to a predetermined level, the order can be generated automatically. 

·      Onboarding Automation

Automating the customer onboarding process saves time spent, money, and human resource. This includes collecting customer information, setting up accounts, and giving access to services or products.

With an automated supplier portal, you can share and receive all details related to a vendor relationship via a web-based interface. 

·      Order Management Automation

Order management is the process by which customers’ orders are tracked and progressed from start to finish. From order placement to post-sale, many tasks can get automated like;  

1. Printing your shipping labels, accurately marking orders as dispatched, and tracking numbers for deliveries.    

2. Sending reminders for customers to reorder as part of post-sale support and continued marketing. 

 3. Sending abandoned cart emails with personalised messages to win some of them back.

·      Inventory Management Automation

Automation helps in Inventory management with proper tracking and management of stock.

When you receive a new order, the inventory management software automatically allocates stock to the order, a ‘ready for dispatch’ tag gets attached to the order, order details, shipping labels, and all other relevant info get sent to the right warehouse, and if stock levels reach a predetermined low level, automatically a purchase order can be raised with your supplier.

·      Sales Automation

Automated sales processes can help businesses of all sizes overcome the complex sale processes challenges by using technology to streamline these processes. 

Automated sales processes also make it easier to manage repetitive sales tasks, undertake crucial follow-ups at the right time, use tools like PayPal, Stripe, and Mollie to collect payments from customers quickly and easily, and many more sales-related tasks.

5 Steps for Integrating Workflow Automation into Your Business

1. Identify repetitive tasks

Identify business processes that you can streamline via automation. Find bottlenecks in your daily workflows that are destructive to your workforce productivity. 

2. Define business goals

Outline ways to improve the bottlenecks in your workflows by automating your process management.

3. Select the right workflow automation solution

Check out the features and functions of the different automation tools available. Intelligently analyse and compare your options and choose the ideal solution for your business.  

4. Train the staff

Once you’ve finalised the software, invest time, effort, and finance into training your workers to use it to ensure that the tool gets used to its utmost capability.  

5. Test and measure the impact

Test and assess the impact the solution is having on your business growth. Rectify in case of any issues, or add and activate a different function of the tool to make it more effective.

Conclusion

Today’s eCommerce businesses have plenty of competition and to ensure you beat out your rivals, you must get all your business processes right, on time, and cheaper. 

Streamlining and automating workflows improve employee productivity and efficiency, completes mundane tasks much more quickly than humans without errors, and helps you unlock the full potential of your human resource.

That’s why workflow automation is something you can’t afford to ignore to ensure that your organisation’s working environment stays on the path to continuing growth. 

 

16 workflow automation ideas for Ecommerce (2022). The BigCommerce Blog. (2022, March 10). Retrieved July 31, 2022, from https://www.bigcommerce.co.uk/blog/eCommerce-automation/ 

Yec. (2022, April 14). Council post: How smes can leverage Workflow Automation. Forbes. Retrieved July 31, 2022, from https://www.forbes.com/sites/theyec/2022/04/04/how-smes-can-leverage-workflow-automation/?sh=327d5fc211ff 

Achuthan, N. (2022, May 19). Manual process vs Automated Processes – which one is for you? Manual Process vs Automated Processes – Which One is For You? Retrieved July 31, 2022, from https://kissflow.com/workflow/bpm/manual-process-vs-automated-processes/ 

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