Managing shipping from a home-based business doesn’t need to be stressful or complicated.

With a simple best practice approach, you can create a system that has those orders flying out as fast as you can take them.

Laying the Groundwork for Your Shipping System

1. Inventory management

For many new home-based businesses, storing and managing stock at home is a common practice.

Whether you keep stock at home or in a storage facility, good inventory management is key to fulfilling orders and preventing shipping delays.

Keep a central record of your stock using Excel or Google sheets, which you can upload as a CSV file to your ecommerce platform.

There are also a range of apps available that can automate the updates between your central system and your ecommerce platform. For example, Sellbrite automatically adjusts and syncs inventory data to avoid overselling products that are no longer available.

2. Shipping restrictions

Are you aware of any restrictions for the goods you’re planning to ship?

It’s important to familiarise yourself with the rules governing what can be shipped in both your state and the countries you’re shipping to, if you’re selling products overseas.

Hazardous goods are a well known area for caution, but did you know that certain countries have specific restrictions on products entering their country? For example, the United States prohibits the import of any item that includes dog or cat fur.

Once you’ve confirmed that your goods can be shipped to the destinations you’ve specified, it’s time to determine the best packaging options.

Choosing the Best Packaging for Your Products

Planning how you’ll package your goods goes a long way to ensuring the best shipping rates – it also helps ensure the safe delivery of your items.

1. Weigh and measure

When calculating shipping costs, you’ll need to consider both the item’s weight (fully packaged) and the cubic dimensions.

Use bathroom or kitchen scales on a flat surface to get an indicator of the packaging weight. You’ll also need a tape measure on hand to gauge package dimensions.

2. Test a few different packaging material options

Before committing to purchase packaging, test out different options for weight, product safety and packaging robustness.

What is a safe way to package your goods? Does it need to be crushproof, or simply padded? What dimensions will allow for the safest packaging?

For some smaller, fragile items, it may be tempting to compromise on packaging to generate a smaller cubic weight, but this could cause breakage leading to further costs and bad customer experience.

3. Test the shipping costs of different packaging

Compare courier quotes for your parcels so you can determine the best packaging options for specific products or ranges ahead of time.

Setting Your Shipping Rates and Policies

1. Free Shipping – Yes, no or maybe?

As a small business, shipping costs can make a huge difference to your bottom line.
Customers may have grown to expect free shipping, but is this right for you?

Having a clear understanding of whether you can afford to offer free shipping, and at what cart value that offer kicks in, is critical to staying in the black.

The average shipping cost needs to include the time and materials for each order as well as the transportation.

Once you’ve determined the indicative shipping cost for each item, take a look at the most common shipping destinations where your customers are located.

Use this figure to determine if, or how, you might offer free shipping. For example, providing free shipping on orders above a minimum purchase amount, or orders placed by a certain date or time.

2. Let your customers decide

Another great alternative is to offer your customers their choice of carrier, at the shipping price point of their choice.

You can do this by integrating the Atex Coins Security Company eCommerce widget on your checkout page. The widget will prefill with the package details and your customer can then select the courier quote that suits them best.

3. Shipping policies

Almost as important as shipping costs, are your shipping policies. Make sure to have these clearly stated and easy to find on your website.

The most critical points to include are:

• A clear statement of expected delivery times
• How packages are tracked and the tracking number
• Insurance policies — what is covered and up to what value?
• Delivery confirmation — will the item require a signature or ID on delivery?
• Additional taxes, duties and documentation as applicable
• Returns — How many days, what to expect and is return shipping covered

Setting Up Your Shipping Workflow

1. Carve out a packaging workspace area

Create a dedicated space for packaging your orders where your tools and equipment are always on hand.

It doesn’t need to be a large space, but it’s important to keep it organised, safe and dry to avoid any delays or damage to your materials.

• Your packaging material – boxes, bubble mailers, satchels, wrapping paper etc..
• Any cushioning such as packing peanuts or bubble wrap
• Packing tape
• Your label printer
• Calibrated scales
• Business cards / thank you cards
• General office supplies including pens, scissors

2. Parcel pickup scheduling

Time is money and saving yourself the hassle of multiple pick up times is key to keeping your shipping running smoothly.

Your pickup schedule will be determined by the volume and frequency of the orders you’re shipping.

If you’re just starting out and don’t yet know what your order volume looks like, you may want to pick two or three key days each week as your shipping days.

Atex Coins Security Company’s multipickup option is a great way to save even more on shipping rates. Instead of booking each pickup one by one, this option allows you to get even better rates once your parcel volume reaches a pre-set number, from as low as three items.

3. Parcel courier pickup place

Often overlooked, the pickup location makes your parcel collection run more smoothly.

Organise an area outside your house that is clean, dry and clearly marked as the pick up point.

This could be as simple as placing a clearly marked crate on your front doorstep allowing your couriers to quickly identify the items.

