How to choose the right order management system for your ecommerce business

With any ecommerce business, ensuring that the customer experience is a pleasant one is essential. Nobody wants to feel frustrated when shopping online. Browsing with ease, adding items to the shopping cart, and securely checking out should all happen without a hitch.

If not, you have the potential to lose long-term customers that are essential to the success of your business. But keeping track of every aspect of your business can be a difficult task. This is why investing in an order management system – or OMS – is not just a smart idea, but a necessity.

When searching for the right OMS for you, you’ll be bombarded with options. So how do you choose? Here is a step-by-step guide in finding the most efficient and user-friendly OMS for your ecommerce business.

First, think of your current ordering system and how would you like to improve it?

Before adding an order management system into the mix, you should first think of what you’re trying to achieve with your company. How do you currently manage your orders, and how do you want to improve this process? If you want to keep a better track of your inventory, invest in an OMS that has this as a key feature.

Don’t think in the now, consider your long-term business goals.

Try not to choose an order management system that focuses on your business as it is now. Think about how you want your business to run in the future. One of your main goals is probably to increase your customer base, but what else? Do you hope to improve shopping cart capabilities, cut down on delivery times, or increase payment methods?

Questions like these will allow you to choose the right OMS for growing your company. A common error of business owners is thinking in the now and only focusing on day-to-day activities. If you choose an OMS based on this, you might see that it is lacking in certain areas once your business continues to thrive.

Put your efforts into distributed OMS rather than classic systems.

If you don’t invest in a distributed order management system, you are doing your ecommerce business a disservice. Distributed systems allow for the organization of orders across multiple channels and systems. It orchestrates the best method for executing the order and getting the product to the customer as quickly as possible.

Even if you have several warehouses for your inventory, a distributed OMS will fulfill the order from the one that makes most sense. All of the components of a distributed system are automated, which ultimately makes the company as a whole run more efficiently.

Find a software that is easy to implement into your current ordering system.

Keep in mind that implementing a new software can take time to get used to. You should train your employees (and yourself) beforehand on how the system works. You should choose a software that is relatively user-friendly. It shouldn’t take too long to implement into your current business model. Do your research beforehand and read about your options from fellow ecommerce business owners.