When you think of web design, you might immediately think about colors and images. However, a big part of a web designer’s job is functionality, both in regards to how visitors use the website and how you use it to better manage your business.

Key integrations on your website can help you run your business more efficiently, cut costs and reduce your reliance on third-party vendors.

As you work with your designer on your new website plan, consider these features.

Integrated Payment Processor

A payment processor allows people to purchase items from your website with a credit card, so if you are selling a tangible product or even a service in some cases, you’ll want to enable online purchasing.

With some payment processors, shoppers are redirected off your website to a pay site location. That site may not look like yours or the redirection can slow down the process. That disruption maybe be all it takes to make customers abandon their carts.

When you integrate your payment solution, you aren’t driving customers to another location, and the process is often more seamless. Plus, because you keep all their contact information within your website, it enables more customization.

Self-Service HR Portal

With a self-service HR portal, you can dramatically streamline communications with employees, specifically regarding HR issues. You can track all employee information, including their benefits enrollment, payroll processing, evaluations and more.

Plus, you can enable employees to log in and see how much PTO they have remaining, request time off, get copies of pay stubs, review the handbook or get information on their health care benefits. Some systems also keep track of paperwork, such as W-2 and 1099 tax documents.

It saves you a great deal of back-and-forth communication with employees because they have plenty of information at their fingertips.

Inventory Management System

An inventory management system tracks your products from production to sales.

Taking it online is more accurate and can save you hours of counting inventory in the stock room or warehouse. Most critical, however, is that in enables you to better control your stock management and avoid either under- or overstocking.

For instance, I have a client who owns a ribbon store. Her warehouse contains every type of ribbon you can think of from mum supplies to fabric ribbons. She has been tracking her inventory on paper and in her head from years and as you can imagine over time things have become very inaccurate and inconsistent. We were able to build her a ecommerce website that manages all of her inventory in the warehouse so as customers place orders online it automatically updates keeping her ahead of the game by not having to pay a 3^rd party software and having accurate inventory at all times.

Client Portal

We all know that time is money so implementing a client portal can help you reduce your business expenses. A client portal could be used to manage a project by allowing clients to approve/disapprove within a system, see the status of their project and have access to things like documents, receipts, etc… This saves you money by being more efficient and allows you to work on more important tasks by giving clients access to these items whenever needed.