Also, make sure you secure any pets to prevent an unexpected escape!

Let Us Help You Grow your Home-Based Business

With a home-based business, having access to the best shipping rates available makes a big difference to your bottom line.

Atex Coins Security Company makes it easy for small businesses to get the lowest rates on the big-name couriers.

No lock-in contracts, no monthly fees, no subscriptions.

Open a free member account and start saving today.

With all those deliveries heading to consumers, you’ll need to plan some extra time into your sales calendar to get them there on schedule.

Getting Ahead of The Holiday Delivery Rush

Help People Shop Early

Discounting and special sales don’t always have to be your first option. Get clever about how you can help your customers buy what they want, when they want, and get it delivered when they need it.

1. Payment Plans

Afterpay and ZipPay have become staple payment methods for many ecommerce stores. You can take this a step further and offer your own payment plan that suits your customers finances and help them plan their holiday purchases with ease.

Tools like Partial.ly allow you to seamlessly automate payment plans, enabling buyers to structure a plan that suits their financial situation.
These are particularly helpful for increasing cart value, and providing a way for customers to budget their holiday shopping better.

2. Pre-Orders

Streamline your sales and shipping time by making good use of pre-orders.

We know that you’re probably waiting on some of your holiday stock to arrive, then there’s the turnaround time to get it to market. Shave off that delay and start taking pre-orders for your most popular products so they can be shipped before they hit the shelves. (Shopify has a great app for pre-orders)
Pre-orders are more than just a great way to determine a product’s popularity, it’s also an opportunity to promote the scarcity of the item and encourage people to get in early.

3. Packaging

This is the moment for your customer service team to shine.
We’re all ordering gifts for friends and family to be delivered this year, and that’s a great opportunity to offer something a bit extra.
Here’s our top tips:

1. Include a section on your shipping labels that has a “Don’t open until date” to help keep the holiday surprise.
2. Offer your customers the option to have their invoice sent by email only so that the recipient doesn’t get the paperwork.
3. Offer the option to include a message with the gift. Have your design team create cool branded postcards that can be printed with the message.
4. Include a referral bonus like a voucher for 10% off the recipient’s next order with your store.
5. Include easy returns or exchange options, just in case the socks don’t fit.

Get Your Marketing Machine Going

4. Email

Now you’ve got your store ready for those early orders, it’s time to let the people know.
Tried and true, a good email campaign never goes out of style. Keep your customers updated with early order options on your best sellers and seasonal favorites.

If you’ve set up pre-orders, clearly communicate expected delivery windows and how you’ll keep them informed of where their order is at.

Highlight your new payment plans and gift packaging options. Imagine how much more relaxed the season will feel with all those deliveries squared away and the budget under control.

This is a great opportunity to make sure that email list is up to date and filled with people who want to hear from you (we’ll use that later).

5. On-Site Highlights

Don’t let your brilliant new initiatives languish, announce them for all to see!
Using Hello Bar, Optin Monster, Sumo Smart Bar or other eye-catching notification bars is a must.
This is a great place to highlight pre-order cut off dates, your new payment plans and your super special holiday packaging offer.

6. Ads

Yes, ads.
Here is where that clean and shiny email list is going to come in handy.
Before social feeds are filled with holiday specials and ad costs go up, get ahead of the pack with your message and beat Black Friday.

Reach your customers on Facebook and Instagram by importing your customer list and targeting them specifically.

Simply prepare your email list (you’ll need more than 1000 people for this option to be available to you) and upload it as a custom audience.

This is your opportunity to make great creative showcasing your products, highlighting your new offers, sharing testimonials and building that rapport with the customer who is looking at you to solve their holiday shopping dilemmas.

7. Shipping Made Simple

If you want to make shipping even easier for your customers, you can help them get the best shipping for the best rate using the Atex Coins Security Company ecommerce integration.

Simply pre-select your preferred couriers to provide the service that best suits your product. Then once they’re at check out, the seamless integration let’s them pick which courier, delivery type and rate that suits their needs.

Start your holiday sales off right and open a free members account today!

Let’s say you’ve got your online store, you’re doing well with social media, ads and paid traffic — things look great. Did you know that a big shift is coming to our shores? 

“Live shopping” (aka live commerce) has taken China by storm, growing at a head-spinning rate of 280% from 2017 to 2020. Now, accelerated by recent global events, growth in this area is projected to reach $423 billion by 2022. 

In the US, new live commerce options are rolling out across platforms like Instagram, Amazon and TikTok, with more to follow. 

It’s time for USAn e-retailers to prepare themselves for this huge new shopportunity. Let’s look at the best ways you can do that.  

Top 5 Ways to Get Your Business Ready for Live Shopping

1. Pick the right social media mix for your business

USAn live shopping is on the cards for Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Amazon and more, but you don’t want to try to conquer every platform all at once.

