Category: Logistics

To all e-commerce retailers, you can’t afford to take a vacation when it comes to delivering customer experience.

E-commerce delivery trends is exploited almost by every nook and corner in India.

Then what difference do you make to stand out from the crowd?

We are in the new industrial age of “experience economy” where customer experience is uber important for e-commerce success.

Customer prefers not just tangible product and product benefits but the overall delightful interaction they have with your brand.

A study says that the customer experience will overtake the product pricing as a critical competition and differentiation factor.

E-commerce customer experience is the next big thing which you must aim to compete for.

Customer experience is beyond only delivery experience. Delivery is just a part of it. Here I am going to discuss what contributes to providing a positive delivery experience to your customers.

However, what is a positive delivery experience from a customer’s point of view?

A study says that 56% of buyers prefer one retailer over another because of the flexible delivery options.

The delivery options they provided were more appealing and convenient.

Moreover, many of them confessed that they left the cart abandoned because there was no delivery choice.

This has been clear that retailers with better and convenient delivery options get an added advantage over others.

Provide clear communication at every point of purchasing journey

Customers expect a clear communication at every stage of their buying journey.

This includes and begins with the product page itself.

Most of the shoppers expect to see the delivery options clearly on the product page.

This becomes easy for customers to make a decision as per their requirement.

Retailers, let’s face this. Not everyone has time to wait long to receive the product.

There are people who willing to pay more to get the shipment on a specific day and time.

Then why not to give them the options?

More delivery options

Drive customer satisfaction

Reduces order cancellation

Order acknowledgement

Acknowledge once you confirm the customer order. This is to verify that the order has been successfully placed.

Send them the order confirmation email. This reduces the post-purchase anxiety from the customer and gives a sense of reliability for your brand.

Image source: My Gmail

Shipping confirmation

Shipping updates throughout the purchase journey keep your customers tuned with your product and brand.

Let your customers be excited about the order.

Include expected delivery date and time.

Image source: My Gmail

Order tracking

A majority of customers expect you to provide an order tracking facility.

The shoppers’ rate order tracking system as a vital part of the overall delivery and customer experience.

Image source: My Gmail

It helps to meet your customers’ need for accuracy. It keeps your customer informed throughout the entire fulfilment and delivery process.

Be proactive

Communicate at every fulfillment and delivery stage for a better E-commerce delivery trends

An active communication throughout the order journey builds customer trust.

This sets clear expectations about when the order will arrive. Effective communication helps to reduce the potential for order cancellation.

It boosts customer confidence and satisfaction.

Communicate when a problem occurs

Inform your customer when there is a delay or any other issue while delivering their shipment.

Communication is the key.

Let them know what exactly has happened and justify them. Apologize for the same.

Image source: my inbox

Increase successful delivery at one go with reminder and updates

“Deliver once, deliver right”

Deliver on-time as promised, this can make or break your brand’s reputation.

It is highly essential to the profitability of your online store.

Inform your customers clearly about when they can expect the shipment so that they can be present to collect the order or make necessary arrangements for the same.

In the end, the customer wants to receive their order on time with least hassle.

Moreover, keeping your customers informed is a plus point for you as well.

Frequent communications will help you to deliver the shipment at one go successfully.

Record post-purchase experience and improve the e-commerce delivery trends

Once you have successfully delivered the product to customers, request them to give feedback.

This gives your customers a feeling of being heard.

Furthermore, it helps you to improve your service and work on the areas which your customers have highlighted.

Image source: My Gmail

Rectify poor delivery experience

Poor delivery experiences hurt your online brand badly.

You can potentially lose customers who had lousy delivery experience with your brand.

In this digital age, disappointed customers will not mind broadcasting their reviews on websites and social media.

Moreover, when fulfilment goes wrong, it costs you an additional customer service cost to make it up for the bad experience.

In addition to this, 56% customers agree that online reviews influence their purchase decisions.

When a customer is raising their concern, respond to them. No matter whether you or the delivery partner is responsible for the bad experience, it is ultimately damaging your reputation.

Tips to handle negative customer reviews

1. Respond to every comment and review for your products and services. Listen to the customer patiently and make a sincere apology.

2. Be proactive. Do not frustrate your customers by asking them to contact you back.

3. Consider customers’ need and preferences and deliver the product as promised.

Search out and eliminate the areas where you are lacking.

Streamlining e-commerce delivery trends

Here, note that communication is the key. Your profitable online business can go wrong when you fail to provide a satisfactory product delivery.

I highly recommend considering logistics aggregator to streamline the delivery process for your online business.

Why logistics aggregator?

1. Choose from multiple courier partners

2. No platform setup fees

3. Sync orders with easy API integration

4. Shipment tracking from your dashboard

5. Receive COD remittances weekly

6. Competitive shipping rates

7. No minimum order commitments

So many more

Final words

Exploit every opportunity to maximize successful first-time delivery. Your online profitability is highly dependent on the successful delivery at one go.

Having the lowest price or sound quality products only won’t help you gain the customers. It takes more than just quality and price to beat the competition and stand out from the crowd.

Start thinking about how you can create an exceptional delivery experience for your customers when they visit your online store.

This can be made possible through the seamless integration of your e-commerce store with a reliable delivery partner.

Why do you need to know about e-commerce growth hacking? Unlike marketplaces, sellers with their own online stores have a different game. They have complete control over their business and its operations. Starting from brand building to the customer experience, they have the freedom to shape and maintain their image.

However, with this freedom, store owners may not have the expertise to scale it up and outperform.

In today’s world of e-commerce, there are thousands of ways to scale, some focus on product margins, whereas some focus of delivering better customer experience, some focus on the specific product line and the list go on.

Neither way is necessarily right or wrong.

Here are some of the best e-commerce growth hacking tips to make your online store a super success.

These tips cover how to shape buyers experience while opening new doors for the future of your online store.

1.Artificial intelligence and machine learning

One of the most important e-commerce growth hacking tip, AI and machine learning is the one that will have outrageous implications the way online sellers sell their products and the way customers buy them.

The visual search engine is one of the most talked about trends in e-commerce.

The key here is to utilize the combined power of the machine learning and Natural Language Processing (NLP).

This will help to understand the context of how your customers express their needs and requirements.

Image source: Slyce.it

Above image is equivalent to a thousand words explanation.

Personalised product recommendations:

Give your customers personalised product recommendations through recommendation signals which identify the preference of each customer. What products they are searching for, which category they prefer, the price they are comfortable with and so on.

Image source: Myntra

Make the shopping experience for your customers more interactive and pleasant with voice-powered personal shopping assistance.

“At Amazon, we’ve been engaged in the practical application of machine learning for many years now. Some of this work is highly visible: our autonomous Prime Air delivery drones; the Amazon Go convenience store that uses machine vision to eliminate checkout lines; and Alexa, our cloud-based AI assistant. However, much of what we do with machine learning happens beneath the surface. Machine learning drives our algorithms for demand forecasting, product search ranking, product and deals recommendations, merchandising placements, fraud detection, translations, and much more. Though less visible, much of the impact of machine learning will be of this type – quietly but meaningfully improving core operations.” – Jeff Bezos, Amazon CEO, Letter to Shareholders (2016)

AI and machine learning in e-commerce will profoundly impact the success of online stores.

