Order fulfilment strategies are becoming more than important amid the times inundated with global supply chain challenges.
Direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands are accustomed to managing the purchase process in its entirety – advertising/ promotion, product details, confirmation emails. However, once the buyer request has been verified, delivery, and maybe even order picking and packaging (for e-Commerce businesses practising drop-shipping) are performed by a third party.
This may be stressful for e-Commerce brands that work hard to establish long-term partnerships with their customers, rendering the customer journey simple and easy.
With situations as unpredictable, destabilised, and volatile, as they are because of the current pandemic, fulfilment providers are seeking creative strategies to overcome these challenges while avoiding severe revenue losses. When well-planned and mindfully executed, order fulfilment strategies can be one of the most potent antidotes to pandemic problems.
If you’re new with the word, order fulfilment strategy refers to the collection of procedures, processes, and technology used by an order fulfilment company to streamline supply and logistics affairs.
- The Multi-Stage Order Fulfilment Process
Order fulfilment is a multi-stage process. These phases will get more complex to tackle as your e-Commerce business scales higher and grow exponentially. Many companies choose to collaborate with a Third-party logistics (or 3PL) company to lighten the responsibility and expedite productivity.
Generally, the delivery service involves the following steps:
- Receiving inventory
- Storing inventory
- Order fulfilment
- Packaging
- Shipping
- Delivery
- Returns processing
To keep pace in a saturated e-commerce fulfilment marketplace, each milestone must be meticulously planned and performed. Therefore, are there some order fulfilment solutions that we may use to prevent the predicaments of COVID-19 in 2022 and optimise the procedure stated above?
- Last Mile Order Fulfilment Tactics & Delivery Trends
The last mile of delivery represents around 50% of your expenditures, making it an ideal area to enhance efficiency and save costs. Last-mile carries are an excellent method to dump the majority of those expenditures.
- Confirmation of Order & Delivery
Consumers enjoy receiving purchase confirmation emails and being kept up to date on the order status. Maintaining frequent interaction with clients through shipping emails and delivery notifications is yet another terrific strategy to increase client satisfaction all the while enabling you in efficiently manage in-progress shipments.
These emails are also an effective practice to try to complete another transaction by giving the buyer another chance to connect with your business. And, because this is a confirmation email, they are generally thinking positively of your company during this engagement, boosting the possibility of repeated purchases.
- Satisfying Customer Service Expectations
Maintaining delivery timeframes is by far among the most difficult pandemic concerns. Sometimes customers are hesitant to wait for shipments or work under ambiguous deadlines. Whereas the “we are all in this together” hyperbole around COVID-19 sounds pleasant, the rhetoric does not apply to order fulfilment companies. For instance, just 21% of consumers are prepared to pardon shops for service outages caused by COVID-19.
Having said that, meeting the delivery expectations of customers is critical. It is easier than it sounds, however, there are solutions one may leverage to resolve these problems. To begin, establish your carrier ecosystem for last-mile fulfilment. Collaborating with numerous carriers who will subcontract the task assigned to them – and that’s OK. What matters the most is that you can always precisely track your products day in and day out.
Another idea is to keep your clients informed of the status of their packages around the clock. Thus, in instances of a delay, your clients will not be surprised, making them less likely to cancel or abandon your e-Commerce business in the future.
Ultimately, you must revise your online delivery standards to be more realistic than ever before. If it involves adding a day or two to delivery times, do it: you are likely to retain most customers with minimal delivery timeframe add-ons. However, missing a delivery window is a definite approach to irritate customers and tempt them to take their business prospects somewhere else.
Bottom Line
A successful e-Commerce company relies on accurate and fast order fulfilment. To keep ahead of the pack, you must control end-to-end costs, adopt efficient practices, and master the whole order fulfilment process.
There are several methods for getting orders into the hands of your buyers. And, a combo of fulfilment solutions is generally the best option for an emerging e-Commerce business. Therefore, as your online business expands, search for scalable, as-needed fulfilment choices that allow you to extend volume while keeping expenses under control.
Vareya BV – Your Partner for Every Order Fulfilment Strategy
The e-commerce fulfilment market is going through a rough patch right now. The pandemic-related challenges, as well as, other supply chain dilemma, have made fulfilment more difficult and dangerous than it has ever been. However, by partnering with a competent 3PL provider, you can grow accustomed to these volatile environments and avert the likelihood of customer or revenue loss.
Vareya BV provides full-service e-commerce fulfilment from the Netherlands, including cutting-edge Warehouse Management Software (WMS) and solutions. Even in these trying situations, we make goods tracking and inventory management simple and easy. We will also assist your company by automating product warehousing, preparation, shipment, sorting, and packaging!
Contact us immediately, and one of our advisors will design a workable order fulfilment strategy that will help your business expand.
To book a free consultation, call +31(0)76 3030540 or email info@vareya.nl.