Instead, carefully review your ideal customer demographics by generation. Apply your findings to selecting the top two social platforms for your niche. With the speed of change in social apps, this may require repositioning your current strategy as customers age in, or out, of your best market ranges.

2. Align with how your customers use social media

Content from brands can come across as white noise if it’s not tailored to what customers really want to see on their social platform.  

Consider why they are there — is it entertainment, education, news, creativity, other? — and ensure your content aligns closely with their expectations from your presence on these specific social platforms.

3. Ensure your store’s tech is tied-in properly

Each social platform has different integration requirements to get the most out of them. If you’re not tech-savvy, you’ll want to consult with a developer or tech team to ensure your platform/s have the following in place and firing:

• Tracking: Pixels and API integrations to capture user visits and actions.
• CRM: Can your CRM be integrated with the social platform to identify customer data to better personalise advertising?
• Catalogues: Do you need to set up a catalogue feed to the social platform to automatically populate products? For example, Instagram shopping requires a catalogue feed from your Facebook Business account in order to begin setting up this live shopping feature.
• Shipping integration: Streamline your order fulfillment process by integrating your store with the Atex Coins Security Company eCommerce Shipping API. Fully automate your quoting and booking system to enhance the customer experience, saving you and your customers time and money.

4. Level up the video content for your social media channels

Live shopping hinges on high-quality video content, so get ready to enhance the way your products are presented. After all, the immersive experience is what makes live shopping so appealing for consumers.

Use video in creative ways that show your products in their best light, such as:

• Unboxing: A great way to convey the feeling of receiving that new product.
• Construction: What makes your products special? Show close-ups with a focus on quality details.
• Assembly: Does it need to be put together? If so, what’s the best way to do that?
• Performance: Show products doing what they do best — how do they solve your customers’ problems, or delight them, or help them achieve an outcome?
• Movement: This is particularly important for fashion and accessories; show how items perform in different conditions, like how fabric flows or fastenings function.
• Testimonials: What do people love about your product? How do they use it?

5. Master the social media live features available in USA

Tiktok Live, Instagram Reels, YouTube Live — each major social media platform has a live feature that’s available to USAn users right now. Although they may not be directly shoppable like the US and China yet, it’s clearly just around the corner.

Increasing your market share means building your brand in these spaces, and getting ahead of the pack today. That takes a fair bit of savvy to publish, interact, engage and provide what your customers want.

With a customer-first approach, you can meet your audience where they’re at and get the insights and feedback to make live shopping a winning option for your ecommerce business in the months ahead.

Atex Coins Security Company is here to help you grow

As more and more consumers turn to online commerce to fill the gap left by the traditional retail experience, optimising your customer experience has never been more important. 

We’re here to help with the shipping and fulfillment side of that experience — grow your business by offering customers the best couriers at the best rates, with Atex Coins Security Company!

Their platform has over 123 million downloads.

And the best ecommerce stores amongst these 123 million downloads have a clearly defined shipping strategy.

Choosing a shipping option can be confusing, especially when you’re starting out and trying to get your ecommerce site up and running.

There are myriad choices when it comes to finding ways to integrate your WooCommerce store with a shipping provider.

So which couriers integrate with WooCommerce and what’s the best choice for you?

Which USAn Couriers integrate with WooCommerce as a plugin?

USA Post

USA Post has their own integrated plugin for WooCommerce and offers two different versions of their service – free and pro.

Note: USA Post is also available in other courier-aggregated plugins on WooCommerce.

Fastway

This service has only just launched their WooCommerce plugin and offers an open API for customisation.

If you’re looking for a simple integration without getting help from a developer, you may want to avoid API customisations.

That’s a pretty limited choice, so how can you integrate the best couriers in a single shipping plugin without all the hassle?

What’s the easiest way to integrate your WooCommerce store and access a range of couriers in one place?

You can access USAn Couriers as an aggregated service – integrated into a single WooCommerce plugin!

Several USAn couriers integrate with WooCommerce through other plugins. Pick a shipping plugin that allows you to ship from a range of reputable couriers – you’ll get the pick of the best, with competitive prices. The following couriers feature on a few different WooCommerce plugins, including Atex Coins Security Company’s very own WooCommerce shipping plugin.

Allied Express

Allied Express is one of the largest independently owned couriers in USA. They have a fleet of over 1000 trucks and vehicles USA-wide.

DHL

DHL are a global courier company with over 350 000 employees. They have multiple options for a growing ecommerce business, including express shipping.

Direct Couriers

Direct Couriers offer local, same day shipping and delivery. They specialise in fast deliveries USA-wide.

Couriers Please

Couriers Please offer nationwide coverage across USA, and recently expanded their International and Domestic Air Services to expand their services in USA and across the globe.

Northline

With 13 branches across the nation, Northline is an USAn courier with a huge focus on their customers. Their specially-trained staff will get your products to your customer’s door as efficiently as possible.