With the introduction of artificial intelligence in e-commerce, it will change the way we buy and sell online.

2.Once your customer is ready to buy, remove every barrier

Dear e-commerce entrepreneurs, chasing abandoned cart is not at all easy.

Work on your checkout page. It is essential to keep the checkout page easy to go for your customers.

When it comes to shopping online, your website’s checkout page surpasses any other element concerning customer conversion.

Keep it extremely simple for your customers to reach to the order confirmation.

Once you have a customer, who is ready to buy from you, remove every obstacle that could stand in the way. This includes,

• Unnecessary form fields (keep them short)
• Consider using auto-completion of fields
• One-page checkout
• Keep it mobile optimized

Convert your site visitors into customers with a streamlined checkout page.

Let your checkout page least painful part of your customers’ e-commerce journey.

3.Get the basics right before jumping into new trends

Let me tell you, no tip will work if you miss the basics.

Before jumping into something new, do not forget what features are most important to your business?

So, what are the basics of an online store?

1. Good experience for mobile shoppers

2. Easy checkout process

3. Content management capabilities

4. High-resolution product images

5. Clear return policy

6. Detailed product description

7. Clear design and easy navigation

8. Search engine optimised code and layout

9. Multiple payment options

10. Promotion and discount code tools

11. Website security

To take your e-commerce website to the next level, you need to understand what is important and what not.

You might be excited to jump on new trends, but many e-commerce sites still struggle to meet the basic needs and make errors which affect their performance.

4.Talk to people

It is really really important to talk to your customers and respond to people fast on social media channels.

What is your average response time on social media channels?

Do you know poor response time is harming your social media engagement with your potential customers?

Research says that approximately 77% of people say that valuing their time is the most critical thing they expect from the companies.

Improve your social media average response time, because an instant response gives your customers a sense of responsibility towards your brand. So if not instant, at least respond within 30 minutes.

For Facebook, “very responsive to messages” badge is what you should aim for and to get this badge, you must follow these two things for seven days.

1. A response rate of 90%

2. An average response time of 15 minutes

This is a bragging point which your customers look at your website.

It represents that you respond consistently and quickly to the people’s queries.

Tips to improve average response rate & time:

1. Monitor your page inbox regularly throughout the day

2. Have a dedicated resource to manage social media page

3. Setup email alerts

Apart from social media engagement, you need to communicate to the audience, customers through emails.

Inform customers when their shipment is out for delivery, when delivered and so on.

It is imperative to talk to people no matter wherever they are and be there when they need your support.

Solve each query, no matter how negligible it may sound to you.

5.Protect your customers’ data

In the world of e-commerce, a number of transactions are taking place. For which you need access to consumers’ personal and financial data.

However, many users have concerns about providing such information.

It is highly recommending to take necessary steps to protect your customers’ data.

Avoid misusing, advertising purpose and unlawfully supplying customer data to third parties.

Stay on the top of the subject of customer data protection.

General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is the European Union’s new data protection law which will impact how big and small companies collect and manage users’ personal data.

There are some tips to ensure the safety for e-commerce owners and customers.

1. Collect only data which is necessary

2. Avoid storing customers’ credit card information

3. HTTP + SSL = HTTPS

4. Be PCI DSS compliant

5. Stay up to date regarding data security and protection laws

6. Demand strong password from customers

6.Take advantage of user-generated content

User-generated content allows online users to communicate and express their personal experience and opinions they had with your product.

SHIEN is one of the excellent examples of this.

Image source: Shien.in

It’s not only about Expressing the emotions; Online customers often create content because in return they get a reward that business offer.

If you have a tight budget, user-generated content allows you to develop fresh content on a regular basis with no additional cost involved.

Apart from this, there are many other reasons to consider UGC for your online store.

1. It helps to understand the target audience

2. Increases customer engagement

3. Builds community

4. Customer spends more time on your website

5. People trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations.

If leveraged correctly, user-generated content promotes customer engagement and also boost your brand visibility and reliability.

It improves site SEO and lead generation efforts.

7.Focus on re-engagement

Why do companies use “loyalty program”, “come back and receive a “free gift” programs?

The answer is customer re-engagement.

Alternatively, should I say repeat purchase?

Companies use these programs to re-engage/attract their existing customers.

Research says that attracting new customers is four times costlier than retaining current customers.

Well yeah, that is true.

It is easy for you because you already had multiple interactions with your customers in the past.

Moreover, if you have been successful in delivering a great shopping experience to them, then you are more likely to get a yes as an answer.

Also, it is easy for the customers too.

Because they already have made up their mind for your brand and its products.

Start win-back campaigns for your customers.

Reach-out to customers once they have stopped shopping from you.

Send them friendly reminders about your new products, styles.

Tatacliq is an excellent example of this.

Image source: My Gmail

Remember, conversion takes more than one touch-point. Recart is a recommended tool to engage in customer re-engagement activities.

8.Stick to four pillars

Trying to run and scale your e-commerce business is a big undertaking.

However, the irremovable factor to your success story is the aim for the ongoing growth.

I recommend the four pillars you need to stick to drive success.

1. Be obsessed with customer experience

Take care of your customers. If you do not treat them well, someone else likely will.

2. Innovate

Focus on being a company that creates value rather than merely transferring value.

3. Optimize every aspect of the business

Not only the sales and customer experience, but you also need to focus on every aspect of your business.

Optimization helps to reduce costs and lead to higher profits in this competitive era.

4. Repeat every single day

1. Do not underestimate the power of content marketing

Many retailers make the mistake of concentrating only on product benefits and functionality while selling their products.

Online retailers often forget the importance of an emotional connection with their audience.

Look for stories which customers can relate to your products.

Build your brand’s credibility with great storytelling efforts.

Look at each story from your customers’ eyes, keep it interesting, relevant and informative.

Those brands are easily ignored by people who are only interested in selling their stuff because people seek value as much as your product.

Do not brag about your company and products. Sell solutions. This will help you to make a real connection with the audience.

Great content is not about how great your products are.

Curate your content in such a way that demonstrates an understanding of customers’ problem and how your products can solve them.

Read more about e-commerce content marketing strategy.

Final words

The success stories which you hear about people, making e-commerce success and earning in five, six-digit figures, are so real.

What you need is to figure out what can work the best for you.

Besides that, You have already taken a big step with the launch of your online store.

Just keep going. The e-commerce industry in India has immense potential in the coming years.

So what are you waiting for? Pick the best e-commerce growth hacking tips from above and make your dreams reality.

Make it happen.

We wish you all the best.

What different are you doing to boost your e-commerce business? Share your views on the comment below.

It had become quite old when people used to buy online because of the lower prices of products. Nowadays people order online because of many reasons including product quality, delivery speed, in short, the overall experience with a brand.

Today customers demand both choice and flexibility when it comes to receiving their online purchase. Your customers won’t mind leaving the shopping cart abandoned if they don’t find satisfactory delivery options.

