Operating an eCommerce store can be a juggling act of different tools and systems. Apps like WooCommerce have made it easier than ever to build and operate an eCommerce store successfully, but you still need a host of other apps to manage your online store.
Your day-to-day operations can run more smoothly when you add the power of automation to the mix. Zapier uses automated workflows—called Zaps—to connect your eCommerce store to the rest of your tech stack.
When you connect WooCommerce to your email and chat apps, spreadsheets, CRM, mailing lists, and more, you can easily keep your orders organized, customer data top of mind, and team in the loop. Here’s how you can scale your eCommerce business with WooCommerce and automation.
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To get started with a Zap template—what we call our pre-made workflows—just click on the button. It only takes a few minutes to set up. You can read more about setting up Zaps here.
Back up order and customer info in a spreadsheet
Spreadsheets can be a versatile way to track and use your WooCommerce order information. If not everyone has access to your eCommerce platform, for example, it’s easy to share a spreadsheet containing the key info needed for everyone to do their jobs.
Spreadsheets also give you more options to filter and sort data. And they can also serve as a backup archive of your important customer data.
Capture all the order details you need in a format that works for you with these simple workflows.
Add customers to a mailing list
Email outreach can increase the likelihood of repeat customers, so automatically integrating your eCommerce platform with your email marketing tool is a no-brainer.
When a new order is placed in WooCommerce, you can use automation to create a new contact or update an existing one in your email marketing platform of choice. Letting automation handle transferring customer data means their info gets into your system faster and more reliably while saving you the hassle of copying and pasting.
Want to send customers a thank-you email or add them to an onboarding series? Or maybe you want to ask them about their purchase experience or send them new offers? These workflows will help.
Keep track of leads
You can much more successfully track and target leads if you have all your customer information in one place. But while WooCommerce is a great place to store customer purchase information, an eCommerce platform isn’t a great lead-tracking app.
Set up a workflow to bring all the valuable customer data you gather in WooCommerce—like contact info and purchase details—directly into your lead-tracking tool. These Zaps will also help you ensure your customer information is always up-to-date as customers return to your online store.
Send custom emails and notifications
A new order triggers a whole lot of important communications and tasks. Automation is the easiest way to ensure that communication happens.
Set up these automations to send emails or Slack messages to your team when a new order comes through. They can alert your fulfillment team, keep salespeople in the loop, or just make an easily accessible record in your team communications channel or inbox.
Create follow-up tasks or to-dos
While a lot of your online store easily runs itself when you’re using WooCommerce, you do need a human to step in at certain critical points, such as when a new order needs fulfillment. Automation helps your team step in more seamlessly when needed by adding important tasks to the tool they’re using to organize their work.
Centralizing task information in one app streamlines your eCommerce operations and helps everyone involved track order progress. Automation makes your order management more organized, more transparent, and more efficient, helping you keep customers satisfied.
Use webhooks with WooCommerce
Once you’ve gotten comfortable automating your eCommerce store, you may start discovering new opportunities for automation to make your life easier. If you want to connect WooCommerce to an app that doesn’t yet have a Zapier integration or customize your workflow a bit more, webhooks might be a good next step.
Here’s a Zap to get you started:
Create a better customer experience with automation
The more you can get your eCommerce operations running like a well-oiled machine, the more seamless your customer experience will be. With less time spent wrangling orders and copying data from WooCommerce to your other apps, you have more time to focus on what really matters—providing a top-notch online shopping experience for each and every customer.
And this is just the start of what you can do with WooCommerce and Zapier. What will you automate first?
This article was originally published in September 2020, written by Krystina Martinez. It was most recently updated in October 2023 by Wren Noble.
