5 Costly Delivery Mistakes Every eCommerce Retailer Should Avoid!

Common E-commerce Mistakes That Everyone Should Be Aware Of

72% of consumers are likely to transfer companies following a single unfavorable encounter, even though a single package return may cost up to 66% of the original item price. To provide excellent customer experiences (CX), a key differentiator such as eCommerce delivery management platform is significant.

Improving shipping procedures is a smart move for any size online business, not just those who are just getting started. Ultimately, a neatly wrapped product that is delivered on schedule enhances the customer experience and builds your company's reputation. One of the most important factors in determining the value of any e-commerce company is shipment and delivery, which is also one of the main areas where last-minute disruptions can occur and cause miscommunication with customers. Several of them are enumerated as follows:

1Excessive Wrapping

Packaging has a significant impact on e-commerce. According to a recent Google survey, one in five customers has watched an "unboxing" video, and 62% of those viewers did so to learn more about the product. Successful brands combine customer-centric delivery strategy when deciding how to package their products. However, one size does not fit everyone. Although larger packaging may provide better protection, it is more expensive to buy, ship, and may annoy consumers with tight spaces.

It's always about size. Use slightly larger materials than what is being transported because shipping costs are determined by both weight and size. Even a 1-centimeter error in package size might result in significant cost increases when using excessively large or heavy items.

Make use of lightweight materials and stay up to date with packaging innovations. Mailers can be a wonderful substitute for boxes for smaller things, especially when delivering lightweight, durable goods. Each product will cost less to ship if you invest in packaging solutions that are specifically made to give maximum performance with minimal size. More significantly, over time, you'll also be lowering the cost of materials.

2Inadequate Communication in Case of Last-Minute Abruptions

In the age of rapid satisfaction, unforeseen last-minute disruptions can happen. Lack of direct contact between your delivery staff and clients may cause misunderstandings and discontent. If riders are unable to get in contact with the consumer, they may be left in the dark about what to do next if the customer is not available to accept the order or arrives at the incorrect address.
Multiple escalations result from such circumstances, including unsuccessful deliveries, delivery retries, needless RTOs, and the much-feared client discontent.

By utilizing delivery management solutions, which provide riders and end users with a dependable, safe, and secure communication channel, retailers can quickly address these issues. These solutions provide built-in features for the rider apps, like the ability to provide delivery instructions for customers, chat and phone them on disguised numbers, and one-click delivery options like "call at this number" or "don't press the bell."

All of these capabilities increase customer satisfaction, rider satisfaction, delivery dependability, and success rates while effortlessly resolving unforeseen hiccups.

3Incorrect address

Bad data is one of the common ecommerce mistakes. Incorrect address input during the checkout process may compromise both the sale and the delivery, not to mention the expenses incurred in returning the goods to you.

Of course, that's when the costs start to mount up. When an order is incorrectly processed the first time, it takes longer for customer service to locate the order details, for a supervisor to approve a fresh shipment or return, for warehouse staff to pack or refill the order, and for additional packaging and shipping costs.

The price of a single miskeystroke. You therefore require an address verification eCommerce marketplace platform. To ensure that deliveries are sent to the correct location on the first attempt, AVS programs verify and update your client information. This verification procedure can help online shops cut down on checkout mistakes while also improving conversion rates. Using address verification to have forms automatically fill out as soon as sufficient identifying information is submitted is one method of achieving this.

How to handle it. Take initiative. Inaccurate or partial client address information is essentially eliminated by Canada Post's AddressCompleteTM service.

4No Options for Scheduling

According to a recent survey, 70% of consumers want flexible delivery schedules. As a result, businesses risk losing out on possibilities to satisfy customers by not providing options for delivery and scheduling. Giving customers the option to plan deliveries increases first-attempt delivery rates while also providing delivery flexibility. This is one of the ecommerce mistakes to avoid.

Additionally, offering a variety of delivery choices to their customers—curbside pickups, in-store pickups, delivery during business hours, etc.—improves the general customer experience. With built-in automation for delivery orchestration, intelligent delivery management solutions provide merchants with a range of capabilities, including robust customer communication, various delivery alternatives, and delivery scheduling for better last-mile movements.

5Ignoring Operational Integration

Operations that aren't coordinated can result in waste and inconsistent consumer experiences. Inadequate integration of your eCommerce platform with logistical operations, vendor and customer management, shipment lifecycle management, etc., can lead to orders being mishandled, bad customer experience, and eventually, decreased sales.

Delivery operations can be transformed by utilizing intelligent eCommerce delivery management platforms with flexible features including order administration, carrier and vehicle management, rider leadership, managing clients, analytics and reporting, and immediate leadership capabilities. Retailers may give a genuinely seamless and easy sell-buy-return experience by integrating the platforms with multiple third parties.

Are you starting an ecommerce business? Reduce the time for deliveries. By implementing third-party logistics (3PL), you may optimize your delivery process without having to make costly investments in fulfillment personnel, transport equipment, or infrastructure. Use all of your inventory, no matter where it is located, by filling orders from the stores or warehouses nearest to each customer, for example.

A 3PL supplier will enable you to increase revenue, expedite delivery, and save a significant amount of money on shipping.