A purchase is made to satisfy a need or want, and delivery is the key to how quickly this need is fulfilled.

Today, your e-commerce delivery strategy is more critical than ever. Unlike the previous generation, today people are seamlessly integrating with digital technology and choices in everyday life. This is the reason they also expect fast and seamless customer experience in e-commerce.

Online retailers today are competing mainly on delivering excellent customer experience.

While making an online purchase, people are not only comparing the product price and quality; they compare the shipping services too! Then, How to fulfill shipping expectations of online shoppers?

Not all retailers are meeting customer expectations.

Not all customers feel that retailers are meeting their expectations regarding delivery speed and options.

Let’s have a look where retailers are failing to do so.

According to industry research, 68% of consumers would like to opt for guaranteed delivery within 2 to 3 days while only 30% retailers offered this option.

80% shoppers are expecting to see the expected delivery dates for the products they are selecting.

Your customers find delivery dates essential while checking out.

It is equally important to provide enough delivery information and delivery options. It has an enormous impact.

1. You build trust in your customers’ mind

2. There is a less chance of loss of sale.

Nearly 35% online shoppers left the cart abandoned due to shipping time was too long or not provided at all.

One out of five shoppers mentioned that speedy delivery is the main reason they prefer to shop from marketplaces.

What delivery options are you offering and what your customers are expecting?

1.Expected delivery dates

It is a fact that users care about the date of delivery. The primary concern of buyers while checking out is “when will I receive my order?”. Users are more concerned about delivery dates than shipping speed.

It is also advisable to mention the date and not to mention “next day” or “three days”. Such information ends up misleading customers.

2.Customers want reminders and updates

Update your customers when and what time they can expect the order. Frequent communication will help your customers to prepare for receiving the shipment.

Prioritize proactive communication with your customers so that they need to check for the delivery updates and they do not have to take the pain to track the shipment. This builds trust for your brand.

3.Rectifying poor delivery experience

Poop delivery experience damages the reputation of your online shop badly. Today’s digitally empowered customers will not hesitate to share the poor experience they had with your brand on social media and forums.

When fulfillment goes wrong, retailers need to rectify that by providing additional customer service and making things right for the satisfaction of a customer.

4.Provide enough delivery options

Keep shipping options that will vary based on the price and customer needs. Some people may choose the longest delivery time to save some bucks and others may prefer the fastest delivery in spite of the extra charges.

Give your customers the freedom to choose the preferable delivery options as per their needs.

A fast and convenient return process

What customers expect while returning an item online?

As little effort as possible

As low cost as possible

Receiving the refund as quickly as possible

Transparency about whether the return was accepted and when they will receive the money back

What problems are customers facing regarding online order delivery?

1. No timely delivery
2. Delivery of wrong product
3. Not addressing the customer complaint
4. Product damaged/lost
5. Fake updates/status from courier partner

See these problems as an opportunity.

Implement all possible solutions to your online store’s shipment strategy.

It is crucial to understand that shoppers’ shipping desires play a significant role in a final purchase decision.

Shoppers are willing to buy from the brand that gives them the most convenient and customised options.

Unless you are Amazon, you probably do not specialise in supply chain and logistics operations, and more likely you are not going to have the infrastructure and resources either.

Then why not try a logistics aggregator to solve all the problems at once? Get your shipment right for the first with the services of logistics aggregator to maximise your delivery and utmost customer satisfaction.

Consider logistics aggregator to streamline your e-commerce shipping.

1. Choose from multiple courier partners

2. Timely COD remittances

3. One-point support contact activated 24×7

4. In-depth shipping efficiency analytics

5. The automated inflow of information through API integration

6. No minimum volume commitment

Moreover, maximise your delivery percentage and

7. Smoothly manage your NDRs (Non-delivered report)

Read 7 ways to reduce e-commerce shipping cost

Final word:

The point is, online buyers are fickle by nature. If it takes too long to reach the product, you may never get it to them. Give them the options they want to see while browsing through the products at your store. Make the delivery right at the first time and turn first time buyer into a regular customer.

Order delivery can make or break your brand reputation and getting it right is essential to the profitability of your online business.

When there is no competition, there is no business either. Every business has competition regardless of its size & product.

Also, when there is a competition, there is a price war.

When your products are selling for the same or lower price on Amazon, it is difficult to meet the break-even point and make a profit.

Forget about marketplaces; you are not the only seller for particular products unless you are selling something really unique which no one has thought of.

Cutting off the product price doesn’t guarantee to beat the e-commerce price race.

Lowering your prices to beat these big e-commerce giants is foolishness.

You might end up making massive losses and eventually step out from the market at all.

In this article, we are going to discuss how to win when your competitors drop their price.

Competing on price is a bad idea.

By lowering your price, you may get customers who buy from you but let me tell you it is not a strategy that works in the long run.

When someone is buying because of the cheap price you are offering, they are not loyal to your brand. They are more likely to switch to the alternate option the moment they find it at a lower price.

Competing over price is a never-ending fight.

Remember, your competitor will also be prepared to sell at lower prices.

As soon as you undercut your price, your competitor will do the same to beat you, and this goes on, and you may end up incurring a loss.

The customer psychology plays a huge role.

It is buyer psychology that you get what you pay for. When people see a low-cost product, they are likely to assume that it’s a poor quality item and vice versa.

Buyer equates low price with cheap quality.

They may think that something is missing.

They may even doubt on having hidden costs involved.

Not to forget,

Once you start cutting down your price, you need to sell more products to make the same amount of profit.

Here, you are you are playing fool.

You need to understand that your competitors’ prices will fluctuate. Your business operations should be independent of that.

What you can do instead, is find smart alternatives to competing on price.

There are numerous ways you can compete with your competitors besides price.

However, at the centre of all of those tactics is “Value”.

Focus on providing more value to your customers and chances are high that they will come back to you for the next purchase.

Make your customers feel that your brand is offering more than just a product!

Price is a financial reward for your product wherein the value is what your customer believes the product is worth to them.

Show the worth of your products to your customers.

Differentiate your products by offering the benefits and emphasize on product benefits instead of its features.

Imagine a conversation wherein you are stuck with someone who just talks about themselves and has no interest in your say.

Understand that people are least interested in you and your product. So stop bragging about your company and brand when you are trying to sell them your products.

Buyers want to hear about what they will be getting from your product. They want to know what value your product will bring to their lives.

I would suggest following the below steps before communicating your product benefits to your audience.

1 – Make a list of your product features

2 – Determine what each feature actually does

3 – Learn how these features will fulfil the desire of your audience

4 – Connect these features emotionally with buyer’s persona

5 – Highlight the emotional impact

It is uber important to understand that your product features are important but do not brag about them from the selling point of view.

Present them from the buyers’ perspective. What impact your product will have in their life.

How your product will make their life easier?

By highlighting what is essential to the user, you are creating a distinct stand from the competition.

If you learn this art, you have already won half the race.

Strike an emotional chord in your pitch to grab the attention of your audience.

