More and more retailers today are looking for solutions that would help them perform time-consuming tasks easily, fast, and effectively. Shipping is one of the major aspects of online stores, and with the help of shipping management systems, retailers can manage it and other operations with ease.
That is why if you provide shipping management software, then you know that your solution is entirely dependent on integration with eCommerce platforms. The fact is also that the more shopping platforms your software supports, the better are the chances to meet more clients' needs and expand your market share.
In this post, we'll explain why integrating your shipping software with Lightspeed, one of the most commonly used shopping platforms by online retailers, is critical for your success as a shipping solution vendor and how to integrate with it with ease.
Shipping Management Software: Key Features
The majority of the functions and operations handled by every shipment management system arrive from integration with eCommerce platforms. Such a connection allows your software to provide shop owners with access to additional features, such as publishing shipping labels directly from the website of their online shop and supplying tracking numbers to inform consumers of the shipping progress of their orders.
Besides mentioned above, the shipping system also helps with:
improving the accuracy of shipment
selecting and delivering products based on a variety of criteria
monitoring and submitting shipment notices to customers
keeping track of order statuses
keeping track of inventory quantities and sync them
delivering real-time shipping data
To be able to perform such features you need to have access to eCommerce platforms databases and get info on orders, products, shipments, customers, etc. The more integrations you will have, the more functionality you can provide to your clients.
Let’s see how Lightspeed integration can benefit your shipping software.
Lightspeed Shipping Integration
Lightspeed is an eCommerce platform for building seamless and completely integrated app-supported online shops that can handle a range of sales tactics while simultaneously optimizing inventory and client management. Although Lightspeed is a relatively new eCommerce platform, the company has been operating for quite some time and has offices worldwide. Lightspeed was mostly a point of sale provider until 2016 but now has almost over $12 billion in net revenue and more than 35,000 customers. Lightspeed offers a variety of services, including inventory tracking, predictive analytics, product customization, and more.
Lightspeed is popular in countries like the Netherlands, United States, Belgium, Canada, Germany, and many other countries.
Lightspeed Integration Development
Explore how Lightspeed integration can help your eCommerce software become more competitive.
By integrating your shipping software with the Lightspeed platform, you can propose to and satisfy the needs of new potential clients. You'll be able to help them enhance their performance by streamlining their order fulfillment and shipping processes. Integration of your shipping solution with the Lightspeed eCommerce platform will give you new possibilities in the eCommerce industry.
However, you should be aware that integration with eCommerce platforms comes with many obstacles, as we'll see below.
Shipping Software Integration Issues
When it comes to integration with eCommerce platforms, we can confidently assume that it is one of the most daunting challenges for any business that offers eCommerce services. As a shipping software vendor seeking to incorporate your software product with eCommerce platforms, you'll have to deal with the following problems:
The process of integration will take a long time to complete. During this time, the developer team would review the platform's architecture and most likely face certain difficulties.
Be prepared to pay a significant amount of money, perhaps even more, if additional configurations are required. When the new updates arrive, more developer work and commitment will be required until the new integration is complete and fully elaborated, implying further changes.
Every integration requires a lot of work to be done and a persistent problem, which never disappears until the job is done. You'd like to employ someone capable and skilled to help you achieve positive outcomes, but that's not so easy to come by.
All of these aspects make integration with eCommerce platforms very difficult, so finding a way to make it simple is important.
How to Integrate with Lightspeed Easily
As previously stated, integrating with various eCommerce platforms requires a considerable amount of time, effort, and determination. The excellent news is that you can easily implement Lightspeed shipping integration with the help of API2Cart without wasting a lot of resources, time, or effort. You will be able to integrate your shipping software with 40+ leading eCommerce platforms and marketplaces, including Lightspeed, at once.
This type of integration's key benefit is that you won't have to build separate integrations with eCommerce platforms or add the support for new versions when they become available. You will only have to write integration with API2Cart, add your clients’ stores and that’s all. API2Cart’s unified API will allow you to get, add, update the needed store data like orders, products, shipments, customers, etc on any supported eCommerce platform.
In particular, integration with customer stores via API2Cart enables your shipping software to do the following:
import orders from multiple sales channels
update tracking info and order statuses
create shipping labels
automate, schedule, and customize shipping tasks to run only for specific stores
organize the data in detailed reports
In terms of LightSpeed integration, API2Cart provides a plethora of API methods that effectively retrieve and manage the data from this shopping platform. Let’s explore them below.
for working with cart: cart.create, cart.list, cart.validate
for working with products: product.list, product.info, product.count
for working with orders: order.list, order.count, order.info
for working with shipments: order.shipment.list, order.shipment.tracking.add
Our static and interactive documentation and useful instructions help to start working with API2Cart easily. Moreover, with a 30 day FREE trial period, you can test and see how you can solve your business cases with it.
In case you have any questions, contact us or schedule a call with our representative. We are happy to assist you with any questions or queries related to integration with eCommerce platforms!
