Category: Logistics

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.