You can pair your products with complimentary service.

Think about the services you can offer that pair well with your products.

Differentiate from your competitors.

Not in terms of different products but by offering a distinct value attached to the product.

People like convenience.

Make it super easy for people.

Right from browsing your product till the after sale service.

One key to understanding the shoppers’ buying behaviour is the “importance of convenience to your customers”.

People like simplified things. They purchase online to save time because it’s comfortable and convenient.

Prove them right by offering the utmost convenience. They are even willing to pay more for that.

Provide them with excellent delivery options.

Introduce customer-friendly policies such as 30 days’ free returns, quick refund, Easy exchange options, etc.

Use the power of online reviews

Nearly 75% consumers claim that online reviews influence their buying decision.

What you can do is,

Simply ask your customers to give a review. Do take polite and friendly follow-ups.

Offer a discount on the next purchase. It’s a win-win situation for both the party. You are retaining a customer for the next purchase.

Leverage customer reviews not just customer acquisition, aim to increase customer retention.

Online reviews have the power to influence and manipulate customer opinion even before they have visited your store and make a mind to have a look at your products.

Send thank you notes to your customers. Show gratitude for their purchase.

Make them feel special by sending them a handwritten thank you notes.

People love to be acknowledged.

It may not work for a long run, it may not be convenient for you to send a personalized handwritten note to all your customers, but it can get you a few loyal customers at the beginning and spread a positive word of mouth about your brand.

Change your product’s positioning

Understand what your customer needs are and position the product.

Craft the key message carefully.

Convey the differentiating value-added aspects of your product.

Remember it has a significant impact on the ultimate purchase decision.

If people do not find any value in your product, they won’t mind dismissing it in a heartbeat.

On the other hand, product repositioning is not a small change.

You need to research the buyers’ persona and consumer psychology carefully.

Apple has positioned its products as premium products. They always focus on featuring product benefits and the value they add to people’s lives rather than the price.

In case you are positioning your products as premium, learn whether your target market has enough purchasing power to afford your products.

Determine the cost and resources attached to the product repositioning.

You may have to change your product quality, packaging, website design, etc. which might require a reasonable amount of time, effort and money.

One of the best positioning strategies is content marketing.

Take help of content marketing

Content marketing can prove a boon to your business.

People love to read useful and relevant content which solves their problem.

Content marketing builds brand awareness, trust and loyalty.

Quality content helps people to engage with your brand and make sound buying decisions.

Good content fosters the healthy relationship with customers.

You can win an entire game if used this marketing strategy effectively.

Learn more about e-commerce content marketing

Show product scarcity

Scarcity is one of the ordinary yet important tactic of converting your website visitors into customers.

Scarcity can be of several types.

1. Displaying a very limited quantity of products.

2. Offering a discount for a limited period.

3. Providing additional benefits associated with the product for a limited time.

When you are using this tactic, make sure you are keeping your words. If you are converting customers with a limited period discount, keep tour words and end the discount period as you have mentioned.

If you fail to do so, it can damage your brand reputation severely.

Here, you need to be true to your word.

Explore new market

Do you sell in a specific state or region?

Try exploring the new market for your products.

Consider expanding your business nationally/ internationally.

Expanding online is a great way to access new markets and experiment with different pricing quickly. It opens up a new market, new customer base, new strategies, and considerably higher revenue.

Conclusion

The best way to avoid price war is not to get in at all.

You are going to make a huge loss by continually dropping your price.

Instead, focus on providing value to your customer. Win customers by improving the overall user experience.

Showcase the product quality and benefits while marketing your products instead of prices.

E-commerce in India has come a long way. E-commerce business opportunity in India is higher than in any other country in the world as India is the fastest growing market (being the youngest country), and hence the e-commerce success factors matter a lot.

The purchasing power of the Indian population is increasing drastically.

People are becoming more tech-savvy, smartphones, internet usage and launch of the 4G network have become a necessity especially for people from cities and small towns.

E-commerce provides ease of doing shopping, and this is the central aspect behind the growth in online shopping.

Launching a new e-commerce venture can feel like an impossible dream when we look at Amazon or Flipkart. However, more and more sellers are looking to sell online and capture the untapped Indian market.

E-commerce businesses are breaking the barriers and enjoying the success point.

You need to understand the success factors of sound e-commerce businesses which are directly contributing to the e-commerce economy and also forming customer perceptions about online shopping.

Having great products to sell is one thing but offering them to your customers in a way is extended inference.

The majority of businesses fail to understand the fundamentals of e-commerce success.

Fundamentals of e-commerce success

You can apply them to your e-commerce business strategy to stay ahead in this competitive market.

When this e-commerce economy is stepping towards growth in the coming months and years, you need to follow some basic yet critical fundamentals to approach it in the right way. In this article, we are going to discuss the ten e-commerce success factors which will prove boon for your business.

1. Pick a simple business name

It is essential to have a unique yet easy to remember the name of your business. It helps your customer to recollect your company and its products easily.

• Keep it short and memorable.
• Stick to .in if you are targeting only Indian market. Go for .com if you are targeting the global market.
• Check with google if the same or similar names come up.

It is not necessary to have a brand name which has a definite meaning. Brands like Google, Flipkart, eBay are instantly recognizable and easy to remember.

You can try a different combination of short words, two short words that rhyme is quite easy to remember.

You can also give your personal name to your online store. It makes your store easy to identify even on a personal level.

Do not use similar words as your competitors. Think something different to stand out.

Another important thing is to make sure you are not copying any name which already exists. Check with copyright and trademark office India for the copyrights before picking any name for your business.

It is crucial to find the right name while launching your online store. It becomes the very first identity of your e-commerce business, and customers recognize and recollect you with the name.

2. Test before the launch

It is uber important to invest in testing and analysis. It is important to find and solve issues that could probably go wrong before it goes live.

There are a few common things which one must test pre-launching.

• User forms – User registration forms allow you to capture leads, it is utmost essential to check that they are fully functional, Is the information relevant you are collecting from the user and so on.
• Help customers to make decisions with clear calls to action.
• Social media integrations – Social media is one of the valuable sources which contributes to your online store’s success. It plays a significant role to make your brand visible, help you connect with your customer and solve their queries at a personal level.

Make sure you create social media accounts and mention them on your website with an accurate link.

• Favicon icon – Before you launch make sure you have created a favicon icon. A favicon icon is the one which reflects on the address bar of the tab.
• Check SEO elements – It is uber important to make your website SEO friendly. Put SEO elements on your websites like meta tags, meta descriptions, title tags, and keywords. This helps your site recognize and rank on google.
• Test your entire website with all possible minor things like spelling mistakes, active links, navigation and what not!
• Test website speed, whether it loads quickly or not. GTmetrix is a free tool that analyzes your page’s speed performance.
• Check browser compatibility for multiple browsers like google chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Safari, internet explorer, opera, etc.

3.Take advantage of m-commerce:

Mobile commerce is basically e-commerce that involves wireless the use of a wireless device like smartphones and tablets.

The first and most important thing to use m-commerce is the fact that more and more people are using smartphones and tablets to make the purchase as it is more convenient than using desktop and laptop.

