Starting an online business and running an e-commerce website can be a successful business plan. On top of that, it is possible to run your business on your own without needing a dedicated team of employees or staff. However, operating as a one-person team can become increasingly difficult as your business grows and you have more responsibilities to manage. This article will explain whether you need employees to run your New Zealand e-commerce website.
What Does Running an E-Commerce Website Require?
There are many different aspects to running an e-commerce website, and their range of complexity can vary. Some parts of this process include:
- building and maintaining your e-commerce website/online store;
- engaging with and responding to customers;
- managing social media profiles and online marketing;
- liaising with suppliers and other businesses;
- sourcing product and managing inventory;
- developing appropriate legal documentation;
- managing your privacy obligations (both national and international);
- complying with consumer law;
- managing payment portals; and
- facilitating shipping and returns.
How labour intensive running your e-commerce site is will depend on what proportion of your business you conduct online. The size of your business will also influence how much work your e-commerce website is and the nature of the goods or services you provide.
Do I Need Employees?
It is possible to run an e-commerce website without employees, especially if you are just starting out and do not intend to grow your business beyond your initial setup. However, as you grow more successful, you may find the responsibilities of running an e-commerce business difficult for you to handle alone. Hiring someone with a different skill set than you can also provide new angles for your business that you may not have considered.
If you find yourself overwhelmed by your work, this can lead to increased stress and mistakes. For instance, if you have more product orders coming in than you can handle, your customers may become frustrated over long processing times.
Therefore, hiring an employee to help out can lessen your workload and improve your business. This fact is especially true if you:
- want to provide services based on skills you do not have;
- intend to grow your business and reach a larger market;
- are lacking in certain business areas, such as good customer service;
- are generating enough revenue that you want to put back into the business rather than in your own pocket; and
- need more time to focus on the business itself rather than your e-commerce website specifically.
For example, say that you started with a simple template e-commerce website, but you want to design it into something more bespoke. However, you lack the technical know-how to do this yourself. In this case, you can hire employees with web development skills to provide this service and maintain your website for you.
Continue reading this article below the formWhat Are The Benefits of Hiring Employees?
While it is possible to run an e-commerce site solo, there are significant advantages to hiring employees as your business expands. Having dedicated staff can free up your time to focus on strategic planning, product development, and growing your customer base. Employees can take on time-consuming tasks like customer service, order fulfilment, and content creation, allowing you to work on high-level priorities.
Additionally, hiring employees with specialised skills can strengthen your business in areas where you lack expertise. For example, you may need a web developer to optimise your site for mobile devices, an SEO specialist to improve your search engine rankings, or a social media manager to build your brand’s online presence.
Scaling Your Team as You Grow
As your e-commerce business grows, your staffing needs will evolve. Initially, you may only need a part-time virtual assistant or freelancer to handle administrative tasks. As sales increase, you could hire a full-time customer service representative, followed by a marketing coordinator and warehouse staff.
It’s important to carefully assess your business needs and hire strategically to ensure you have the right skills and resources in place to support your growth. You may also consider outsourcing certain functions, such as accounting or IT support, to third-party providers rather than hiring in-house staff.
What Employees Do I Need?
If you do decide that you want to hire a new employee or employees, you need to plan for the kind of people you want to look for and hire. As such, you need to consider:
- whether you want to hire full-time, casual, or part-time employees;
- the kinds of skills or experience you are looking for;
- how many hours a week it would take to do the work you want to hire someone for;
- what responsibilities you want to delegate, and how much;
- whether you can train your employees or you need to;
- salary expectations;
- whether your employees will work remotely or come to you; and
- your legal obligations as an employer.
How many employees and the exact roles you need will depend on the above considerations. However, some potential roles to hire for include:
- general manager;
- customer service worker;
- digital marketer;
- accountant;
- supply chain specialist;
- software engineer;
- business strategist; or
- channel lead.
Your Responsibilities as an Employer
Hiring employees can ultimately bring success to your business, but you must meet your legal obligations as an employer to avoid complications down the road. Such obligations can include:
- treating employees fairly;
- paying employees on time and with the correct amount;
- maintaining various important employee records;
- managing PAYE and other tax obligations;
- protecting employee privacy;
- supplying leave and holidays appropriately; and
- meeting health and safety requirements.
If you choose to hire someone to help run your online business, you must ensure you comply with employment law requirements.
Hiring new employees for your NZ business can be complicated. Let us help you scale up and reach your next milestone faster with this free employer guide.
Key Takeaways
You can start and run an e-commerce website on your own. However, once you grow and diversify your business, you may find that the workload becomes too much for you alone to manage. Therefore, it may be time to look into hiring skilled employees to improve your business. Hiring employees gives you the flexibility to focus on high-order tasks to ensure continuing growth, where your employees can complete daily activities. Additionally, they may have different skill sets that contribute to your business.
If you would like more information about hiring employees for your e-commerce website, our experienced employment lawyers can assist as part of our LegalVision membership. For a low monthly fee, you will have unlimited access to lawyers who can answer your questions and draft and review your documents. Call us today at 0800 005 570 or visit our membership page.
Frequently Asked Questions
If you want to start an e-commerce website, you need a clear plan of what you will sell, who you are going to sell it to, and how you will do so. Then, you need to determine what kind of e-commerce website you want to create. Many online platforms provide templates and plans for completing this process.
You can certainly run an e-commerce website on your own, but you may find that the workload becomes too much for you alone to manage once business picks up. Therefore, in these situations, hiring an employee may be wise.
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