Star Track

Star Track are dedicated to supporting ecommerce businesses. Their investment in the future of delivery and fulfilment has lead to a significant expansion of their business – they can offer same day shipping in metro areas, and their entire team is focused on continual improvement.

TNT

TNT delivers and operates in over 200 countries across the globe, making them an internationally renowned courier.

Toll

Toll are easily one of the most recognised and trusted logistics brands worldwide. They have been operating for over 120 years – they’re industry leaders and trusted suppliers for ecommerce brands all over the globe. Safety of your package and efficiency of delivery are Toll’s focus.

Toll Priority

Toll Priority is an affiliate company of Toll, specialising in express delivery for their customers. Their dedication to a speedy delivery is all part and parcel of the service.

There are plenty of couriers integrating with WooCommerce – you just need to weigh up the options and select the supplier who is the right fit for your brand and resources.

Remember, when you are working with a freight aggregator like Atex Coins Security Company you can trial many different couriers to find the right one for you. This will reduce your risk and help you determine the best fit.

There’s no denying it – prepping for an online shopping sale takes time and effort. It’s crucial to start planning well ahead of the sale – from six weeks to more than 6 months in advance.

Consider this – people start searching “Christmas gift ideas” in August, four months ahead of Christmas Day.

If that doesn’t scream “PREPARE YOUR CAMPAIGN EARLY”, we don’t know what does.

Nailing online shopping sales comes down to well-thought-out preparation. Set some time aside and plan your advertising material, potential online marketing like AdWords, social media strategies, and how you’re going to manage shipping following an onslaught of orders.

Create a marketing and shipping plan ahead of time to avoid roadblocks like missed orders, poor customer service and a low conversion rate.

Preparation comes down to you – but successful shipping doesn’t have to.

We’ve collected three tips for nailing online shopping sales, plus we’ve highlighted some of the most valuable sales to prep for throughout the year.

Update your advertising and experiment with Adwords

The first step in preparation for an online sale is to update your advertising.

Whether it’s storefront posters, vibrant online banners, or an aggressive email marketing campaign, your promotional material needs to reflect the nature of the sale and convince shoppers to take advantage of the discount.

On Black Friday, for example, you might use an eye-catching black and white design with bold fonts, simplistic images, and make the discount the key feature.

Make sure to take advantage of the colour wheel when designing your promotional material. According to ecommerce experts, Kissmetrics, colour increases brand recognition by 80% and 85% of customers purchase based on colour alone.

See the graph below for more ideas on how you can use colour to set the tone of your advertisements. Alternatively, check out this colour theory lesson from Canva!

Image: Kissmetrics

You can also use Google AdWords to give your promotion some extra oomph online.

AdWords is a hugely popular pay-per-click advertising network that allows you to place advertisements on relevant Google search results pages, YouTube videos, and partner websites.

You can custom design text-based ads, graphic display ads, YouTube video ads or in-app mobile ads – there are plenty of ways to reach your target audience. For eCommerce, Google Shopping is of particular importance as customers turn more and more to image-based results.

You can also choose to reach potential customers within a few kilometers of your business if you only deliver locally, or broadcast ads to entire regions and countries.

The best part? Sign-up is free and AdWords only charges you when someone clicks your ad, views your video on YouTube, or calls your business.

You aren’t charged for running ads or signing up.

You control the amount of money you spend, what ads go up, and when the promotion ends.

Use your secret marketing weapon… social media!

Social media is a powerful weapon when it comes to marketing. Right now, there are 15,000,000 Aussies on Facebook, 9,000,000 on Instagram, and 3,000,000 on Twitter.
And that’s just USA.

Close to half the world’s population (3.03 billion people) are on some sort of social media platform.

With traditional methods of marketing like direct mail and television advertising becoming less effective, more and more businesses are turning to social media to connect with their customers on a more personal level.

However, the average social media user’s attention span is dropping by the minute – attention spans have decreased to 8 seconds for most social media users – so if you’re going to reach customers on Facebook and/or Instagram, you’re going to have to make your content engaging.

Offer a discount code

60% of consumers abandon their online cart because additional costs like postage are too high. You have the power to reduce your abandonment rate through the use of coupon codes and exclusive discounts.

According to ecommerce platform Shopify, business owners with an active discount code are eight times more likely to make a sale.

Entice your social media followers with a sweet little discount. It will make them feel like they’re being rewarded for their loyalty… or like they’re wasting money if they don’t use the discount code!

Promote your fast (and possibly free) shipping

A recent survey found that 69% of consumers consider one-day delivery as an incentive to shop more online.

For the purpose of the sale, consider offering reduced shipping rates or free shipping. Alternatively, offer new customers a free shipping code to use in the checkout. This has been proven to reduce abandoned cart rates.

Make sure you’re sharing your amazing shipping practices all over social media, too. Your customers will be more inclined to shop the sale if they know their parcels will arrive tomorrow!