You have to elevate your design to replicate the same user experience as a desktop or even better than that.

Mobile users are more concerned about ease of navigation and interaction they have with your website. If you already have a website, first you what need to do is to check its display and interface on multiple platforms, Not only various platforms but also for numerous devices with different screen size for smartphones and tablets.

Your website should be fast, easy to navigate & mobile responsive.

Your website visitors should not have to spend much time to find what they are looking for.

4. Checkout & Returns: Keep it easy for your customers

Make sure your customers have a good experience at every point of interaction with your online store.

Optimize your checkout page with these simple tips.

• Create a mobile-friendly checkout page.
• Show steps included in checkout through progress indicator.
• Give your customer easy & multiple payment options, also give them the option to save the card details for one-click payment.
• Allow guest checkout. This results in a reduced abandoned cart and helps customers to checkout without logging in to their account for making a purchase.
• Make your customers feel secure at checkout. Ensure that the payment options are secured and trusted.
• Request the information which is actually required and essential like the name, shipping address & contact number. Do not ask for any extra information at checkout. This will make your customer frustrated and leave the cart unattended. Even if you are asking for additional information, keep it optional.

Returns:

• A study shows that 67 percent of customers are more likely to be repeat customers of the brand.
• 75 percent of customers complain about the experience they have in the return and exchange process.
• E-commerce businesses need to have a customer-friendly return policy which allows your customers to return the products without any hassle.
• It is uber important to define and explicitly mention the return policy of your online store.
• Your customers are more likely to refer your store and products to their friends, family, and colleagues once they gain trust not only for your products but also to the quality of your service.
• Lastly, 78 percent of online shoppers said that comfortable and hassle-free return policy convince them to buy from an online retailer.

Guidelines for creating a customer-friendly return policy

1. Put yourself in the shoes of your customers.
2. Make sure your customers can find a return policy easily. Keep it visible.
3. Include information regarding refund, exchange and store credits.
4. Highlight the return timeline.
5. Clearly outline the return fees that may apply.
6. Provide contact information in case your customers face any additional queries regarding returns.

5.Great website design

There is one principle to website design, keep it simple!

Ask yourself one question. How easy is your website to use?

Let your customers find quickly what they are looking for.

The only metric which defines your website’s success is the actual conversion rate.

“Website design is a plan for arranging elements in such a way as best to accomplish a particular purpose”.  – Charles Eames

A good website design can be one thing that pushes you above.

So what is a good web design anyway?

If you ask different web designers to define good design, you will end up getting a variety of answers.

However, if you have a close look at some well-designed e-commerce stores, you will be able to find the similarities they have concerning user experience and customer satisfaction.

Make sure that your website is tidy and not confusing or chaotic. Read the complete list of UI-UX problems with solutions.

However, while the design and navigation of your website play a significant role, not to forget about the high-quality product images and product description. While browsing through your site, people should be convinced to buy from you.

6. Providing top-notch customer support is an important e-commerce success factor.

Unlike offline stores, online players do not get a chance to interact with customers personally. Excellent customer service is the only way you can capture your customer attention.

Not all customers are willing to give a second chance if they have bad service experience.

What are the common mistakes that lead to bad customer service?

• Unprepared customer service staff
• Unable to meet the order volume
• No action plan to respond to negative customer reviews
• Third party mistakes (e.g. Delivery partner)

Learn the power of “customer-first” mentality.

In the online world, customer loyalty is the key to success. Persuade your customers to return to your store to make more purchase. For this, you need to build trust and rapport with your customers.

Let your customers speak about your products and service level commitment.

“If you do build a great experience, customers tell each other about that. Word of mouth is very powerful.”- Jeff Bezos, Founder of Amazon.com

7. Make your site SEO friendly

Let’s have a look what are some of the Google’s most common ranking algorithms.

1. Optimize your website for mobile marketing
2. Demonstrate a strong online presence with social media extensions
3. Add high-quality images and rich snippets
4. Clean code with HTML navigation and transparency
5. Include long tail keywords that precisely define your products and services
6. Creating user-friendly UI-UX
7. Publishing high-quality original contents that follow SEO guidelines
8. Develop high-quality links with authoritative websites
9. Publish product reviews, FAQs, customer testimonials
10. Avoid broken links
11. Add meta title, meta tags and meta description on every page of your website

In today’s highly competitive online market, Simple website design is not enough to guarantee the success of your e-commerce store.

You need to have a strong SEO & content marketing strategy to be found when your potential customers are searching for products that you sell.

8. Communicating your discounts and freebies is an important e-commerce success factor.

Needless to say that Indian consumers are price sensitive and always looking for a way to save money.

One thing you can do is to offer excellent and genuine discounts at your store to attract more traffic.

Discounts are not only/always beneficial to customers, but it can do a lot for your business.

Here are a few ways of offering discount codes.

• Offer discount code while launching a new product.
• Send promotional discounts to your email subscribers.
• Give the discount code to a new customer in a welcome email.

Discounts not only attract people and increase sale but also persuade them to look for another exciting stuff at your store.

Another important aspect is to communicate your promotional discounts and freebies with your audience.

There are numerous ways you can reach out to your audience to let them know about the offers going on at your online store.

• Leverage the use of social media. Reach your target customers through Facebook ads, Instagram posts, LinkedIn ads in case of the corporate audience and any preferable social medium where your audience spend time.
• Spread word of mouth
• Engage in various community forums to discuss the trends, problems, and solutions.

When it comes to e-commerce marketing, discounts are undoubtedly significant but how you leverage the use of discounts and how you put them in your strategy is uber important.

9. Regulating your product pricing is an important e-commerce success factor.

You must be thinking; the price is such an essential factor for your store’s success, then why am I mentioning this point at the end of this article?

Because if you fail to regulate your product pricing, all points which we discussed earlier are of no use.

65% of consumers stated that product prices are one of the significant factors that affect the buying decision.

This is why pricing makes a massive difference in this competitive e-commerce industry. Price not only attract new customers but also improve the overall performance of your websites like website visitors, conversion rates, profit margins, and total market share.

Prices are essential to any business regardless of its size. Setting a product price requires a considerable degree of analysis and competitive research.

There are nearly thousands of ways to set pricing for your online business. It is advisable to test your e-commerce pricing strategy.

Balancing your price according to its value and competitive pricing will create a product and brand value what a customer perceives in your product.

10. Evolve continuously

Once you’ve implemented your store idea and secured a steady stream of sales, make sure that you keep up with optimizing your e-commerce website and marketing as you go.

Every day, visitors’ experience with the online market is becoming more mobile, social and visual. This helps to improve the experience for customers and makes it complicated for the e-commerce business owners to stay up to date with the latest developments.

E-commerce is a process which demands continuous improvement but is also essential to focus on the scalability of your online business.

Focus on customer-centric evolution by improving customer value continuously.

Final Thoughts

Starting a successful e-commerce venture is not an easy task, but by following the basics, you can build a solid foundation to build a successful e-commerce business.

