Benefits of the Integration of eCommerce in LMS

It often happens that people give a lot of importance and value to creating a perfectly balanced and content-rich online course, followed by marketing efforts that establish your online presence so people become aware of who you are and what you have to offer. What people forget or ignore is choosing the right eCommerce tool for selling these online courses to the audience you attract as a result of the hard work you put into the marketing efforts. Choosing the right eCommerce learning management system solution for selling your online courses is something that is just as important, if not more, and should not be neglected.
When it comes to choosing an eCommerce platform for your needs, not just any will do. It should be one that is specific to digital content and is designed to meet the requirements that arise as a result of selling online courses. You could create courses using an LMS software and then use another e-commerce tool to sell them to your audience. It makes little to no sense to use two tools for tasks that can be achieved with one. An LMS can be integrated with an eCommerce tool to form a single platform where you can create, manage, and sell your online courses. It opens the door to new levels of efficiency, user satisfaction, and convenience that you might not be able to get with a dedicated eCommerce system that works separately from your LMS.
eCommerce Integration into an LMS and What It Means
To put it in the simplest terms, an eCommerce platform provides you with the tools and functionalities that enable you to sell your products online. When it comes to selling online courses, the product in question is a digital product and involves more than just a simple download. The ideal course of action is to perform course creation, management, and selling right from your learning management system, which requires integration of your software with an eCommerce tool.
eCommerce integration in an LMS means the fusion of the two systems so that their functionalities are combined. This fused eCommerce learning management system remains a single system to the user, offering the combined features and functionalities of both. There are a lot of services available today for doing this but a large number of these compromise on the simplicity of the system which is an important requirement. The goal is to provide learners with quality learning material and at the same time make the interface and modules simple enough to encourage engagement and usability.
Features of an eCommerce Integrated LMS
The whole point of eCommerce integration with an LMS is to promote usability. Following are some features that you can expect or should look for when making your choice of an LMS and an eCommerce platform to go with it. These features are also what make your online courses easy to integrate into a workflow both for you and your students/learners.
Single Sign-On (SSO)
A single sign-on lets your users log in to their LMS account and access all their course content and make purchases on the online store with just a single login. The information that is used for logging into the LMS also logs them into the online store. Sometimes the options to save payment data is also available so users can easily and quickly make additional purchases if they want to.
Automatic Enrollment
Auto-enrollment means that every user is automatically enrolled and registered as soon as they complete the purchase. The system identifies payment and enrolls the users, oftentimes directing them to the course homepage. Automatic enrollment saves admins time and eliminates enrollment errors.
Discounts and Variable Pricing
If an existing user wins a coupon or prize of some sort, it is automatically remembered by the system so that the user can make use of it at the online store. Similarly, you may want to offer discounts to a specific set of users or offer variable pricing to clients depending on whether or not they are members. The option to allow for bulk purchasing can also be added for your B2B clients.
Variety of Payment Options
You can offer your customers multiple payment options so that they can use the one that best suits them. Limiting them to certain specific payment methods can be discouraging for customers and might drive them away, which is the opposite effect of what you’re trying to produce. 
Direct Purchases Straight from the LMS
Though you have integrated an eCommerce platform with your LMS, to all the users of the system including admins and learners or customers, it is a single system. A benefit of doing so is that your users can buy additional courses right from within the LMS without having to leave it or perform further logins.
Auto Account Creation
An integrated eCommerce learning management system increases possibilities massively. It helps you save administrative time in ways a dedicated eCommerce platform never can. By integrating your eCommerce tool and LMS in one system with other external systems like HRIS, CRM, ARM, etc., it gives you the option to automatically create new user accounts. Other tasks and processes can also be automated, like automatically registering new users for certain courses that might be mandatory, or setting up rules and attributes that automatically register users for specific courses based on their profiles.
These are some features that one can expect to avail from the integration of an eCommerce tool with your LMS. Selling your courses that you’ve put so much effort and time into creating is a great way of earning some extra bucks and increasing your company revenue, maybe even turning a profit as a result.