Barriers you may need to overcome include the following:
- Little or no management interest
There may be lack of buy-in by company management. To overcome this, management should be encouraged to understand the benefits of e-commerce and how it can help the company survive. The possibly disastrous consequences of acting too slowly or not at all should be stressed, for example via these arguments:
– If your company has never had an e-commerce presence, now is the time to innovate. Seizing the opportunity now may not be a question of choice but of necessity, if the company is to survive.
– If the company has been slowly developing an e-commerce presence, this should assume a much higher priority and faster deployment. Nimbler companies may already be encroaching on your firm’s sales and customer base. If they secure a significant lead, catching up may be impossible.
- Lack of company capabilities
You may feel your company lacks the capability for e-commerce. Solutions include:
– Instead of developing an in-house solution, turn to a ready-built platform such as Shopify to speed the development process. Such platforms can be configured for most SMEs regardless of size, in weeks rather than months. The companies that provide such platforms usually offer resources for deploying them as well.
– Whatever platform you choose, make sure it provides a customer-friendly interface, easy product searches, flexible payment options, simple methods for returns and refunds, and good customer analytics and reporting.
– Be prepared to revamp your internal organization and processes to support the platform and your move to e-commerce.
– Use third-party help to get you to where you need to be. Trying to stretch company resources to do everything yourself will be counterproductive.