You can always set a benchmark by studying the top players. Do not just blindly follow the trends, learn what can work the best for you.

The biggest challenge about running an online store is that you cannot interact with your customers in-person. Email marketing tips for e-commerce is not just about selling but building strong relations with your customers.

If you are not using e-commerce email marketing in your marketing strategy, you are missing out the tremendous potential for your sales funnel.

You are an entrepreneur recently launched an online store, there are chances you do not have much time to invest in marketing research.

However, it is advisable to make an effort to invest your time in email marketing to make the most of it.

If used successfully, email campaigns are highly influential sales tool.

However, it is spam and a waste of time when used poorly.

I am listing a few must-have email marketing tips for e-commerce for you to reaching out to your customers.

• The welcome email
• The referral email
• The discount email
• The abandoned cart email
• Order confirmation mail
• Survey Emails
• Promotional Emails
• Thank you email

Read the full list here with the example for each type of emails.

Here is a list of best practices for e-commerce email marketing.

1. Don’t fluke it. You must have a plan

Staring email marketing without a plan is a bad idea. You need to prepare a strategy to reach your customer through email marketing. Write down your email marketing plan and the steps you need to take to achieve the goal.

First of all, you need to have an email list.

Optimize your e-commerce website to grab the opportunity to add visitors to your email list. Collect emails whenever possible. Request your customers to subscribe to your newsletter.

Another brilliant option to collect emails without letting your customers think much to enter their email id is, by providing a choice of “notify me when in stock”.

I personally feel that this is one of the excellent opportunity to keep your customers coming back and you are not even directly asking to subscribe to your email campaigns.

Another good way is a blog. It’s a great way to build a relationship with your prospects. Consistent blogs with great insights and knowledge encourage readers to sign up for your email, and this can eventually make them regular readers.

Here is the list of 29 simple ways to grow your email list

2. Keeping it original & to the point is a vital email marketing tips for e-commerce

Unique and engaging content can work really well for you to build relations with your customers. Avoid sending repetitive stuff as it may lead to getting a poor opening rate and your target audience may end up unsubscribing your emails.

Here originality and relevance work hand in hand. Create content in a right format with appropriate media which is consistent throughout the email.

Try including humor in your email content as it helps to keep your email marketing campaign light and also keep your audience engaged.

3.Write fantastic subject lines

A study says that almost 85% of the email opening rate highly depends on the subject line. Optimize your subject line and preview text to create a positive impression on your customers even before opening it. Not paying attention to subject lines may cost you a poor opening rate.

You can create a catchy attractive subject line with these two major components.

1. Include humour or suspense to grab the attention of your audience.
2. Write a subject line that delivers the purpose of the email.

Grab the reader’s attention with an enticing subject line which will tell them what the email is all about.

4. Call to action is very important

CTAs are essential to the success of your email marketing campaigns as they provide clear and straightforward direction to your readers.

A strong CTA let you come one step closer to your potential customers.

Create CTAs that is easy to spot and clickable.

You can use tools like Canva to create a button without many dependencies on graphic designers.

Also, research suggests that try to keep only one call to action, as keeping multiple call to actions in an email campaign may confuse your audience and cause them to take no action at all.

5. Segment your email list

Keep your emails relevant to the recipient whenever possible. Sending the same email to every person in your email list might not work well every time.

If your e-commerce website is selling items to different categories, you need to segment your email list based on their interest, gender, location, the engagement rate and so on.

Your potential customers are only going to take action on your email if it is relevant to them.

Again, you can segment your email list on the type of customer. By this, I mean segregate your customers on the basis of their interaction with your online store.

You can have email lists like this,

• New customers
• Returning customers
• Potential customers
• Loyal customers
• Dormant customers

By segmenting your email list, you can target your emails to the right audience and chances becomes high for converting your potential customers into regular and loyal customers.

6. Send regular emails

Be organized with the frequency of your emails. Here what I mean is do not annoy your subscribers by sending too many emails at a point of time. Plan a calendar which includes your special offers, Blogs articles, festivals and so on.

Keep your posting frequency consistent. Say thrice a week or on a daily basis if you have some exciting and fresh content to share with your audience.

To discover the ideal number, you need to try and test with your subscribers.

One more thing, while asking your audience to subscribe to your newsletter, if you promise them to deliver a weekly digest, please send them as your audience are expecting.

7. Keep your eye on unsubscribe rate

Your email subscriber rate is a crucial factor to measure your marketing success rate. For this, you need to take steps to improve your subscriber rate and reduce the unsubscribe rate.

Your email unsubscribe list is never going to be zero. The people who unsubscribe from your email list, are probably not your target audience. So you need not take every unsubscribe personally; instead, you can try finding out the reasons why people are unsubscribing from your email list and work on the improvement areas. Focus on providing more value to the subscribers. Increase frequency of personalized emails which your target audience seek.

Another important thing is to keep your unsubscribe page interactive, by interactive I mean when a person is unsubscribing ask them for a reason and make sure you make their exit memorable.

8.Keep it mobile friendly

Google predicts that in the near future, billions of users are going to connect to the internet through mobile devices.

Optimize your email campaigns for mobile. If you are not, you are losing great potential traffic to your webpage. A recent study shows that more than 70% of emails are opened on mobile. While your email is not mobile friendly, it eventually loses the game.

9. Keep this email marketing tips for e-commerce in mind and Automate your emails

You can’t spend your time writing emails. You have more important things to do. A number of tools exist to automate your email campaigns where you can send thousands of emails with a single click at a time.

Automation allows you to reach thousands with no pain.

Keep a regular track on opening rate, click through rate and the actual conversion for each email campaign. This gives you insights about what your customers are liking and what kind of content or promotional offer attracts your customers more.

10. Being aware of anti-spam laws is an important email marketing tips for e-commerce

There are specific regulations which user have to abide by.  You must follow anti-spam requirements that may apply to your business.

Some of the common anti-spam requirements are,

1. The mail message’s “from” label needs to be the sender’s email.
2. The subject line has to reflect the purpose of the email.
3. There has to be a link to unsubscribe to the email.

Make sure you follow anti-spam requirements and your emails are not ending up in a spam folder.

Wrapping up

Deliver regular content to build a long-term relationship with your customers. You can keep them engaged by passing on special offers, birthday or festival discounts recently published articles and what not!

Whatever you send to your customers, just make sure these are not ONLY sales intended. You can inform them about exclusive offers and promotional campaigns but not in every email.

You make a lot of efforts and time to stand out as an e-commerce brand, what you need to focus on is how it reaches to your audience and touch their feelings.

Keep your newsletter as a medium to reach and remind your customers that you exist with some beautiful products and the stories which make them fall in love with you.

A study shows that e-commerce shipping charges are the primary reasons for the abandoned carts. This is the point where many of your customers left the shopping cart without proceeding to the checkout as they see the additional shipping charged they have to pay exclusive of the actual product pricing.

Shipping costs for your online store are a huge pain. Whether you are a small or large seller, no doubt you have felt the pain of shipping costs and many a time, the number of abandoned items on your dashboard. Today, free shipping has become so familiar and expected by your customers. Cutting down your e-commerce shipping costs will surely help you make more profit and possibly grow your sales.