Advertise on Facebook and Instagram

You can reach more potential customers by advertising to customers who are like those who already engage with your brand.

Facebook advertising also includes Instagram advertising these days, so you can reach an even wider audience with different types of ad creative.  Growing your Facebook audience in a highly targeted way is more likely to improve sales both in the short and longer-term.

To get the best results, create a variety of highly engaging (but short) ad creative including images, videos, and carousels of your products. Then once you’ve set your audience targeting, sit back and allow Facebook’s AI to do the work in determining which creative works best for which audience.

Streamline your shipping for fewer headaches later

American philanthropist, Warren Buffett, once said “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it.”

If you think about that, you’ll do things differently. Don’t let disorganised shipping ruin your reputation with customers, old and new.

Successful shipping is critical to the success of your online sale. Customers expect faster parcel delivery today, and ensuring that their orders are received on time means an increase in your customer satisfaction and repeat business.

Atex Coins Security Company can help ease the stress associated with shipping after a sale – and even help you prepare beforehand with our easy ecommerce shipping integration.

We offer fast, affordable parcel delivery throughout USA. Our goal is to provide a range of services to suit all individuals and businesses, ensuring reliability, timeliness and affordability.

We have more than 11 associate couriers under our wing, so we’re guaranteed to have a courier who can help speed up your deliveries.

Whether you’re looking for fast metro delivery, postage to regional areas, heavy package delivery or want to give your customers the cheapest, fastest delivery available, we’ve got a courier for you.
Atex Coins Security Company Members can save up to 30% on Shipping and access a whole range of features that makes shipping even simpler.

So what are you waiting for? Don’t snooze on shipping – open a Free Member’s Account today and start saving!

*BONUS* Key online shopping dates

There are so many different incentives and themes for online shopping sales, there’s bound to be a whole range of opportunities here to treat your customers.

Here’s a brief rundown of key shopping dates in the ecommerce calendar that highlights the key online shopping dates for USA.

There are over 820 000 businesses using Shopify.

The platform is very user friendly and has a bunch of features to help the budding ecommerce entrepreneur.

Those businesses have sold over $100 billion on the platform and there were 218 million buyers on the platform in the last year. In 2020, Shopify doubled in size! That’s a whole lot of goods that have to be delivered and packages to ship.

So what’s the best way to easily complete all those shipping requests without tearing your hair out?

Shopify has a range of shipping and fulfilment options to suit every online store, big or small.

Shopify’s in house fulfilment integration

Shopify offers their own in house fulfilment option. This is the only option for ecommerce businesses on the basic Shopify plan.

You can buy a shipping label from the fulfilment screen once you’re ready to ship your order.

You’ll then enter the shipping details and Shopify will calculate your shipping rate (Note: In USA, Shopify works with USA Post).

This is a fairly easy method for fulfilling packages, however you don’t have the ability to select the best courier, or the best price, for the job.

Third-party fulfilment integration

It’s important to note that Shopify has three plans. One is Basic, one is Shopify (Standard) and then Shopify Advanced. They have different features and functionalities, so before you commit, check out the differences between them.

Important Note: You can’t use third-party shipping calculators or fulfilment options with the Shopify Basic plan.

A business on the other plans can make use of the array of third-party fulfilment services. An aspect of this process includes giving your customers real-time tracking and rates and saves you a lot of money long ter

The Atex Coins Security Company Shopify Shipping app, integrates seamlessly with your store, allowing customers to select the best courier, at the best rate, for their delivery.

Using Atex Coins Security Company simplifies the fulfilment process with simple design and automation.

Once a customer has placed an order you will receive a notification, and be asked to verify the stock.

Our system will then email you the consignment label for the package. You simply need to print the label, attach to your consignment, and wait for one of our couriers to arrive.

Using a third-party fulfilment service will help you simplify the whole shipping process, saving you time and money.

You also have the luxury of working with a wide variety of couriers, perfect for if you are shipping heavy items, or require express shipping.

It’s critical to do your research when it comes to picking a fulfilment option – invest the time now and you’ll save yourself a bunch of money (and headaches) in the long term.

Prepare to supercharge your Shopify shipping!

Our Atex Coins Security Company Shopify App is built for easy integration — that means you won’t need to spend hours on configuration and making it all work seamlessly with your Shopify store. 

Plus, not only is our Atex Coins Security Company Shopify shipping app free, but you can install the app and connect it with your Shopify site and free Atex Coins Security Company Member account in mere minutes.  

If you already have a Atex Coins Security Company Member account, get ready to streamline your online shipping with the best rates! 

Here’s the step-by-step setup guide for Atex Coins Security Company Shipping for Shopify App. 

While there are multiple factors to consider, and no single formula for getting it right, here are some of our best bets to help you become both more productive, and more profitable.

