Feature: These 3 strategies will help you sustain online order fulfilment!

The U.S. ecommerce market alone will hit US$279billion in sales by 2015, up from about US$200billion today. To meet this explosive demand, more and more retailers are turning to distributors for help in fulfilling on-line orders……Forrester Research.

In previous features I outlined some of the things to ponder when you decide to go online with your business. Among them is the fact that as you decide to offer a product online, you should have it at the back of your mind fulfillment is an integral part of e-retailing. It is rather unfortunate that most of the solutions and campaigns urging businesses to jump onto the online wagon are making no provision for distribution.

Ecommerce demands can be very exhausting, especially as more people begin to know the benefits of the Internet economy. And here in Ghana we are seeing significant online awareness. I must say that we are gradually realising the efficiencies that characterise online business activities. Certainly, various distribution channels will have opportunities to position themselves properly for the ecommerce take-off here in Ghana.

Shipping, as admitted by most experts, is one of the difficult aspects of running an ecommerce business. Many online retailers on daily basis do have complaints about shipping cost and delivery time frames. To most shoppers, questions such as how soon or how well the purchased item will get to them is a bother.

E-business managers have the responsibility of ensuring that their companies are able to generate maximum revenue from an acquired customer over a long period of time. One of the lures of ecommerce is the detailed information the consumer can have about the product s/he intends to buy.

And the fact is that right after check out the customer is informed throughout the shipping process, giving him a peace of mind in such a virtual world. For shipping, the customer wants to know details about shipping-price, speed and carrier-choice.
It is very crucial to note that the third arm of ecommerce, which is shipping, should be strategically handled. How you handle the shipping of your goods sold online can be crucial to your ability to retain and attract new customers. In much-matured Internet economies, shoppers have mentioned thatmost of them wouldn’t make purchases because of the shipping choices available on most sites.

Developing a shipping strategy
Test shipping options:
For a start, it is advisable to run quite a few offers on shipping. These different promotions can run within the same period of time but independent of each other, just like the Telcos do. There should be a significant rise in the conversion rate when this is done well.
• Free-of-charge shipping: Let it be clearly stated on your home page through to the fulfillment info page. Let the site designer incorporate a link on each page to the order fulfillment page. As much as possible, make it very visible.

• Subsidized shipping charges: As much as affordable, make some cuts on your delivery charges by giving discounts. Also, look at what others are offering and try to match them.

 Data collection:
As part of your data gathering parameters, you can evaluate the total purchases made by a customer and look at the possibility of you bearing the total shipping cost as against you subsidising for him/her.
There are various web analytic tools you can adopt to help you know the percentage of online shoppers that never complete a purchase. By this, you can evaluate the amount of traffic your site is attracting and at what stage of the purchasing process are they discontinuing.

Take an average estimated value of your target market’s expenditure over a considerable period of time, bearing in mind not to confuse this with their first-time buying only. By knowing the average customer transaction value and the average number of s per year, you can estimate the valuable lifetime business benefit of your target audience.
 Do Some Result analysis:

Some critical analysis of the conversion rate is needed here .You have to look out for changes, noting either declines or rises in the number of site visitors that eventually make purchases. As already mentioned, there are various web analytic tools one can deploy in result analysis.
Here following are some of the analyses you can do:
• The percentage number of visitors who never complete their purchasing process.

• Revenue increment in relation to profit margins against shipping.

• Recurring patronage — Has there been any improvement in recurring visits and eventual conversion since you started the shipping offers? Depending on the type of product you offer, this could take some period of time.
You can send emails to customers, asking their opinion about the shipping promotion and how they were encouraged to make purchases.
It makes a lot of sense that as you run an online retails shop you should use online shipping tools that will enable you to package, ship and manage your inventory from a single point and in real-time. Your choice of delivery, however, should help you save a great deal of time, money and headaches — leaving you to focus on what really matters, which is making sales.

{Your Weekly ecommerce Tips:
{E-commerce success stories:
Thanks go to GhIPSS’ ‘gh-link’, an interbank switching and processing system that enables different banks to share each other’s Automated Teller Machines (ATM) is fully in place. So feel free to use any ‘gh-link’-enabled ATM near you this Christmas and save precious time to enjoy the festive season.
{Theodore’s expert diary:
In Search of old Facebook posts
There is a new feature being rolled-out that will enable users to search for specific posts, photos, or videos on Facebook. This ability to search for archives on Facebook should also be a concern for every user on the platform. How do I mean? It means that things you post today can be brought up years after. So simply think twice before you post next time.