Amazon would be your choice for the e-commerce king, if you had to name one.
It’s an incredible business that has raised the bar for customer satisfaction in the industry.
Fast shipment is one of the main differentiators they work to achieve.
Amazon has established a number of challenging delivery goals over time. They pushed for delivery in three days, two days, and finally the same day.
Just pause and consider that for a moment.
You must compete with a business that can ship a product the same day from its warehouse to a customer’s door.
That’s fantastic for the consumer, but it’s difficult to top that.
Amazon is a fierce competitor for many eCommerce businesses, including multinational ones. They just lack the infrastructure necessary to provide their consumers with deliveries as quickly as Amazon.
One of several factors contributing to the company’s rapid growth is this.
Nevertheless, you shouldn’t give up.
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Some of the best practices for eCommerce shipping will be covered in this article.
Additionally, you’ll learn how to apply these best practices within your company.
This guide on eCommerce shipping best practices will teach you the following things, among other things:
- Why you should build a shipping crew and how it will help you financially.
- Find out how to develop a shipping plan and how to evaluate your development.
- Find out if multi-carrier shipping is appropriate for your company.
- Utilize the customer retention technique used by Amazon to learn how to keep your customers satisfied.
- That is but a sample of what you will discover. Continue reading to learn 9 ecommerce shipping best practices that can help you impress clients and expand your clientele.
Assemble a shipping crew
The easiest method to enhance any aspect of your company’s operations is to assign someone to take the fall for anything.
You establish accountability when you delegate responsibility.
That, in a nutshell, is the reason you require a shipping crew.
Ecommerce shipping is a topic that affects several company divisions. Your shipping strategy has an influence on your costs, business operations, sales, marketing, and customer service. Your team should ideally include members from each department.
It must at the very least have a senior project manager on staff.
The shipping team should convene regularly and establish attainable objectives. Additionally, they must monitor their progress and report their findings to the board or the company’s creator.
Competitive research and benchmarking
You must evaluate your position in relation to the competition before establishing corporate goals. Setting internal goals and performing competitive research are necessary for this.
Let’s start with competition research.
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You prefer to believe in your greatness. I believe you are correct.
But it doesn’t imply that prospective clients are aware of your brilliance (is that even a word?).
Competitor research is crucial for this reason. It enables you to comprehend how people view your business and what you can do to improve perceptions.
Let me offer you a delivery example for online stores.
Man carrying a package
Imagine…
Mediocre Incorporated is one of your main rivals. Customers are charged more for shipping. They typically need five days to transport goods from their warehouse to clients’ doors.
The majority of individuals will hesitate before using Mediocre Incorporated.
Superstar Limited, on the other hand, offers free shipping on all items. Deliveries from their warehouse to the clients’ doors typically take two days.
Most likely, I’d purchase stuff from Superstar Limited.
You may learn how you stack up against other companies in your niche by conducting competitor research.
Invest time in studying your rivals. See how soon they deliver to your door by making test purchases. Examine their prices, etc.
There are several approaches of studying and analyzing competitors. Among the models I suggest is a SWOT analysis.
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SWOT Analysis stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. You can use a SWOT analysis to compare your eCommerce shipping against other companies.
Next up is internal benchmarking.
Setting standards is crucial in business. Benchmarks help you assess your current performance. Before developing your eCommerce shipping strategy, you need to assess how you’re currently doing.
You will want to know, for example:
- What is the average customer delivery time?
- What is your refund rate due to damaged goods?
- How much does shipping a product cost on average?
- How much do you spend packaging a product on average?
You get the idea.
Spend time conducting competitor analysis and benchmarking. Once you have gathered the relevant data, get your shipping team to set realistic goals.
Keep in mind that benchmarking and competitor analysis are continual processes.
At least once a quarter, set aside some time to review the competition. Benchmarking to assess your performance against your goals needs to happen more frequently.
Set SMART, practical objectives.
Now comes the enjoyable part: brainstorming time.
Your shipping team must create a strategy to enhance and track shipments.
You must consider every potential improvement to shipment. The next step is to choose the items that will add the most value.
When evaluating your alternatives, keep the following in mind:
- How much will it cost to put the policy into effect?
- How challenging will the implementation be?
- What advantages will customers receive?
- What advantages will your business enjoy?
I advise evaluating each concept in light of those issues. You can assign a grade between 1 and 5. The easiest and most beneficial is number five. One is challenging or of little worth.
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Rate each thought. Add up the scores after that.
These insights may be used to rank the tactics that have the greatest impact.
Next, make realistic goals to help you reach your objectives. Utilizing the SMART method is wise. SMART objectives are clear, quantifiable, attainable, pertinent, and time-bound.
You need to do more for your company than just work hard and wish for the best.
Your ambitions should inspire you, not depress you. In order to evaluate your performance, you need goals that you can measure and quantify.