6Undervaluing the Management of Returns

Ecommerce delivery management platforms require returns, and disorganized returns handling procedures can harm both operational effectiveness and customer confidence. The inability to provide simple and dependable returns might result in direct customer attrition, even when unwanted returns are considered overhead operational expenditures.

Effective administration of all return-related activities and events is necessary to ensure safe, dependable, and profitable returns. This includes providing a variety of return alternatives as well as handling return pickups, consolidation, and reconciliation. It is not possible to accomplish all of this in delivery management solutions that is manually or fragmentarily controlled. Consequently, it is imperative to invest in a SaaS platform that guarantees hassle-free and clearly explained returns, in line with a brand's promise of a genuinely smooth shopping experience.

Perfect 3-Way Methodology to Manage eCommerce Order Fulfillment

There are four main approaches that retailers can plan for order fulfillment and common ecommerce mistakes to avoid. However, not all models can support your long-term expansion strategies because they each have advantages and disadvantages and are only appropriate for specific use situations. Let's take a closer look at these retail e commerce market models:

Self-Fulfillment

The most common model for fulfilling orders for eCommerce is self-fulfillment, in which companies handle all aspect of fulfillment in-house. This covers packing, shipping, refunds, inventory control, order processing, and storage. It indicates that brands process orders using their storage facilities.

Since the self-fulfillment approach cannot be scaled, it has greater drawbacks. This approach is only applicable to new companies that are still searching for a reliable customer-centric delivery strategy partner. Limited resources and fulfillment capabilities are no longer able to sustain business growth once they begin to expand.

Drop Shipping

Under the drop-shipping approach, the vendor never stores inventory with them as the wholesaler or manufacturer distributes the product directly to the client. Orders placed by clients on the website are therefore sent straight to manufacturers and suppliers. After then, the producers must process orders from their own facilities and distribute them to clients.

Regretfully, in the long run, this model is likewise not optimal. Vendors lose out on the chance to build brands through their items since they have no control over inventory. Furthermore, because this paradigm gives no control over inventory, it also makes scaling difficult.

3PL Fulfillment

One of the most effective e-commerce delivery management solutions is third-party fulfillment. Here, retailers contract with a third party that offers access to warehouses, inventory management systems, shipping, and reverse logistics to handle their fulfillment operations.

When vendors choose to work with a third-party fulfillment partner, these third-party logistics companies handle all aspect of their eCommerce order fulfillment business. 3PL service providers utilize automated eCommerce delivery management platforms and trained resources to ensure seamless fulfillment operations and SLA adherence.

Third-party logistics businesses can be approached by retailers and eCommerce sellers to form agreements. Temperature-controlled supply chain management, B2B and B2C order processing, and other customized fulfillment solutions are provided by every 3PL service provider.

By leveraging their intelligent eCommerce logistics infrastructure, online enterprises can increase their revenue more quickly. eCommerce marketplace platforms have several advantages, some of which are listed below:

• Improved growth outlook
• Meet sales peaks with ease
• Simple to attain scalability
• Builds brands and provides access to improved infrastructure
• Increased likelihood of meeting client expectations
• Increases one's competitiveness

Combining two or more of the fulfillment models mentioned above results in a hybrid model and avoid common ecommerce mistakes. For example, a shop might decide to handle the fulfillment of popular products in-house and contract them out during peak sales periods, holidays, and sales rushes, or the manufacturer might decide to ship large orders straight to customers' doorsteps.

You Live, You Learn: Unlock Quickorders Advantage!

Avoiding these five delivery errors is essential to preserving customer pleasure, brand loyalty, and operational excellence as the eCommerce industry changes. Nevertheless, this would necessitate a very intelligent and powerful set of technological capabilities that can provide integrated delivery process management. CXOs, retailers, and eCommerce organizations can create a robust and customer-focused delivery strategy by emphasizing fast returns management, direct rider-customer communication, automated validation checks, and seamless integration of operations. Making a seamless and dependable delivery experience a top priority will help the company stay in the competitive industry by retaining customers with a customer-centric delivery strategy and positioning it for long-term success.

You should be concerned about starting an ecommerce business to complete orders, offer reliable customer support, appropriately price your goods, facilitate a seamless onboarding experience, offer affordable shipping, and more. An eCommerce firm can succeed or fail based on all of these factors. Now, these expensive errors can be unsettling. However, this is not necessary! To make sure that your company doesn't make these typical eCommerce errors, get in touch with an agency with eCommerce experience.

• Quickorders provide end-to-end support for all fulfillment requirements, including shipping, delivery, inventory control, and warehousing.
• Quickorders gives companies a single interface that they can use to accurately and quickly manage all last-minute disruptions. The logistics management platform driven by AI enables simple order fulfillment.
• Advanced data analytics and state-of-the-art AI/ML algorithms enable deeper insights into the entire operating process.
• By automating every aspect of eCommerce order fulfillment, customers are enabled to optimize their use of time and resources.
• Planning inventories, streamlining operations, optimizing resources, tracking data in real time, scaling, and delivering a pleasant customer experience therefore become second nature.

To learn more information on Quickworks automated delivery management solutions, please contact our experts right now.

Frequently Asked Questions(FAQs)