Running an online business is easier now than ever. However, many entrepreneurs fail to explore the full potential of their eCommerce platforms by not understanding or incorporating the tools that can elevate their ventures to the next level.
APIs are undoubtedly eCommerce’s best ally and weapon. They are versatile, all-encompassing, and quintessential if you wish to elevate your business into a proper business juggernaut with minimal effort and maximum efficiency.
Ready to take your platform to the next level? Take a look at the six ways incorporating APIs can boost your eCommerce business and create a satisfying experience for you and your buyers.
What is an API?
APIs stand for Application Program Interfaces, and they can be defined simply as the lines of connection between two or more software programs. More technicalities are at play, but at their core, APIs are digital bridges that establish reliable communication between applications and systems.
When applied to an eCommerce platform, using APIs allows you to integrate multiple complex and sophisticated services into the structure of your business more intuitively and straightforwardly, connecting them and allowing the transfer of data seamlessly.
For example, incorporating a book API allows users and potential clients to instantly access information on millions of books directly from the website without leaving the site. Platforms like ISBNdb provide comprehensive book data from different sources that can be easily searched by ISBN, title, author, or publisher.
What Are The Types of API?
According to BigCommerce, three main, general types of APIs are worth considering for your business ventures.
First, the system APIs are the ones that can help you simplify the complex process of navigating your platform’s core systems, such as CRM. They are a baseline type of API that can help you manage the backbone of your eCommerce.
Second, they mention the process APIs that simplify and categorize the data after it originated in the system but before it is delivered. They are the ones that store, modify, and shape it according to what you need.
Lastly, there are the experience APIs that can reconfigure data and make it ready to be used by the audience. They modify and reconfigure how information is delivered to create a specific experience.
Ideally, your eCommerce would incorporate all three types of API to improve the back-end and front-end of your business and create a sleek, engaging, and well-connected shopping experience.
How Can APIs Boost Your eCommerce?
Now that you understand what APIs are and how they can change how you conceive eCommerce, it’s time to take one step further.
Although discussing the abstract benefits of APIs is nice, nothing beats tangible proof and down-to-earth, specific examples. To convince you, take a look at six concrete ways incorporating APIs can facilitate online businesses and increase customer satisfaction.
1. Improve the Checkout and Payment Process
Few things are more important to an eCommerce than the security of the essential data it manages, and clients’ financial information at the moment of payment is perhaps the most critical of all.
Luckily, by including APIs for payment processing, you can ensure a safe and seamless user experience, as the most renowned ones incorporate standard and advanced data encryption processes and authentication mechanisms designed to protect sensitive data and thus guarantee customers’ trust.
Likewise, payment gateway APIs also facilitate secure online payments through multiple processors: credit cards, PayPal, Stripe, and many more. Giving your potential clients options enhances their experience and helps you secure a new customer.
2. Facilitate Fraud Prevention and Detection
Customers are not the only ones that need protection. Your business is always at risk of loss from fraud, scams, and other attempts at illegal profits derived from your hard work.
Anti-fraud APIs can help you monitor potential dangers through a regular and perpetual risk assessment scan that detects red flags for shady purchases—fraudulent emails, fake phone numbers, stolen credit cards, strange geolocalization, and more.
It works by redirecting the clients’ purchases toward the API’s anti-fraud algorithm, which may block the transaction from happening. These APIs are also regularly updated with the latest data encompassing new and popular scam trends to ensure your business is always protected without relying on painstaking manual labor.
3. Simplify Personalization
It is well-known that customizing the user’s experience can increase customer engagement and conversion rates, subsequently inducing brand loyalty. Customers like to feel special and receive information relevant to their interests.
As reported by Zapier, a 2021 study by McKinsey determined that well-done personalization can increase revenue by an impressive 40% compared to mediocre customization efforts. And while this was a complex topic in the past, APIs make it easier than ever.
For example, with the right APIs, you can add product recommendations to clients based on their interests and past purchases. Likewise, you can enhance the browsing experience by incorporating APIs that showcase a homepage with product options that align with the audience’s interests.
The options are countless and—best of all—perfectly automatic.
4. Improve Customer Service and Engagement
On par with personalization of the customer experience, APIs also help improve customer service and the engagement of your eCommerce with potential clients, shortening the distance between both.
With the help of APIs, you can integrate countless customer service tools that can automatize assistance and provide buyers with immediate help as required. You can seamlessly incorporate direct message platforms, chatbots, AI assistance, and many more alternatives to provide 24/7 support.
APIs can also help you manage customer accounts, which can further help provide detailed customer service options.
5. Enhance Marketing Automation
Nowadays, marketing automation APIs stopped being a luxury and are now a must-have. According to Brevo, over 90% of professional marketers consider marketing automation “very important” for success.
The marketing automation options available depend on each API, but in general, they retain customer data and categorize them according to multiple criteria—location, age, preferences, browsing history, past purchases, money spent, and more. This allows you to create several customer groups depending on your business needs and target them with personalized marketing messages, emails, and promotions.
Other marketing automation APIs also incorporate various techniques to increase customer engagement, such as automatic promotion posts for digital marketing or sending reminders to customers about forgotten items in their shopping carts.
6. Improve Inventory Management
With the help of APIs, virtually every step in the inventory management process can be fully automated. This method guarantees real-time catalog tracking and inventory updating, ensuring your eCommerce is always up-to-date with minimal effort.
The possibilities are countless. Catalog APIs help you create, edit, and modify your product catalog as needed, allowing you to manage thousands of items quickly with minimal effort. Likewise, you can connect your eCommerce with the inventory management system, ensuring automatic availability tracking.
Conclusion
It’s not an exaggeration to claim that APIs may be the key player in the booming success of contemporary eCommerce platforms. They allow online businesses to offer a sophisticated experience by shortening the gap between multiple systems directly and smoothly.
APIs provide access to a vast range of software that can turn regular eCommerce businesses into a fantastic medley composed of many complex yet user-friendly systems. These tools automate multiple tasks, making businesses efficient and giving entrepreneurs more time to focus on managing the core aspects of their company.
More than an option, APIs are a necessity for businesses that want to thrive in the modern world.