5 Tragic Mistakes Behind Your Delivery Delay
The boom of ecommerce fulfills our fundamental right to the pursuit of happiness., as described in the Declaration of Independence. While Jefferson probably referred to the right of every man and woman to define their life for themselves outside of the influence of political, economic, and social powers, modern-day happiness is only a matter of clicks. When one makes you happy is available online, you only need to click and wait.
While it’s a lazy approach to happiness – ultimately the pursuit is a matter of broadband speed –, there is no denying that for many Americans, the ability to have access to everything they want and need through a site has been an inalienable right of the 21st century. It’s probably why they show little patience when their digital happiness is corrupted. Indeed, the most common ecommerce complaints refer to delivery issues. Customers don’t like waiting for their goods, as they perceive it as a denial of their essential right to happiness. So what could go wrong with your delivery services?
Your scheduling practice needs improvement
Running an ecommerce business doesn’t mean that you don’t need to manage a team. Indeed, your team connects the dots between digital orders and customer deliveries. However, your team needs to be organized to stay on top of orders. No customer wants to wait days before their order is finally packed – let alone shipped. Scheduling issues are one of the most common complaints in the retail environment, and they also affect the eretail sector. In an ecommerce business, you can run several shifts in a day – a morning, day, and night shift, for example – to tackle the demand. Your scheduling plan needs to ensure that your team can be productive while fitting in their personal obligations. Scheduling errors and inaccuracies can cost your delivery over 7 days. Do you think your customers are ready to wait?
You can’t save cost on safety
If you’re managing your delivery service, you need to put fleet maintenance and safety as a priority. While it might be tempting to skip servicing to save money until the business takes off, your cost-saving strategy could have dramatic consequences, from an 18 wheeler accident due to technical faults to the inability to deliver as a result of a breakdown. Additionally, it’s essential to consider the fleet as a whole, which means that your vehicles and your drivers should both follow a strict activity schedule. You can’t afford to overwork your team or your resources. In other words, f you need to scale up your deliveries, you should scale up your fleet.
Don’t offer same day delivery unless you can afford the drain on the resources.
Customers are contesting the order
The delivery has arrived, but your customers have not received it. Worse, they may not have ordered it in the first place. With online shops, hacking is a risk you need to take seriously. Being digitally secure doesn’t stop at the padlock display on top of the page. You need to run thorough tests with white hat hackers who check your system for vulnerabilities, for instance. Additionally, keeping up to date with the latest security requirements and IT functions can also make a significant difference to your safety. Ultimately, when your customer databank gets hacked, you are faced with an IT crisis and a terrible reputation drop. You can’t take any chances on losing your brand trust, and therefore, digital safely should be on top of your ecommerce priorities.
What’s wrong with your packaging?
Each parcel has its place in your delivery truck. However, too many companies fail to improve their packaging system. They continue to use standard, one-size-fits-all packaging that is not suited to the product. More importantly, large parcels take a lot of room, which means that some customers will have to wait for the next delivery spot. As a company, it’s your responsibility to use space-saving packaging methods to ensure that every order is safely packed with minimum waste – both in space and money. Ultimately, excess packaging means excess waste.
Your courier fails to deliver on time
Courier companies tend to hire self-employed freelancers for their delivery rounds. A freelancer is typically paid for each delivery attempt. In some cases, the courier may choose to drop a notification of failed delivery instead of trying to deliver in an effort to boost their income. More often than not, they’re running out of time and can’t afford to wait a few minutes for the customer to come to the door. Gathering feedback from your customer can give you insightful information about the delivery process, and therefore can let you suggest improvements to your courier partner.
Unexpected delivery delays affect customer satisfaction. In a society where the pursuit of happiness can be resumed to a click, nobody wants to wait longer than necessary. It’s up to eretailers to provide efficient, productive, and strategic delivery improvements throughout their process.
Partnered Content.