Are there any proven ways to cut down your shipping costs?

Yes. Here are seven tips e-commerce owners can use right now to help get control of their shipping expenses.

1. Use Multiple Courier Partners

Having multiple courier partners is an advantage that most e-commerce players are in need of.

Key Benefits of using services from multiple courier partners are:

A. Backup When One Unavailable

Imagine you’re having a tie-up with only one courier partner with delivery limitations and you get several orders at once!

Why depend on a single courier partner when you can have multiple options?

B. Increased Reach

Relying on a single courier partner has one major limitation. The Reach. However, in case of multiple courier partners, no matter how distant your customer resides, you can make the shipment possible in a limited span of time with the help of a courier partner which covers that area.

C. Helpful During Festivals

In India we frequently observe a considerable rise in online shopping around the holidays and festival seasons and companies find it challenging to keep up with their delivery deadlines at such times.

With the help of multiple courier partners, it becomes easy to manage the sales load during such festive seasons and keep your customers happy reaching them on-time.

D. Competitive Price

It is beneficial that you tie up with multiple e-commerce shipping agencies and choose the ones that suit your preferences and budget. Get the best out of the competition from multiple courier companies to get access to quality services at competitive prices.

Here, negotiation also plays a vital role. It is up to you how well you negotiate with a delivery partner to get better services at lower prices.

2. Consider Logistics Aggregator

As the popularity of online shopping grows, e-commerce logistics aggregators are emerging in India to provide one-stop delivery solutions for online merchants.

First of all, let’s have a brief understanding of what is a logistics aggregator?

The logistics aggregator is a technology-driven logistic company that operates on a B2B platform to cater to all the logistics needs of online sellers.

If you understand that you need to have services from multiple courier companies, you don’t require to tie up with these logistics service providers individually. Instead, make a smart choice of logistics aggregators like iThink Logistics, where you create your account and get tied up with all the major courier partners at once. Some of the well-known courier companies include Delhivery, Aramex, Xpressbees to name a few.

Advantages of using services of Logistics Aggregator.

A. Multiple Carrier Partners

Use the services of multiple courier partners on a single platform. You don’t need to have a separate agreement with all the courier partners. Just register with the aggregator and you are all set.

B. Economical

You can choose the best shipping rates comparing multiple courier partners to process orders. Alternatively, you can have a standard flat rate for all partners at your ease.

C. Technical Support

Most automated e-commerce shipping solutions are made available and can also be easily integrated with your existing systems allowing for timely and centralized order information.

D. Shorter Remittance Cycle

With the help of logistics aggregator, you can reduce the long remittance cycle, say up to 7days or even less than that!

3. Use Packaging Provided By Your Carrier

Another vital way to reduce shipping costs is to go for the packaging provided by the courier companies. If you are going to handle the packaging part on your own, you might end up spending extra and don’t forget the efforts which you are going to make for the packaging. To avoid those additional costs & time, consider using the packaging provided by your carrier.

4. Prepaid Shipping

Here is another smart option to cut down your shipping cost by availing shipping rate discounts from courier companies. There are delivery services which provide good discount rates on prepaid shipment orders. You can get a good discount here, which may sound lame but very well effective if you are shipping a reasonable quantity.

Prepaid shipping operates best when you know you’ll be sending out the same weight packages frequently and can determine the shipping price in advance.

5.Use Postal Services

Why use Indian postal services?

Indian postal service has an unbeatable network! This network covers about 25000 pin codes which are quite large.

Postal India has extensive rural reach. If your target customers reside in most of the rural areas, this option will definitely work well.

6.Use Correct Mode Of Shipment

A common difficulty for small businesses is deciding the appropriate shipping mode to use for deliveries. In India, you are having multiple choices to reach your customer which includes Roadway, airway, waterway, railway and combination of any of these.

It is on your part to pay enough attention to the weight and characteristics of the shipment, location, service needs, cost of shipment mode, loss or damage concerns etc. while choosing the shipment mode for the delivery.

Again, prioritizing customer needs and urgency, understanding your shipment and comparing costs is uber important while choosing the best mode of transport.

7. Consolidate Orders Whenever Possible

Did you know order consolidation can benefit you save some really good amount and even efforts? Consider you got multiple orders from the same customer, try to deliver all the products within the same package, provided the order/delivery date is nearly the same for all.

Combining orders provide benefits to both shippers and receivers of small package and freight shipments, including:

• Reduced shipping supply rates.
• Higher fuel efficiency.
• Less time needed to receive, handle and restock orders.

Shipping is a primary cost factor for any small business that ship products to the customers. It is often possible to decrease these costs with a little research, planning and effort.

Carefully crafted shipping strategy helps you to cut down the cost while keeping your customers happy.

You might be thinking how this tiny thing can help me with boosting my e-commerce sales and profit, right?

Gift wrapping is a simple add-on service which might seem insignificant, but it can have a considerable impact on the level of service you provide to your customers and resulting increase in the e-commerce sales and average order value.

Let’s take an example; you want to send a Christmas gift to your friend. Are you going to send the gift without wrapping? Alternatively, you going to order the package at your doorstep and then take the pain to buy the wrapping material and do it by yourself? No right? This sounds time-consuming.

Don’t you think your customer might find it frustrating to wrap the gift on their own!

Some people think that gift wrapping is a part of the fun but not all. A large group of people find it time-consuming and difficult to do.

Gift wrapping is an essential yet overlooked area in e-commerce servicing.

This article is written to highlight the importance of the gift wrapping services to you and also your customers, and how your E-commerce sales can be boosted with this simple yet effective service.

You are telling your customers that they are important to you.

These small things matter a lot.

Let me tell you, offering gift wrapping is not new for both offline and online business. These services are as old as people have started buying gifts.

All major online players are offering gift wrapping services to their customers.

They are large retailers with a vast customer base, excellent infrastructure and a strong manpower base.

In this article, I am going to give you a closer look at offering gift wrapping services for your e-commerce store. I have tried to include almost every aspect of it including the cost & manpower involved, what you need to do to make it right, and things you need to keep in mind while launching gift wrapping services to your online store.

Importance of gift wrapping services for e-commerce stores:

Gift wrapping is an excellent way to save your customers’ time.

Your customers need not worry to buy wrapping material and pack the present themselves.

They can send the gift right to the recipient.

Significant for customer-driven business.

Provide your customers with an emotionally engaging experience.

Not to forget,

This also attracts last-minute shoppers.

Those who are interested in shipping gifts right to receivers. By giving a choice to have an item gift wrapped and sent directly to the recipient, you’re more likely to entice those last minute shoppers.

Think of all possible gift-giving occasions.

Of course, who would not want to receive a gift wrapped in a glossy paper with a beautiful ribbon on the top?

The e-commerce stores experience a high demand for festive and holiday seasons.

