eCommerce 2025 Projects and Budgets – Start now! Spend later!
In this post we outline why – even though eCommerce projects and budgets might not kick in until next year – you need to start now rather than waiting until mid-January or the beginning of April.
TLDR: eCommerce projects take a long time from start to finish, so even though your budget may not open up until 2025, you should start the free work now or risk not being ready until well into next year.
You’ve earmarked ‘scaling up our eCommerce effort’ as a key priority for 2025, and maybe you’ve also secured a budget for the 1st of January or 1st of April – or maybe you’ll see what the quotes look like and budget accordingly. Time to keep the head down during your Q4 peak or sit back after a busy outdoor season and take stock, right?
Wrong, unfortunately. To start seeing the benefits of this kind of eCommerce project in January, you need to have started already. If you’re targeting Easter-time (mercifully late next year) for ramp-up then the hard work starts now. You can get the all-important preparation work done and avoid touching budgets until you have them. Let’s delve into the why and how.
The time factor
Money is rarely the killer resource, it’s usually time. The stuff slips away so quickly. A month can go by in the blink of an eye.
An eCommerce re-platforming project, for example – where you change your eCommerce management system – can take anywhere from six months to over a year in total elapsed time, depending on your unique business and the degree of change and customisation you’re contemplating. If you delay starting until the budget is in place you’ll probably miss the window and can kiss goodbye to another 12 months. Nobody sane wants to do this during their peak selling period.
Deciding if there is a project takes longer than planned
We’re assuming you’re reading this because you’ve defined an objective – although not necessarily. Let’s say you’ve had an eCommerce system in place for a while and you’re wondering if it will see you through the next couple of years. Waiting to re-platform might seem like a good way to save money, but if your current platform is outdated, has slow performance, or needs constant manual workarounds you’re looking at higher maintenance costs, increased downtime, and poorer productivity.
Furthermore, competitors who upgrade their platforms now will have the edge when it comes to the end-to-end buying experience. The longer you wait, the more ground you’ll have to make up when you finally do re-platform, potentially causing you to lose customers and market share to faster movers.
Selecting a partner takes longer than planned
Some companies understand their requirements to get from A to B and then start the beauty parade. Others invite companies to help them frame the project, and then make their selection. Either way, the selection and contractual processes always take longer than planned. Both parties are busy, and it takes time to sync up for the various milestones of the buying process.
The cost of delay is hidden, but real. If you’re targeting a 10% uplift in GMV for your eCommerce project, then divide that number by 12 and that’s your cost of delay with every passing month. Thinking about building it yourself rather than buying it in? Figure it will take you twice as long, so double that real cost.
In our experience, companies need one to three months to select a partner, and another month to dot the contractual i’s and cross the commercial t’s. Have you factored that in?
Implementing the new project takes longer than planned
Once you’ve selected your system and/or outsourced services partner, getting to ‘go live’ always takes longer because you only really get into things once you get into things. The quality of data is regularly a time-killer, and the success of the project is mostly about the data (and the new processes, ways of working and so on).
Make sure that you allow for overlap between the way you do things now and the way you’re going to do things. It’s rarely the simple flick of a switch; the pre and post-project processes will run in parallel for a while as you negotiate switching horses. Starting now allows you to plan the transition with eyes wide open, gather the necessary resources, and think about the key components of the project, such as data quality, migration, design, workflows, and connecting systems. By the time your full budget is available, you’ll be several steps ahead rather than scrambling to catch up.
Ramping up takes longer than planned
Even though you might be live and trading with the new system or the new outsourced partner, with something as critical as your eCommerce business and brand you’re going to start gradually and build from there. You’ll plan to increase the range of products you have, work on your promotions, and add the places where you sell and the regions you sell to, over time. This ramp-up period often takes longer than planned because there might be teething problems, gaps or errors in the new processes, or simple human error adopting the new behaviours. You might also need to secure go ahead as you approach each gate, or phase, in the project.
Don’t imagine that you’re going to go live and everything will go gangbusters. There will inevitably be periods of analysis, review, experimentation and further tweaking. Maybe you’ll also need to factor in product availability, supply chain, keeping the project budget-holders bought in, and so on. Take an educated guess at how long it’s going to take you to get fully ramped, and then double it.
Fortunately – paying takes longer too
All of this good planning stuff comes with no outgoings, the only investment being your well-marshalled time. Most potential partners you talk to will consider that they’re providing their expertise and estimates free of charge, on the understanding that if they win your business it will be worth it to them. We’re not suggesting you be a tyre-kicker without a concrete project and budget, because word gets round on time-waters, but you don’t make a format commitment until you sign, and that, as we’ve explained, could be months from now.
Even when you’ve signed on the dotted line, the days of paying for everything up front are largely gone. The eCommerce industry is full of flexible payment plans, deferred payment schemes, or other finance options. It’s completely normal for you to pay in phases or after milestones are reached, meaning you can spread the cost over time. At Volo, we charge a modest implementation fee and then a monthly fee once you’re live and trading. Why not ask if you can pay the implementation fee over time too? You won’t know if you don’t ask.
Working this way means that you can take a phased approach to your eCommerce growth ambitions. You can implement important projects like connecting to new channels, adding supplier feeds, adding more courier options and bringing in advanced reporting and analytics rather than having to wait for a larger budget that may never materialise. Then you’re hopefully building on the early benefits of the new way of doing things, such as increased sales, improved productivity and stickier customers.
How to start?
No company has all the resources they need to do everything they want, so you have to prioritise ruthlessly. It’s easy to avoid making time for these seemingly long-range projects. Everyone can find half an hour, so use 10 minutes to research online an expert company in this field and then spend your 30 minutes on a discovery call to find out (from the good sales people) what you need to factor in.
Scaling your eCommerce effort, whether it’s with a new system or a new outsourced partner, takes months. Don’t be seduced by the sales people who tell you it’s a couple of weeks. This is a change management exercise and 70% of them fail, so the odds are not on your side. All the more reason to start the conversations now, learn the lessons early and plan properly. You shouldn’t end up paying for ages anyway. Do the work now, in time, and make the commitment and investment later.
To get moving on this, have a look at these further reading resources below, or get in touch to start the conversation.
Further reading:
