Ordering online is exciting and convenient, and these days, many customers prefer it to walking or driving to their local store.
As a business, you’re probably already making use of this trend and offer your products for shipment online. But when it comes to deliveries, there is a lot to consider to ensure customer satisfaction.
Nothing turns customers away as fast as late deliveries and lousy communication. Luckily there are a few easy steps any growing company can take to ensure their shipments are hasslefree.
Follow these four tips to improve your shipping process and keep your buyers happy from the moment they click purchase, to the ringing of their doorbell!
1. Let Customers Know When Their Parcel Will Arrive
When ordering online, customers are anxious to know that their delivery will arrive safely and at the right time. Uncertainty as to the whereabouts of their much-anticipated parcels adds nothing but the anxiety to their customer experience!
Even if your delivery usually is fast and reliable, if buyers can’t predict the delivery date before confirming the purchase, they might not go through with the transaction. After all, no one wants to waste their money on something that might not arrive on time.
Provide an estimated delivery date at checkout to avoid this and send out confirmation emails to notify your buyers when an order is confirmed and shipped.
While these notifications usually only get a passing glance, they provide some security in knowing their payment and order has been properly processed.
By sending a confirmation, you can avoid worried customers calling you up to make sure everything is in order.
A great way to keep your buyers informed is adding a tracking service to your website. This should allow customers to enter their order number and check where their delivery is.
This also makes sure that the buyer will be in when the parcel arrives and there is less cause for trouble or complaint.
Customers who are well informed are less likely to stress over the delivery, and more likely to trust your business. So keep them posted. It’s easy and produces excellent results!
2. Provide the Right Kind of Packaging
Packaging can get expensive. So when you wrap up deliveries, make sure the parcel is only as big as it has to be. Not only will you look sustainable and practical to your customers, but you’ll also save money on unnecessary material.
Depending on the volume of your shipments, you may also find some free packaging services to make the process cheaper and more accessible. USPS, for example, offers free packaging for a variety of boxes and shapes, including shoeboxes and tubes.
You can also wow customers by ensuring your products are branded and well designed. Nice-looking packaging makes it more of an experience to receive products from your store and will delight your customers.
It’s always worth spending the extra effort to look professional!
3. Offer Several Delivery Options
Prepare your shipping process to allow for several delivery options that your customers can choose from, and make them aware of these at check out.
If buyers can’t have their parcel delivered on a day they’re free, they might take their business to a different company.
With the e-commerce juggernaut that is Amazon lingering just around the corner, smaller businesses have to keep up to retain their customers by offering a similar level of service. Free and fast shipping is part of that.
Try to include at least some options for free shipping above minimum orders with FedEx or UPS.
3. Research Your Couriers
Your courier service is going to play an enormous role in your customer’s satisfaction. To deliver products when promised, you should be able to rely on a service that fulfills your items quickly.
Make a list of couriers that deliver to the areas you are operating in and be sure to compare them thoroughly.
Remember, your courier is going to be the one in contact with your customers as well, so a friendly attitude and excellent customer service is vital! Otherwise, it may reflect negatively on you and your product.
4. Streamline Your Shipping Process
If your shipping process is chaotic and unreliable, you could lose time, money, and trust from your customers.
For everything to arrive on time, every time, your process needs to run smoothly.
Here are a few ways to do that:
We recommend making a list of your current procedures and seeing what works and what doesn’t. Make sure there is a system in place for informing your packers when an order is placed.
Perhaps they receive an SMS notification or even a call to update them on the details of the order.
Have a variety of boxes and packaging readily available to wrap products quickly. Dispensers for tape and labels are an excellent way to contribute to this.
Write a shipping checklist that your staff can refer back to so everything is in place and nothing gets missed. This will streamline the tasks in order and ensure everyone follows the same reliable procedure.
Keep your warehouse tidy and itemize your products by location. Its essential items can be found simply and easily. Use barcode and wireless scanners to locate your merchandise faster and keep track of everything that’s shipped or relocated.
Ready to Send out the Next Order?
We hope you might have spotted a few new tips that can help you optimize your shipping process. Your customers will love the hassle-free deliveries and reliable convenience of your online shopping experience!
For help with this please feel free to reach out and contact us!