Below, you can see the distinction between a good goal and a terrible goal.
By January 1, cut average shipment time from three to two days.
Increase delivery times
You will fail if you don’t define what “improving” really means.
Multi-carrier vs single carrier
You will rely on your carriers to deliver goods to your clients if you run a small to medium-sized eCommerce business.
Therefore, choosing a carrier is one of the most crucial decisions you must make.
Spend some time contrasting various carriers.
The carrier you choose will rely on the requirements and objectives of your company. Important things to think about include:
- Product Type to Be Shipped
- Locations for pickup and delivery
- tracking service they offer Dimensions and weight of the package
- preferred time of delivery
- Do they exclude certain items?
- They offer insurance, right?
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Compare the various carrier choices. Some online retailers will select just one courier. It is simpler to work with a single carrier. You have more negotiation power since you just have to deal with one business.
The downside is that it raises dangers. After all, you’re shipping your entire shipment to one business.
In some cases, a single carrier may be more expensive than a rival carrier. Alternatively, they provide less services than a rival.
Think carefully before deciding whether to utilize a single carrier or the multi-carrier option. Choose the eCommerce shipping strategy that is best appropriate for your company.
Be open and honest about shipping prices.
People’s purchase choices are significantly influenced by the cost of delivery. High cart abandonment rates are typically the result of expensive shipping and lengthy delivery periods. Some businesses conceal delivery expenses in an effort to increase sales.
This approach fails, as seen by the graph below.
Regarding what people may anticipate from your business, you must be open and honest with your audience. This include disclosing freight costs and emphasizing delivery dates.
Keeping your price and procedure open and honest promotes trust.
You may, for instance, explain that you provide slow shipment because it helps the consumer. Customers that really must have speedier delivery can pay more for it.
Customers will be understanding as long as you offer decent service. People dislike being made to feel tricked.
Expedited shipment versus free shipping
Amazon should be held accountable for making eCommerce delivery a headache. The business invented rapid delivery and free shipping. Clients adore them for it.
Free and expedited shipment will increase the cost to your company. However, putting these regulations into place might increase revenue for your business. Identifying those opportunities requires determining where they are located.
Examine your profit margins and transportation costs for various products. Don’t forget to consider order volumes as well. Would you make money, for instance, if you were delivering 1,000 units per day?
Having a long-term perspective may require taking a financial loss today in order to expand more quickly and benefit later. What Amazon does is that. You can determine when you may offer free or expedited shipping using this approach.
Once you have the data, you may conduct tests or just put customer-friendly tactics into practice. After all, anything that enhances customer satisfaction often encourages sustained development.
Select and enhance your package
The packing is a crucial consideration when thinking about best practices for eCommerce delivery. To safeguard things during shipping and storage, a variety of packing options are available.
Your choice of packaging must fit both your demands and your budget.
The packaging must be tailored to match your product perfectly.
The simple explanation for this is that major carriers charge you based on the weight and dimensions of your cargo. Below is the dimensional weight formula they use to calculate costs.
Optimizing the packaging dimensions for the products you are shipping can reduce package costs and shipping costs.
Of course, you want the item to be undamaged when it is delivered to the destination. That means providing sufficient padding around the product in the form of void filler.
Value engineereed packaging can help further lower shipping costs. It’s the process of designing packaging from the ground up for a specific product, minimising the amount of material used, while maximising security.
Use attractive packaging
The design of your package and how it’s presented can have a huge impact on a customer’s initial impression of the product. Need proof of this?
Check out one of the unboxing channels on YouTube. Many of these channels get tens of thousands of views per video.
Effective package design will aid your marketing efforts.
It appeals to customers and offers a memorable customer experience, as well as acting as an extension of your company’s identity. In that sense, it’s a marketing channel.
Consider investing in personal touches too.
Personalised thank you cards with mailing bag and package
For example, including a handwritten letter with a product is a great way of saying thanks for trusting us with your hard-earned money.
Have a great return policy
Returning products is a pain. You often need to deal with customer service, explain why you need to return the product, and actually send the product back. It’s no surprise many people hate the process.
A fair return policy is a great way to reduce that friction. It also helps you build trust with your customers.
Your return policy should be simple to understand, with clear rules, restrictions, and allowances. For instance, customers need under what conditions they may return items. It’s also a good idea to create a return process for your customers.
KAY, for example, includes instructions on how to return things on the return page.
Providing clear instructions is great. You can make the process of returning goods easier by providing free return shipping.
Your customers will appreciate you doing small things like this. It leaves a good impression, which can translate into glowing customer testimonials.
Conclusion
An essential component of every eCommerce operation is shipping. Where the physical and digital worlds converge is in shipping. Your shipping rules affect your clients’ perceptions of you for a long time, therefore you must do it right.