It is becoming more and more difficult for one e-commerce site to differentiate itself from another, knowing that in a few clicks, a customer can find an identical reference somewhere else. To retain customers, a wide and deep range is no longer enough.
On the other hand, the customer experience, and in particular the delivery experience, now strongly influences the purchase decision, as Benjamin Hamilton, Director of Octopia Fulfillment reminds us : « How do you offer the best delivery experience to your customers? If the delivery options offered online do not meet the expectations of the customers, 60% of them abandon their shopping basket . 40% of customers who have a bad delivery experience do not order again .” Therefore, retailers are looking for new solutions to better manage their fulfillment and deliver an enjoyable end-to-end customer experience.
How to offer the best delivery experience to your customers
The reason for the choice: to outsource the delivery to offer the best customer experience. To ensure an optimal quality of service during delivery, sellers have two options: they can manage the logistics part themselves or delegate it to a third party . This is a decisive choice, as it affects the delivery service and therefore customer satisfaction .
First scenario: dropshipping
The e-commerce site decides to leave the responsibility for shipping and handling of returns to its potential suppliers . This is called dropshipping . Although apparently practical and cheap, dropshipping does not have all the advantages: consumers are faced with delivery and return procedures that differ from one supplier to another. For the seller, it is also necessary to ensure that they have conscientious suppliers so as not to tarnish the brand image of their e-commerce with delays or negligence. Check out more interesting articles on our site IG368.
Nor is internalization a panacea : Between the daily management of the warehouses, the attention to orders, the establishment of transport contracts, the hiring and training of qualified personnel, to name only the most obvious areas of expenditure, the costs they accumulate quickly . These costs, impossible to recover for many e-commerce sites, are then reflected in delivery fees and are a source of consumer dissatisfaction. Also in this case, the customer experience suffers. The shipping costs increase, which causes the abandonment of the shopping cart.
Second scenario: outsource logistics
There is one last solution, which is to outsource logistics to a company like Octopia, whose core business is fulfillment. In this case, Octopia Fulfillment takes care of the final stages of the purchase process, starting with the purchase itself. The service offered is consistent, qualitative, and costs can be anticipated for sellers (and shared between multiple e-retailers), allowing them to keep shipping costs competitive, resulting in higher customer satisfaction.
Association in which everyone wins
Using an e-logistics solution offers a good mix of benefits for both e-retailers and their customers.
As an expert in Fulfillment , Octopia takes over from the moment the customer places an order, allowing e-commerce sites and sellers to focus on their business. From pickup to international shipping, delivery tracking and returns management , Octopia ensures a great customer experience, designed to satisfy you as quickly as possible. As this company tells us: “ 99.7% of packages are sent on time ”.
Delivery method selection
The choice of delivery method (at a relay point, at a point of sale, at home, through a specific carrier such as Mondial Relay or UPS) is decisive for most customers. Offering a wide range of possibilities also means ensuring that the needs of different audiences, whether individuals or professionals, are taken into account.
Lastly, the prices applied are competitive , since the seller pays based on the area of the warehouse that his merchandise occupies. Therefore, he knows the costs in advance, which are lower for him than if he had to manage his own logistics.
To facilitate delivery and achieve operational excellence, it offers e-retailers a centralized tracking platform. The connection to the IT infrastructure is easy and does not require any development cost. Thanks to this platform, the seller can remotely manage his stock in real time, control the number of orders and their preparation. The customer has access to multiple delivery options and can track the progress of their package. A perfect experience for both parties.
Octopia opens a logistics platform in Spain to accelerate its international development and that of its customers
Octopia continues its expansion throughout Europe with the opening of a storage space in Spain. This 5,000 m² storage space reinforces the logistics network of Octopia Fulfillment, which already has ten logistics platforms in France (ie more than 600,000 m² of storage space available to its eMerchant customers ). The goal, thanks to this new storage and shipping platform, is ” to be as close as possible to sellers in the Iberian region to offer them a practical, reactive and highly competitive logistics solution” . « Spanish e-commerce sellers now have access to new delivery methods, in particular express delivery (delivery in D+1 or D+2) » they add.
Octopia Fulfillment is also about to launch two additional logistics platforms in Germany and England, continuing with the goal of improving the customer experience and offering a logistics solution tailored to the needs of sellers.