Solutions retail E-Fulfillment
By ensuring timeliness and transparency on the supply of products, retailers can achieve higher customer satisfaction with their E-Fulfillment
Many retailers, large and small, are struggling every day with the question of how to organize their omni chain. It seems like on-line selling forces their business models in a constant balancing act. Only 1 in 10 retailers have confidence in their E-Commerce approach, says research LaSalle. The main condition for the implementation of E-Commerce continues to be Customer Delight. Because the purchase experience of the customer changes rapidly, companies are struggling to follow the customer.
Flawless.
What do customers want exactly. For all error-free handling of their order. Whether online or in the physical store, make sure your processes from start to finish run perfectly. It is important that customers get what they ordered, get it delivered at the desired moment and can settle the financial transaction on their preferred manner. Seems odd but in fact it is business as usual.
Before, you walked into a store, select the desired product, walked to the cash register and payed. In fact, the customer wants to achieve this on-line as well. Fortunately for retailers not all customers require a 24-hour delivery. If the price of delivery is lower, the customer is willing to wait a few days. But then make sure you have it perfect right.
Packaging.
Buying is an experience for customers. Keep your packing into account. Not the big clunky oversized brown boxes. Provide customized and well sized packaging. At this time, it is quite possible to realize packaging with improved and tailored made packaging. Colorful boxes contribute to a better customer experience.
Also make sure that the content contains not only the product but also extras such as offers or features such as postcards or other small gifts. Make a gift of it. And do not forget to reward your loyal customers with something extra!
Do not fill the package with potentially dangerous filling material. Customers are becoming more environmentally aware and do not appreciate that their garbage is filled with your filler. Again, the packaging industry already offers better solutions. Therefore it is time to sit down with your supplier and involve them in the customer experience.
Returns.
Despite your best efforts and good intentions things will undoubtedly go wrong. Make sure your customer can return the product with the greatest of ease. Allowing returns sticker or add a QR code so that customers can return the item thru on-line solutions such as printing a return sticker. Registering on-line is a major advantage for an improved supply chain handling. But also provides the ability to return the product in one of your stores.
Also make sure that the financial completion of the returns is quick and without error. Pay immediately or within a few days the amount to the account of the customer. This delivers you lots of goodwill and therefore customer retention.
E-Fulfillment processes.
Because customers expect a fast delivery, you must take this into account your location strategy. Good analysis of your markets, where are the locations of your distributor so that the transition period is kept as short as possible. Also, consider to fully outsource to a service provider. Important in the choice of your distributor is their flexibility and transparency of their services.
The E-Fulfillment process should be able to go with your volume size. It is a big difference whether you have a 1,000 or 100,000 different products. In the latter case, far-reaching automation is cost-effective. Other wise you will have to invest more in the quality of your staff to achieve error-free handling.
When handling your processes it is also relevant to look at your single pieces or bulk handling. Keep into account at your internal flows and workload the specific requirements of these flows. It is appropriate to separate the flows in your warehouse.
Outlet shops
Most chains have on average sufficient capacity for storage, distribution and sales. It is precisely the peak days that are so extreme that many retailers get into trouble, such as during Christmas.
For your storage, you need to build your inventory timely and it is probably necessary to temporarily use the storage facility of a third party. Be sure to have an effective and quick solution to resupply your stores. Even on a daily or half day base. Shuttling solutions can help you achieve this strategy.
You can also hire temporary retail space in a prime location to achieve additional sales. In addition, you can use the outlet concept to set up a store quickly and at low cost. The products you offer will especially be articles with a high turnover and lower value.
Finally
We see a tremendous change in the retail sector, led by the expectation of the consumer that he can buy any item on-line and / or in a store can buy it anywhere and can return in any way, and the customer can pay cash in any other way such as the use of apps. For your logistics are two matters of fundamental importance. Speed up your chain and realize visibility to you yourself and the customer. The best way you can achieve that is by making your supply chain shorter and flatter and to involve all the parties directly at achieving maximum customer delight.
