In today’s digital world, there is a heightened demand for eCommerce scalability due to evolving customer expectations. Google states that the probability of a bounce rises by 32% when the page load time increases from one to three seconds, and by 90% when it increases from one to five seconds.
If your online infrastructure cannot handle a sudden increase in demand, you will lose money, highlighting the crucial significance of customer experience in online retail.
The customer experience should always be the top priority for your business as it takes steps towards eCommerce growth. This is why scalability plays a crucial role in ensuring your long-term success. In the coming lines, we will delve into the definition of scalability and its significance.
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Scalability
The ability to increase or decrease IT resources in response to changing demand is what scalability in cloud computing encompasses. Businesses find the cloud’s scalability to be one of its most robust features, which contributes significantly to its popularity.
Users can easily and quickly scale data storage capacity, processing power, and networking using today’s cloud computing infrastructures. The added benefit is that scaling can typically be done without experiencing significant downtime.
In present times, every Managed Service Provider possesses pre-existing infrastructure. In contrast, in the past, when scaling was tied to physical infrastructure located on-site, the procedure could consume several weeks or months and incur significant expenses.
Now that you have comprehended the concept of scalability, let’s proceed to explore the significance it holds for your eCommerce business.
Scalability allows you to get the most out of every situation
The aim of every eCommerce business is growth. No one starts an online business with the intention of breaking even annually. The objective is to make a profit by capitalizing on favorable environmental factors and being prepared for unexpected external events.
In 2018, Amazon introduced “Prime Day” as a means to connect with its 100 million Prime members by offering them exclusive deals and significant discounts. Nevertheless, Amazon encountered a significant issue shortly after the sale commenced, as their website was overwhelmed with an enormous influx of visitors.
Due to this, all Prime members were unable to complete their purchases and instead were redirected to the homepage. As a result, Amazon incurred a loss of over $1 million per minute on that particular day. This incident served as a costly reminder of the importance of scalability, which is a valuable lesson for businesses of all sizes.
Amazon largely brought the situation upon themselves, although there are numerous other factors, like pandemics, that can lead to unpredictable consumer behavior. Whether this change in behavior is a good fit for your retail business depends on your level of preparedness, specifically, if you can easily expand your hosting resources.
A scalable hosting solution will allow you to grow
The importance of scalability lies in ensuring that, while expanding your ability to handle both high web traffic and order fulfillment, you do not overlook the factors that contributed to the success of your brand initially.
You should consider scalability in your plans well in advance, even before it becomes necessary. It is important to ensure that in the future, whether it be in one, five, or ten years, you will be able to handle double, triple, or even ten times the number of orders you currently do without encountering any difficulties.
It is crucial to prevent any downtime, maintain the customer experience, and ensure timely deliveries without fail. Any mistake in these aspects can lead potential customers to leave your website and choose one of your competitors, who are likely to appear in the same Google search that brought them to you.
Today’s online businesses have the advantage of not having to be concerned about finding scalable hosting solutions because there are numerous options available to handle the task.
If you desire to gain a competitive edge, it is insufficient to rely on a solution that simply possesses the capability to complete the tasks. It is imperative to locate a trustworthy partner with a strong background in delivering cloud and hosting solutions specifically tailored for the eCommerce sector.
Planning for e-commerce growth before it occurs
To ensure scalability, it is important to think about it in advance rather than waiting for the need to arise. Even a moderately successful e-commerce business will experience growth on an annual basis. The key is to expand capacity in order to handle higher web traffic and order fulfillment without sacrificing the factors that contributed to the brand’s initial success.
You aim to ensure that in the future, either within a year or five years, you will be capable of fulfilling double or triple the amount of orders you handle currently without encountering any problems. It is crucial for you to prevent any interruptions, maintain a satisfactory customer experience, and guarantee on-time deliveries, regardless of the circumstances.
Even the slightest mistake in any of these aspects can result in potential customers choosing to leave and instead give their business to one of the numerous competitors that appeared in the same Google search that brought them to you.
You must be prepared to scale your software for order fulfillment, accounting and warehouse management, as well as any CRM tools and ERP suites that you may use. It is important to note that this only refers to the back-end of your retail operation.
When considering the front-end, it is essential to consider the customer experience. This encompasses alterations to your website, implementation of new features and functions, as well as the addition of fresh products and content. It is important that all of these aspects expand simultaneously to prevent any inconvenient downtime that may frustrate loyal customers.
What was the potential number of Prime members and sales that Amazon could have lost when they experienced difficulties during checkout, preventing them from accessing and benefiting from the advertised deals specifically targeted at them? The importance of scalability should be considered.
Finding a scalable e-commerce solution
To achieve true scalability for your business, it is necessary to consider future steps. That is why there has been significant interest in development architectures like headless commerce. Although it may seem daunting, the concept behind headless commerce is actually straightforward.
When we talk about a headless architecture, we mean separating the front-end of your business (including your website and other components that interact with customers) from the back-end of your business (which includes activities like payment systems, CRM tools, etc.).
Essentially, this enables you to easily incorporate new features to the back-end without causing any disturbance to the user experience, facilitating the effortless expansion of your business. Discover further advantages of implementing a headless commerce strategy by clicking here.
Due to their inherent nature, headless solutions are typically based in the cloud. As a result, there is no requirement for physical server space, and you can enjoy automatic updates for performance and security without any extra charges.
In addition, you can seamlessly integrate future customer touch-points, such as mobile apps, sister websites, or voice commerce, into your current setup. This allows you to scale not only for volume, but also for capability and access.
Analysts and think tanks are currently discussing the lasting impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the retail sector, predicting a permanent shift towards online shopping as a fundamental aspect of the “new normal”.
If your business is not currently prioritizing scalability, it is not too late to begin preparing for the opportunity presented by this shift in consumer behavior. Keep in mind that 83% of consumers claim that they are less inclined to make repeat purchases from an online retailer after a negative experience with their website, shipping, or delivery. Ensure that you scale your business at an early stage and in an intelligent manner.
Preparing for anything with a scalable e-commerce solution
All retail businesses have a shared objective, which is to achieve growth. No one initiates a retail business intending to stay stagnant and only make enough profit to cover expenses annually. The objective is to make a profit. This entails capitalizing on favorable environmental factors and being prepared for unexpected external events.
In 2018, Amazon introduced ‘Prime Day’ in order to attract its 100 million Prime members with special deals and significant reductions in prices. Nevertheless, Amazon encountered a major problem as its website was unable to handle the sudden increase in online traffic during the sale, which happened just a few minutes into the event.
Due to this issue, desktop, mobile, and in-app users were unable to proceed with their purchases as they were directed back to the homepage. This mishap, which is estimated to have incurred a cost of over $1 million per minute for Amazon, serves as a valuable lesson in the importance of scalability, and one that small businesses can take note of.
Amazon’s situation was largely caused by their own actions, but there are also external factors like pandemics that can cause unexpected changes in consumer behavior. Whether these changes benefit retail businesses or not largely depends on how well they are prepared, or in other words, how scalable they are.
