Being an online seller, you have various roles to work on while you have the pressure to fulfill the responsibilities on time. The list of roles like maintaining the product content across various channels, fixing the Inventory Issues, adjusting the marketing strategies, and so on And so, inventory management becomes the last factor to look on.
When multichannel selling comes into the picture many issues just pop-up especially during busy seasons. The more eCommerce platforms you list on, the more SKUs you have, the process ends up being more complex.
Many of you fail to understand that inventory management should also be on your priority list so that other factors of multichannel selling becomes highly efficient and easy to manage. But if you don’t manage the inventory, then your business would soon be battling form negative reviews, overstock or stock-outs, and ultimately lost sales.
Major Inventory Issues of eCommerce retailers
Supply Chain Complexity:
With eCommerce concepts such as multichannel selling, cross border sales, and tough competition the small and medium-sized businesses are forced to:
- Expand product portfolios so that they can offer more choice to the customer. Which in turn puts more pressure on inventory processes and warehouse space?
- Include more partners and end up making the supply chain more complex. This takes more time to ship a product and has tracking issues as well.
- Increase the stock levels so that they can show the availability to customers. This is the risk factor and retailers are forced to increase their investment costs.
Best Solution:
- The lead times (i.e. the amount of time taken to fulfill an order) are very important. If you are into the eCommerce business then you should definitely check on the holidays and weather conditions.
- Safety stock is the best option to fulfill the orders efficiently in case of a delay in restocking or shortages.
- Invest in automated inventory management software or order management software. This eliminates Inventory Issues and maintains your real-time stock across various eCommerce platforms.
Still Making a Lot of Manual Updates:
Every eCommerce platform comes with its own set of rules and standards for order and inventory management. If you fail to follow the rules, it may result in costly suspensions and thus lost sales.
You can manage the compliance part if you are selling on a single or two platforms. But it becomes difficult if you are selling across multiple marketplaces. If you are doing manual updates, it becomes very difficult to keep up with an array of requirements.
Without automated inventory management processes, you would be struggling with all the processes, multiple warehouses, accounting, shipment, and tracking.
Inadequately Trained Employees
No matter, even if you have the best software embedded with the latest trends in the eCommerce industry, there is an important human element to managing inventory. While buying a good order or inventory management software you should also train the employee well. We recommend you to train more than one person about the inventory management software. The inventory management software should fulfill the tasks like:
- Identifying shortages and notifying you
- Providing daily reports on the level of inventory
- Calculating the amount of stock that needs to be ordered
- Providing forecasts on how much inventory you might require in the next order cycle at a particular facility.
Counting Inventory once in a blue moon
Even the most automated inventory management system has errors when un-trackable inventory such as exchanges or pilferage are not entered. For the inventory system to run smoothly and display proper stock you need to schedule frequent stock audits.
It is mandatory to perform scheduled checks with barcode scans frequently. If various sections of the stock are counted and checked on a regular basis, then you can rest assured that the number would be exact or quite close. Do this activity when you have sufficient staff available for counting.
Sellershub.io offers the best and affordable inventory management software that not only offers you automated and easy processes, but you also get the flexibility to integrate with the best shopping carts, logistics companies, and accounting software. Integration to all the aspects of the eCommerce business allows you to make the processes automated and free of errors.