eCommerce means selling products online while also making sure they’re available in various forms. It is a highly customizable platform where each product has its own size, color, price, and so on. To ensure customer satisfaction, it’s important to record everything.
For online store owners, especially those with large inventories that include multiple product lines, it can be challenging to manage all the information manually. To ensure customer loyalty, an item that is out of stock needs to be added as soon as possible.
Inventory synchronization between stores helps retailers maintain optimal amounts of their products.
This article will show you how to easily synchronize stock across multiple eCommerce channels via a unified API.
Inventory Synchronization Feature in Different Software Providers
Inventory and order management systems
Such types of software monitor inventory in all online stores. Any retailer benefits from using a solid inventory management system as it shows whether an item is sold out on one online store and available on other sales channels.
ERP systems
ERP software also allows merchants to automatically synchronize stock levels and keep inventory updated on multiple platforms. When a customer buys an item, the inventory count is instantly updated. Automated inventory updates help online merchants avoid customer disappointment and build trust and confidence with their clients.
Warehouse Management Software
One of the greatest advantages of WMS is that you can track and manage inventory across multiple channels. Any update to inventory is automatically posted on every sales channel. Warehouse management software has a lot of similarities to inventory management systems, but it has a few extra features.
Multi-channel system
Multi-channel software is another technology that helps businesses synchronize their inventories. It enables merchants to prevent stock-outs and to have a better handle on their inventory.
How does inventory synchronization work?
The process of inventory synchronization often happens in real-time, but sometimes it happens every few minutes. Here is a breakdown of the process:
- Merchants manually enter the number of products and then link everything to the listings across all their platforms.
- Shoppers place orders on one of the several platforms where store owners may sell their products, like Shopify or eBay.
- Orders are sent to the B2B SaaS system, which automatically adjusts inventory.
- After the system recalculates inventory, updates are automatically made on all linked listings.
The systems mentioned above need to be integrated with eCommerce platforms and marketplaces to synchronize stock.
But usually, it is difficult to integrate with every eCommerce platform manually. What's more, when multiple platforms are under consideration, the issue gets more complicated.
eCommerce Integration Challenges
B2B SaaS companies that integrate with eCommerce platforms individually can face the following challenges:
- Complicated process. Learning a shopping cart’s specific architecture and logic takes time and effort.
- A qualified expert. For B2B eCommerce applications, users rely on good integration. If poorly developed, an API can lead to customer problems and losses.
- Integrations take time. It takes a minimum of one month to develop the integration. Each platform integration is unique, so multiply the time it took you for one particular platform by the number of platforms you intend to integrate.
- Integrations are expensive. Integrations may cost as much as a few thousand dollars.
- Additional maintenance. After the integration is completed, more upgrades are needed. These will take time and effort because IT staff will need to support them.
How to synchronize inventory across multiple sales channels?
- Set up a free API2Cart account.
- Add your store.
- When an order is placed you will get notified. The order data will be included in a webhook event called “order.add” or you may choose to retrieve the orders via the “order.list” method.
- Update stock quantities on all sales channels via product.update method using increase_quantity and descrease_quantity parameters.
Instead of integrating with each e-commerce platform separately, it is easier to use a unified API. For instance, with API2Cart , you can integrate with 40+ shopping carts and marketplaces at once. The service will give you all the needed information for implementing the inventory synchronization feature. You will also be able to get, add, update, delete, etc., information on orders, products, and customers.
Contact us or schedule a call with one of our experts for more information about our service. Or create a trial account and check out all the features we offer.