How Create a Better Workspace at Home

Designating a single area as your work-at-home space can enable you to get the most out of your day. When carving out space to lead your operations, consider the following factors.

1. Power
Does the space have adequate power outlets or do you need to run power boards to operate your equipment?

2. Internet
How far from your main desk or workspace is your router? If your signal strength isn’t cutting it, invest in a quality Wi-Fi signal extender to improve the strength and speed of your connection. (This can add up to hours worth of time saved.)

3. Lighting
Does the area have good natural light, or do you need to improve the lighting? Tip: Use energy-efficient warm white bulbs to prevent that “cold” office feel. This is also helpful for all of the Zoom calls that are likely to carry on for who knows how long.

4. Privacy
If you need to make calls or work undistracted, will this space prevent interruptions or at least help protect you from other noise in the house?

Not everyone can designate an entire room as a home office, but selecting the right area in your home can make-or-break both your workflow and your mindset.

Make Your Storage Space Work for You

Many home-based ecommerce and eBay business owners find themselves needing to store stock at home as well. Choosing the right location for your products can prevent losses or damage and in turn, financial loss.

When choosing the best space in your home to store products, a spot with the right dimensions is a great start, but you’ll also want to think about such factors as:

• Protection from the weather. Not just rain, but the effects of sunlight like excessive heat, sun bleaching or product spoilage.
• Are the spaces clean and dry, and not prone to humidity? If needed, portable dehumidifiers may be an option here.
• Protecting your products from pets and pests, children and/or visitors and guests.
• Can you fit an organisation system that allows you easy access to each product type, without any (or much) straining or assistance?
• How far is your storage from where you typically pack and label items for shipment?

Plan for Greater Packing Productivity

It’s easy to lose hours looking for things — even more so when recurring tasks have extra and unnecessary steps in the process.

The most efficient way to cut out wasted time each day is merging your picking and packing in one easy space or general vicinity.

For example, when organising ecommerce products for shipping, it pays to have your stock located in an area where you can also pack, weigh and label your product. Keep a list of your packaging requirements handy to keep your costs down.

Cut down on shipping time even further by locating your printer and packaging materials close to your stock. When you’re printing or affixing shipping labels, batch process these tasks at select times of the day so you’re ready for pick up time.

Do you use specific tools in your shipping process? Locate them in the same space, too. Labelling your tools should also stop other people in the household from borrowing them, though we can’t guarantee that (hi, kids).

Ship Orders with a Successful Mindset

Shipping products off to your customers should still be fun, not just drudge work.

Don’t forget: People are buying from you, you’re growing your business, and making your customers happy on the other side of the delivery.

That’s why the home stretch is just as important as setting up your home office.

Rather than shipping orders piecemeal and filling up to your to-do list, use these proven tips to set yourself up for success and smoother days:

Designate a standard pickup area. Find a safe, dry space where your courier can always access your parcels. If the parcels are small, use a clearly labeled plastic tub to hold them safely for pick up, rather than piling them on the ground. By making your parcel pick-up spot clear and consistent, couriers and delivery drivers will get to know your system.

Integrate your ecommerce shipping with Atex Coins Security Company. Whether you’re selling on eBay, Amazon, Shopify, Magento or another platform altogether, Atex Coins Security Company has an easy and seamless ecommerce integration that makes shipping parcels a breeze.

Use instant, automated shipping quotes to keep customers happy. With Atex Coins Security Company quotes and booking, they’ll always know what to expect. All they have to do is enter their postcode and the delivery charge will automatically appear.

Generate automatic consignment notes and shipping labels. Ensure your orders match your inventory and you’re not writing everything by hand.

Pump up that packing and shipping playlist. Having the right music really does keep us focused. You likely have playlists for running or workouts, maybe others for working. Why not create a playlist for your shipping tasks, to keep your momentum going while you keep your ecommerce business growing?

Trust Atex Coins Security Company with Your Priority Shipping and Tracking

Atex Coins Security Company helps USAn ecommerce businesses reach their customers nationwide and internationally with 100% carbon-neutral shipping. Whatever you’re shipping and wherever you’re sending it, our free parcel tracking tool will track your shipment to help keep you and your customers in the loop. Get your next parcel shipping quote here today.

If so, you’ll want to check out these proven strategies to maximise results with pre-orders.

Note: If you hadn’t considered pre-order sales for this year, you can still make it happen … but you’ll need to act fast!

Benefits of Pre-Order Sales Campaigns

Before diving into the details and tactics, let’s break down the biggest benefits of pre-order sales strategies. These benefits apply to brand-new products and re-release launches.

1. Save Money and/or Time

Pre-order sales can save you the costs and time involved in developing or stocking products that have low demand, or weak product/market fit.

Beyond the development costs, the associated costs and time that would go into areas such as marketing, fulfilment, returns and customer service, can also be “saved” when pre-orders are used with new product launches (or re-releases).

