With a reported 95% of Americans shopping online at least once yearly and a quarter of shoppers having purchased online from a physical storefront, it’s important to recognize the value shipping has on your business. Using the checklist below, kick-start your business right with action-oriented shipping goals that can help your business be more efficient and more profitable in the year ahead.
Extra Shipping Tips To Think On:
- Take the Time for Carrier Contract Negotiation
- Incorporate Multi-Carriers into Your Shipping Strategy
- Lean on Data to Increase Your Shipping Efficiencies
- Introduce Parcel Auditing into Your Shipping Management
- Identify What Shipping Insurance Policy May Make Sense for Your Business
As everything online becomes even more complicated and competitive, to keep platform matrix up enough to even have the slightest chance of your items coming up in search, Ship On Time if Not Faster.
Now this sounds like an easy enough chore andwith a large percentage of sales no problem.
Yet sometimes the matrix for shipping requires difficult decisions. I come across this the most on eBay. On the same hand if I don’t have too many issues, normally, sales can be good to some degree even with the “New eBay” when your shipping matrix is fast.
Basic example, you sell an item and it’s fine yet you notice a tiny corner of the package has a crinkle. Not a major crinkle as a matter of fact most would not even notice it. Yet if you write the buyer with an image to verify that the item is fine and they don’t reply within less than 24 hrs. Late or ship regardless?
Below are several things to help you Ship Fast, Correctly and On Time
Organization
This is probably the simple one to identify but the most complicated to do correctly.
Your Inventory
Even if you manufacture your own wares, stocking up on inventory or materials and having reserves should be a normal part of running your business. How big that reserve is, of course, depends on your product and how quickly you turn over that product. Having too much inventory in your warehouse is a classic mistake, and one of which you may be dealing with the most often.
The key here is balance. As a part of your normal business process, you should be running reports. How many orders you get. How many miss-ships and returns happen in a month. You should be able to quickly answer anyone who asks what your monthly revenue is as well as your normal stock levels, turnover rate, and fulfillment time. When you’re expecting a large spike in orders, these numbers are what will help you determine how much inventory you need to purchase or pre-make.
You’ll need to calculate the statistics on your products and the best ways to ship them to be able to make the most strategic decision possible. Once you settle on a type — or combination — of how you’re going to charge your customers for shipping, it’s always a good idea to go back in a few months and re-evaluate your strategy.
Your Shipping Station
As a part of your warehouse, even if it’s your spare room or garage, you should have some sort of shipping station. Depending on your particular setup, you should have at least a few of any business cards, inserts, blank labels, regular paper, or any other material that is part of your normal shipping process. Make sure to have extra on hand of every type of material you need as a part of your shipping process.
For the actual station, make sure everything is in its place and that any hiccup you have during your normal shipping time is immediately addressed to make your process more efficient. Maybe this means hanging a white board with important information.
Supplies and Packages
You do not have to spend a fortune buying a whole bunch of different types of boxes for first class or priority shipping.
You can order all of your priority shipping supplies free from United States post office and I highly recommend you do that. However make sure that you use the boxes in the proper recommended way.
First class or odd sized items you can easily take cardboard boxes that you get from the store where you do your source shopping or even your grocery store got the cardboard into patterns and simply make your own boxes. Keywebco has been doing this for a very long time and saves thousands of dollars. The advantages are lower overhead costs equals lower buyer price tags which inevitably leads to higher volumes of sales increasing profits.
Make sure you use plenty of bubble wrap or protective wrapping. This is the only way that you can ensure that the items do not arrived damaged. No matter how well you pack still you will have a few items arrived damaged by the post office.
Quality Controls
At Keywebco we do video inspections three times minimum on every item.
First inspection begins after the item is purchased and prepped for photographs.
Second inspection as well and it is pulled from the warehouse after sold. This is a quick video inspection to document the condition of it as it was removed from the shelf.
Third and most important video inspection is when the item is being shipped counted verified with the listing for the correct numbers including Vin numbers, UPC codes and quantities, colors, etc… at this point we make sure that the shipping label is visible in the video the items are visible in the package and the package being sealed is visible.
I cannot begin to tell you the difference this is made for my business.
Let’s take a quick peek at what I’m talking about.
In the past if I were to receive an email from a buyer saying that you sent me two items and I ordered three items how would I know what I actually did and how would I prove it. Bingo video!
Now this is helpful if you have a problem with the buyer but it is even more helpful in quality control. For A Fact you will know if you make an error with any shipment and you should be able to determine where that error was made based on the information in your videos.
When I first began my business I did not have video inspections. I had a good procedure in which to ship items with quality control by checking. Even still periodically and error was made.
Since establishing my video inspection method not only have I stopped several errors that would’ve gone out otherwise I have definitely greatly reduced the number of scams and false reports from a few bad buyers that resulted in losses.
An Order Comes In!
Get It!
Check It!
Protect It!
Ship It!
Double ASAP It!
It’s important to Offer Free Returns!
Your Customers Will Love Your Free Return Policy:
Product returns are already a major roadblock on the way to a smooth and satisfying customer experience, so by asking your customers to pay for return postage, you’re introducing more friction and hassle into the process.
Free Product Returns Encourage Conversions & Boost Sales:
E-Commerce is a numbers game and if you’re like most retailers, your conversion rate floats around an average of 1% to 3%.
Everybody’s Doing it! Customers Expect Free Returns:
Thanks to services like Amazon Prime consumers not only expect speedy shipping, they expect it for free and the same applies for return shipping.
Free returns and exchanges are becoming a standard throughout E-Commerce, in fact a National Retail Federation Study found that about 59% of retailers currently offer free return shipping.
To remain competitive in today’s customer centric retail space your business must proactively employ policies like free returns shipping.
Free return shipping doesn’t have to apply to your entire product catalogue. By segmenting your return policy to apply to various you’re protecting yourself against financial loss and return fraud, while reaping the benefits of free return shipping.
Here are some ideas of how you can segment your return policy to offer free returns for select products and situations:
Offer free return shipping for only full price items
Free return shipping during the holiday season
List items as Final Sale
Return shipping depending on item category
While a free returns policy has numerous benefits, it’s also important to consider the some of the disadvantages of free returns before implementing changes.
To best handle a large number of orders, you need to group them into batches of a common definition. This something could be its location in your warehouse, shipping method/speed, carrier, package size, or even something as simple as color and size. Batching your orders together will give your shipments a point of common ground so that they’re easier to manage. This will also give you smaller chunks of orders to manage so you get constantly rewarded with completing something rather than slaving away at some giant list the entire day.
Whatever method of sorting you choose needs to also be compounded with time. When you create a batch, think of it as “locked:” it should not change even if a new, similar order comes in. Disrupting your shipping process will only cause you time. Time to go find that new order. Time to add its information to your group of shipments. Time that you could’ve spent more efficiently on a new batch, or on the next step of your current one.
Generally, each batch could be given to a person on your team, but of course, that can get complicated if you only have one printer, for instance. This is where the assembly line idea comes to fruition where each person takes a portion of the batch, and then completes their part so that it all comes together in the end.
Once you do decide on a process, don’t be afraid of changes. If something’s not working, fix it. If something could be done to make it more efficient or easier for you and your helpers, do it. One of the fun things about ecommerce is how it’s always changing; don’t let your processes fall behind the times.
Keywebco
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