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5 Ecommerce Myths You Need to Stop Believing

22 April 2022

It’s time we set the record straight on some ecommerce myths that too many business owners still believe.

Ecommerce is an achievable goal for any business with a product or service to sell. It helps companies lower their costs, grow their sales, and optimize their customer experience.

And yet incredibly, a large number of business owners still feel unwilling to venture an online channel. Having talked with many small-to-medium business owners over the years, we’ve learned that their objections usually come down to one of the following four ecommerce myths.

Ecommerce Myth 1: I’m already successful

It’s always hard to argue with success.

If you’re already running a successful business offline, consistently growing your sales and your customer base without an internet connection, then launching a web store may understandably be an afterthought (at best). And for certain local businesses in small, well-established communities, it could seem like a lot of work for not much (expected) benefit.

Ecommerce myths: I'm already successful

The reality:

Ecommerce is growing in every industry, and will continue to grow. The marketplace is changing rapidly. According to Statista, retail ecommerce sales are expected to break 7.4 trillion by 2025.

In other words, no matter how successful your business may already be, ecommerce represents a highly lucrative channel that can grow your business quickly and dramatically.

At the same time, your competitors are looking at the same opportunity. Many of them may have a similar assumption—that they’re doing just fine without it. Implementing an ecommerce strategy now puts you ahead of the curve, letting you claim your share of all that growth before everyone starts running to catch up.

Ecommerce Myth 2: It isn’t right for my business

We hear this ecommerce myth most often from business-to-business (B2B) companies, who tend to see ecommerce as a retail thing.

This makes sense from a certain standpoint. Ecommerce originated as and went on to become a global standard for retail. It brought speed, accessibility, and convenience to retail purchases, empowering customers all over the world to shop twenty-four hours a day without the need of a sales rep.

But B2B companies have longer sales cycles, with purchasing decisions that often involve numerous departments and managers. Their business model is built on intricate customer relationships involving highly personalized product offerings and pricing structures. The one-size-fits-all impulse purchase retail model just wouldn’t work.

Ecommerce myths: It's not right for my business

The reality:

Ecommerce has evolved a lot over the years. Industry giants like Amazon and eBay have set the standard when it comes to the ecommerce customer experience, and this has influenced every area of ecommerce development, including B2B e-commerce.

B2B ecommerce platforms incorporate the best features of B2C, like customer self-service, around-the-clock accessibility, and price and product transparency. But it’s calibrated for B2B. It lets you configure prices and products on a per-customer basis, create individualized promotions, price by quote, and more. All fully integrated to your back office systems and ERP.

Ecommerce Myth 3: Nobody can compete with Amazon

Some business owners feel that sites like Amazon make it pointless to try selling anything online. Proponents of this common ecommerce myth believe that all the factors from SEO to word-of-mouth marketing (to say nothing of these companies’ bottomless pockets) doom any other online venture to come in dead last.

The reality:

The success of Amazon only makes it that much easier for your business to succeed.

On the one hand, it goes without saying that despite their versatility, these companies aren’t direct competition for absolutely everything.

On the other, both sites give businesses and individuals alike the ability to sell goods and services through them. Selling on Amazon can be highly competitive all on its own, since pretty much anybody can do it.

But when you connect your Amazon Marketplaces to an ERP-integrated ecommerce platform, you can simply manage them as additional sales channels that synchronize back to your ERP.

Ecommerce Myth 4: It’s too much work

One particularly persistent ecommerce myth is that it will take up all your time.

It’s true that there’s a lot to think about when you’re starting an online business. The amount of work often feels intimidating.

Just getting all your products online can be prohibitive for some companies. If you have a small staff as it is, the prospect of spending hundreds of hours manually entering products and configuring prices can seem totally unrealistic.

And that’s not even factoring in orders, invoices, and inventory and customer management. All this data entry adds up to a considerable amount of work very quickly. And the more orders you get, the more quickly it adds up.

Ecommerce myths: It's too much work

The reality:

By choosing an ERP-integrated ecommerce solution, you eliminate literally all of your data entry problems.

ERP integration automates all of the routine business processes that involve copying and transmitting data. It sends product, price, customer, order, and invoice data back and forth between your web store and your ERP, getting everything done in a fraction of the time while eliminating the possibility of human error.

This means that even small companies can get an online channel up and running smoothly without placing any additional burdens on their staff or having to hire new people.

Ecommerce Myth 5: It’s too expensive

An e-commerce channel can seem like a complex, time-consuming, and potentially expensive undertaking.

The reality :

To get a clear understanding of the actual cost—and to size up the real opportunity—you need to consider the ultimate return on investment (ROI) of such a project.

Your team can update pricing and inventory in real time without any risk of costly errors. Your order and invoice processing are automated, saving countless hours of manual entry. Do all this without a single customer service or sales rep, allowing your staff to focus on growing your business.

Not only does an ecommerce platform save your team a lot of time and money, it greatly improves the customer experience. It gives your customers access to products, prices, and account information 24/7. Customers can now search for the product or service your business offers from anywhere in the world, just by performing a search on Google.

If you still need convincing, check out how you can benefit from an Ecommerce ERP integration.