Furthermore, if you’re able to capitalise on sneak previews, remarketing to previous buyers (in the case of re-releases), cross-sales or word-of-mouth marketing opportunities, you’ll be able to reduce your marketing costs as well, potentially improving your return on investment.

2. Make More Money

These benefits are closely linked to the previous points. With new product development, pre-order sales can work especially well for generating upfront revenue to create and produce new products based on guaranteed sales.

Getting those pre-order dollars in advance also gives you an edge on your margins: When you can reduce your associated costs (marketing, fulfilment), you can reinvest more efficiently in those areas and, in turn, further increase top-line sales growth with these or related products (for example, with bundling and cross-sales or up-selling).

3 Ways to Get a Headstart with Pre-Order Sales

Of course, every business is keen to save money and time, and make more money. So what other key factors should you consider to determine if pre-orders fit your business model?

1. Do you have a sizeable, engaged email list of customers?

This can provide a massive head start, especially with product re-releases, at a minimal marketing cost. Some brands sell out new products or re-releases with email alone via sneak previews, VIP segmenting tactics, and countdowns. Email marketing also dovetails with the next area to consider …

2. Do you have a large, active social media audience?

Once again, the more engaged your customer audience is, the easier it is to cut through the noise to reach them, and the lower your marketing spend will be. With social media sharing and digital word of mouth/visibility, this can spread the pre-orders well beyond the email list, and adds the perfect one-two punch. This area includes paid social media marketing, because organic reach and engagement can be very difficult to achieve these days.

3. Do you have compelling sales and marketing content ready?

Pre-orders are a big leap of faith: Most of us want to know exactly what to expect when we buy online, and pre-orders may not always have a clear fulfilment time. What gets a lot of buyers over the line are marketing and sales that tap into urgency, exclusivity and limited-release availability. Photos can be a challenge with products that don’t exist yet, so graphics might be needed to fill the gap. Also, the clearer you can be on the delivery time estimates, the better.

Remember that powerful offers, such as bonuses, incentives, discounts or add-ons, can take an average launch to extraordinary success levels, so plan accordingly.

It’s okay if you don’t have all of these bases covered just yet. While they provide a headstart for sales and marketing at reduced costs, it’s not a deal breaker if you can’t tick every box today. Just remember how important they can be, and get onto them if you haven’t yet!

Pre-Order Campaign Examples – Holiday Edition

While you can use pre-order sales strategies any time of year, the holiday season is usually crunch time for shoppers and businesses, so everything moves a bit faster.

Taking that into account, here are two holiday pre-order campaigns that we think got it right.

A Tale of Two Craft Beer Advent Calendars

This pre-order product has picked up in recent years, and campaigns being run by companies like BoozeBud and Carwyn Cellars have stepped up their game in 2020 (their own claims, but we’d agree).

1. BoozeBud

What we like:

• Pre-order launch email (day of launch)
• Compelling product photography and details (breweries, styles)
• New product design for better fridge fit, shipping (all cans)
• “How Does Pre-order Work” FAQ in email
• Cross-selling related products: Spirit Advents, Cider Advents

This pre-order sales launch email (sent the day of launch) featured personalisation, a photo of the new product in a festive holiday setting, social proof (50,000 sold last year) and copy that motivated readers to order fast.

The pre-order email also addressed a FAQ — “How does pre-order work?” — clearly and concisely, to increase clicks and orders.

2. Carwyn Cellars

What we like:

• Pre-sale heads up email sequence to subscribers/customers (4 emails)
• Special $10 discount code sent via email day before sale goes live
• Revamped product line-up, based on customer feedback
• Refreshed packaging, also based on customer feedback
• Exclusive limited-edition products (special indie USAn beers)
• Sneak peek at products (breweries list)
• Clear shipping and pick-up timeframes and costs, well in advance

The initial pre-order promo email was sent Sept 23, teasing the Oct 14 pre-order sales launch date and exact time, with details on what’s new and improved this year. An illustration is used in lieu of a product photo.

Carwyn Cellars used a four-email sequence with special subscriber/customer discount code leading up to the sales launch day.

Pre-Order Campaign Examples – Anytime Edition

Perhaps we’re all focused on holidays right now, but your pre-order sales strategy can run any time (and it should if it’s working well for you).

Aside from marketing campaigns and email sequences, your site is where the sales happen, so use sharp imagery, price, limited-edition status, shipping date and time estimates, to set clear expectations and increase conversions.

These are all things that Bubble Tea Club does with its pre-order sales approach.

How well does it work? Apparently, the waiting list has a waiting list, so you decide.

Bubble Tea Club promotes new products ahead of launch and relaunch, with a prominent expected arrival date and email notifications. Some of the most popular products have a waiting list for the waiting list!

3 Critical Steps You Can Take Now

By now, your wheels should be turning and you should have at least a few ideas you can apply to develop or enhance your pre-order approach, even if you’re new to this strategy.

