40 Useful Tips when Integrating an ERP to E-commerce

‍How confident are you that integrated software, such as an e-commerce system, knows your ERP data is accurate?

“Is the data presented in the e-commerce accurate?”

Below, you'll find a glimpse of the questions focused on B2B e-commerce from the checklist:

• Are order discounts presented in real-time?
• Is customer-specific pricing, including tier pricing (or so-called contract pricing) available based on real-time or synchronized logic and data?
• Is real-time inventory needed, or can this be done based on a scheduled synchronization (every x hours)?
• Is the customer credit standing accurate? In B2B, e-commerce customers could (or could not) order by using the payment method ‘pay by invoice.’ If this is changed in the ERP, it should be synched in real-time to the e-commerce.
• Is an order (and order number) presented on the web screens in real-time?
• Is the e-commerce environment's basket/checkout able to show possible surcharges, administration costs, transport routes, and delivery possibilities in the ERP?
• Are the tax and special discounts taken from the ERP or rebuilt in the e-commerce environment?  

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Is the architecture of your integration future-proof?

“Does the solution allow you to get a notification when hiccups occur?“

When building an integration, it is crucial that your integrations are being logged and monitored, so the business impact of ‘not working’ integrations is minimal.

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“Are you building an A-to-B integration or building a future-proof ecosystem?“

More than likely, your primary goal is to integrate software A (ERP) to software B (e-commerce). As this is your business question, your integration will likely be based on an integration built with custom code or using a so-called plugin.

This type of approach works best when you have no more than two applications to integrate. If you feel comfortable enough in your integration team’s stability, then this should work for you. However, we always recommend that you agree on the code and have robust discussions regarding how the integration will function.  
Reasons not to use custom code or a plugin when integrating your ERP but an iPaaS solution are:  

• When you want to re-use the data from your ERP to connect to other software, custom code would not be the way to go.
• Custom code integrations often take more time to build than using middleware iPaaS tooling.
• For mission-critical integrations, you would need custom monitoring protocols, which can be expensive. Error handling and logging are often minimal and basic, which leaves you unable to recover data without manually reconstructing the integration.
• Adding new or changing existing software in your IT landscape requires a big project and a significant process.
• You’ll need extra data routes at some point to integrate new technologies like marketing automation software, AI, and machine learning tooling. And relying on custom code to sustain those integrations is unsustainable for your IT landscape.