Diwali

Eid

New Year’s Day

Valentine’s Day

Easter

Christmas

Mothers’ Day

Fathers’ Day

So the list goes on…

There are some other gift-giving opportunities besides festivals and holidays:

Birthdays

Anniversaries

Retirement

Thank You or apologies

Housewarming or moving

Baby or bridal showers

Weddings or engagements

Personal achievements

Get well soon gifts

And so on.

There may be occasions or festival I didn’t consider in this list.

Now imagine, you being only online seller offering a gift wrapping services on that specific festival!

You have an excellent opportunity to earn a strong customer base on that alone.

These are the best occasions for you to adopt some new idea that will not only increase the average order value but also to your customer a delightful experience at your store.

Time to consider the cost involved in gift wrapping.

First and foremost, it is essential to calculate the overall cost of offering gift wrapping services. There are a few factors which you must consider before jumping into this.

Let’s discuss all of them one by one in detail.

Do you have a warehouse? If no, who is taking care of your shipping and handling?

A third party logistics.

When you are using third-party logistics services for warehousing and shipping, it is undeniable that they are only taking care of the packaging part.

Here, you need to ask the service provider whether they are offering or can offer gift wrapping for your orders.

The best possible way is to negotiate for such service and calculate the extra time and cost involved in this.

No matter if you are making high margins or moderate, you still need to calculate and plan everything carefully if you are solely responsible for the packing and packaging.

Here you have a kind of freedom to decide how to do this.

let’s consider the cost of gift wrapping material.

First of all, what material you need to wrap?

A gift box

Printed gift paper

Bow

Ribbons

Tissue papers to fill up the empty space in the box.

India mart is a good option to buy gift wrapping material at a wholesale rate.

Approximately an average gift paper can cost up to rupees 3 to pack one box of dimension 12.5×17 inches.

A box can cost up to rupees 12 if purchased in quantity.

A decent Bow and colorful ribbons can cost up to rupees 5 for the bulk purchase.

So here we arrive at the total cost of material at rupees 20.

The material and cost of the material vary for different size and shape of gifts.

Apart from the material cost, you also need to consider the manpower or say extra labor required for the actual wrapping of the gifts.

Can you accommodate the wrapping task with the current strength? Alternatively, do you need to hire the extra manpower?

The salary/wages (in case you are hiring on per hour basis) is again an important factor consider while calculating the overall cost of gift wrapping.

How efficiently can the gift be wrapped to save time?

How much time does it going to take, is there any efficient way to cut down the average time per packing?

It may take a few practice rounds to pick it up, but it’s totally worth it when you think about all the possible ways you can save some time. These techniques are fruitful when you are wrapping gifts in bulk.

Tip: Use double-sided tape. It looks polished and saves your time magically.

Is it possible to skip the extra workforce and also save some time?

Yes, Definitely. There are some alternate options available in the market practiced by the top online sellers.

Try printed gift boxes.

Similar to a box with ribbon is a printed gift box, with one outstanding difference: it doesn’t need to be shipped inside an extra box.

This affordable alternative simplifies the packing method because all you have to do is replace the original box with the newly painted box.

A gift box design should be neutral to accommodate a wide variety of festivals and occasions.

Offering a “gift kit.”

Apart from actually wrapping the gift, some e-commerce players chose the smart option of providing a “gift kit” option to the customers.

This gift kit includes the material to wrap the gift.

For this kind of services, they only charge for the packing material and not the cost of packing.

What you need to do is simply attach a kit to the package to save time and extra workforce and cost.

Charge only for the material. Save yourself from the complex calculations of the cost of human resources and precious time. Simply brilliant!

A “gift kit” can also generate a source of revenue for your online store if used wisely.

Offering a free gift wrap???

Take care of your average cost of gift wrapping considering the various types of material required and the size of boxes.

Free isn’t the only option you have though.

Then what is it?

Encourage your customers to buy more by offering free gifts over a purchase of a certain amount.

There are certain things because of which your customers may avoid using gift wrapping services.

Customers are afraid that their order will come with a broken or defective product.

They might get a wrong product.

Your customers can’t figure out how the present will look like.

Is the gift wrapping look decent enough as shown in the picture?

There is a lack of gift options.

They consider gift wrapping too expensive.

Give your customers confidence about your service and its quality.

Here is the list of things you should consider while implementing the gift wrapping service on your e-commerce website.

1. Include Pictures

Let your customers see how the present will look like. Include good pictures of the gift options.

2.Reviews

It’s a great idea to have reviews for your gift wrapping option similarly you have for your products. It works the same for both. It gives your customer a positive aspect of going for the gift wrapping option on your online store.

3. Detailed description and explanation

Give your customer a clear explanation about how this gift wrapping works and give them a detailed description about what includes in each option (in case you are going to have multiple options like gift wrapping and gift kit).

Also, inform them which products can’t be wrapped. This gives your customer answers for basic questions and support to their queries.

4.Give your customers a choice

Make sure you keep at least two to three options for various gift wrapping for men, women, and kids separately. Under that, it is your choice to have options like simple wrapping, expensive or luxury wrapping or seasonal wrapping options. It is entirely as per your wish and convenience.

5. Upgrade with time

Give your customers a fresh design and packaging options from time to time.

6. Include a gift message option, for free

Let your customers send their greetings in their own words with the gifts. Include a free message option with required to and from fields, so that the recipient knows who have sent them a gift.

7. “No price tag” option

If your customers don’t want to show the price to the recipient, give them the option to hide it.

8. Provide quality service

So this is obvious to provide the exact wrapping which your customer has selected. Make sure it is, and you don’t make a mess with a gift message.

Avoid making mistakes here as this might create frustration for your customers which will be harmful to your business.

Organize your gift wrapping in such a way as if it is for your dearest one.

9. Duration to offer gift wrapping

When should you provide a gift wrapping service? Throughout the year or only during the festive season?

10.Offering gift wrapping on specific items or for everything you sell?

It is advisable to decide wisely on which items you are offering gift wrapping services. Different products ask for different time to wrap. A small gift shaped square or rectangular may take lesser time than wrapping a teddy bear.

11. Charges for gift wrapping services.

Are you going to keep a standard gift wrap pricing for each product? Offering free gift wrapping above specific amount? Making it free for regular or returning customers?

In the end, the purpose is to

1. Create an overall customer experience.
2. Helps to convert more sales.
3. Proving such services helps to gain repeat customers.
4. Apart from the products you are selling, there are also other ways to wow your customers.

As you know running your e-commerce business is a constant challenge. You need to keep up with the market trends and what services your customers are expecting.

You need to focus continuously on marketing your products and keeping your customers happy with top-notch services.

Take the next few days to build your gift wrapping strategy. Consider how much you are currently spending, your average order size and value, your profit margins, and most importantly what you can do to deliver a great shopping experience to your customers that drive them back to your store and also share their experience through positive reviews.

Apart from this, there can be specific questions that may arise in your mind about offering gift wrapping services.

1. Is it feasible to adjust gift wrap cost for big items or to average it out?
2. Does gift wrapping slow down your productivity?
3. Approximately what percentage of customers actually purchase gift wrapping services?

Write to us at sales@ithinklogistics.com to get your queries solved by experts.