Of course, automation can go as far as accounting, production workflows, or HR processes. And yes, everything affects the customer experience in a business, but for now, let’s focus on these top three: Marketing Automation, Data Collection Automation, and Shipping & Fulfillment Automation.

But, before we dig into it, there are two essential steps you should consider that could help lead the way into effective automation.
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Step 1. Look inside

The type of ecommerce software you run your business on has a first-hand impact on the automations you can access. Let’s look at the top 3 platforms, according to Techradar, and see what type of integrations they have to offer.

Wix has 250+ apps in its marketplace, ranging from CRM tools to Payment and Shipping.

WooCommerce has over 700 extensions grouped into ten categories, so you can easily choose the ones that interest you most.

Shopify is one of the most generous ecommerce platforms with their integrations offering. With 6800+ apps in its store, there’s a lot you can cover.

Whether you’re already using one of these platforms or looking to switch to a new one, scan their app marketplace. It gives you a good understanding of possible automations.

Step 2. Look outside

The ecommerce industry has 7.9 million online retailers, out of which 2.1 million are in the United States. And that’s only B2C companies. It’s a competitive market that continues to grow while being the constant target of innovations.

Source: Statista

So, keeping an eye on the industry trends and the market evolution can help you decide which automations you could consider prioritizing at some point.

Let’s say you want to expand to a new market next year. You want to start shipping to Europe. You might need a whole new set of automated workflows that are GDPR compliant or make shipping easy and fast on the European continent.

After you correlate Step 1 with Step 2, it should be easier for you to decide on the automations that make the most sense to your ecommerce.

Now let’s explore the three main ways to automate your ecommerce for fast growth.

Marketing automation

Consumers shop in a messy way. Even if you have a well-defined buyer’s journey, they still don’t go from point A to point B in a straight line. You might attract them on Facebook, but make the sale through email a month later.

Source: Think with Google

So your ecommerce business needs to be everywhere. And you might find it challenging to embrace multiple channels if you do things manually.

But marketing automation has proven to be successful in this area. About 63% of companies that use marketing automation are outgrowing their competitors. And it leads them to an average of 14.5% increase in sales productivity and a 12.2% cut in marketing expenses.

Marketers say that email marketing, social media, and analytics are some of the top areas to automate workflows.

Email marketing

Email marketing automation implies sending predefined emails to your target audience based on a trigger (e.g.: purchase, click) or event (e.g.: birthday). An automated email flow is different from a newsletter or a campaign because you set it up just once, and it’s automatically launched every time the trigger sets off.

You can also personalize the flow based on your customer’s action, but usually, you build it to address a specific group.

Out of various digital channels, email marketing is proving to be the most effective for ROI.

Source: GetResponse

How to use email marketing automation?

Welcome new subscribers – tell subscribers what to expect from your emails, share the brand’s story, invite them to follow you, and surprise them with an exclusive offer.
Create a post-purchase flow – thank customers for their purchase, keep them updated with the status of their order, give product tips & tricks, ask for a review.
Address payment failure situations – inform customers of the payment status, give reminders, offer your help or step-by-step instructions in case of payment issues.
To set up your email flow