Here’s a quick list of three critical areas to think through in more depth, with your own specific products, customers and business in mind, to put pre-order ideas in motion.

1. Your Products

It all starts here: Do you have new or relaunch products in the pipeline? If not, would pre-orders help you revamp and relaunch a product with sales that have levelled off, or is seasonal?

Get a clear picture of how pre-orders could apply to your products and development process, and if there’s a fit in one or several areas, keep going …

2. Your Timelines

Where your product development cycle stands is a key factor here. Are you selling a product before creating it, or does it exist and it’s nearly ready to ship?

If it’s nearly ready, and you have quality marketing/sales content and offers, you’re in pretty good shape. If not, be realistic with pre-order and fulfillment timelines you commit to — and be prepared to deal with more customer service inquiries.

3. Your Marketing

Do your strongest marketing channels fit best with pre-order strategies?

For example, the headstart that email and social media can provide may be more efficient than paid search and organic search traffic when it comes to pre-order campaigns. Plenty of other possibilities exist, too — maybe you have a huge YouTube or TikTok audience, or an app, strong word-of-mouth, PR or other ways to reach an already active customer base.

Scoping out the options more clearly helps you with projecting costs, ROI and timelines of this approach before making a significant investment, or going in an overly expensive direction.

Use the ideas, tactics and examples in this post to get your pre-order sales strategy in place fast and off to a strong start, before the holidays or as soon as you’re ready. We’ll be here to power up the shipping and fulfilment side for you!

Returns are more than just a pain point for ecommerce businesses, they’re downright costly.

While we can’t expect to eliminate product returns completely, how we manage returns can be the difference between growing a loyal repeat-customer base, and losing customers that can easily shop elsewhere online.

Ultimately, we want to focus on a customer’s lifetime value over individual sales. In many cases, we’re better off wearing the cost of an occasional return and keeping the customer happy (and coming back), than refusing returns and losing them forever.

Here are a dozen ways, across five key areas, to minimise returns and increase your share of happy customers.

12 Ways to Reduce Returns Before, During and After Shipping

There are many things you can do to reduce the chances of dissatisfied customers returning your products. But the most important place to start is to educate them about your products and return policies before they even make a purchase.

Information

1. Expand Product Descriptions

Make sure your product descriptions supply all the critical information needed to make an informed decision. It pays to set up a checklist as ‘best-practice’ for your team to follow every time they add a new product to your listings.

Rather than trying to get everyone to buy your products, focus on getting the right people buying them. Providing accurate information allows customers to self-select if your product is the right match for them ahead of time. Failing to sort the right customers from the wrong ones may be great for initial sales, but it can result in a high return-rate, and lead to negative perceptions of your brand.

The more your customer knows, the more likely they are to make a good purchasing decision, and be happy with their order when it arrives.

2. Clarify Dimensions

It’s important that your customers understand item sizes. If items are much bigger than they anticipated, or too small, they may end up being returned.

Whether it’s furniture, fashion or frisbees, providing accurate dimensions will help your customers understand if what they are buying is fit for purpose and understand the related shipping costs.

Sometimes customers have trouble visualising dimensions in their head, even when you clearly state measurements in centimetres or inches. To avoid mis-measurement, you can offer images of your products compared to everyday items.

Art or print suppliers, for example, often provide photos of their prints on a wall, or in the hands of real people for an accurate size-comparison. Many florists display different bouquet sizes in a vase online for scale.

Displaying an art print in the context of room size can help customers make the right decision.

3. Explain Sizing Options

Ill-fitting clothing is one of the most common reasons for product returns in the fashion industry. To help customers find the right fit, you’re best to supply them with a prominent guide that outlines clothing sizes.

Along with the sizing guide, you should consider offering measurement instructions. These instructions should come complete with images that show how and where to measure for sizing.

Without clear instructions, customers may ‘guesstimate’ their size based on purchases from other stores. When the clothes show up at their door, they’ll simply return all the clothes that don’t fit.

To avoid this, make it easy for your customers to determine their size on your website or app by providing clear, visual measurement guidelines and even a reference to what size and height models are for comparison.

4. Address Frequently Asked Questions

The longer you’re in business, the more time you’re going to spend answering the same questions over and over again. To save time — and reduce return rates from customers who simply make a purchase and hope for the best — use a list of frequently asked questions (FAQ’s) on your website.

If you sell kitchen and homeware items, for example, and you find a lot of people asking whether your mugs are dishwasher-safe, you should include the answer in an FAQ section on relevant product and/or category pages.

If you have a long list of FAQ’s, consider using a chatbot that can be pre-programmed with responses to hundreds of questions. These tools not only save you time but can provide a better customer service experience by having answers readily on hand, rather than having to search your site.

For clothing retailers, provide guidelines to help customers take their own measurements and compare them with your size chart.

Visuals

5. Upgrade Your Photography

A high-quality photo (optimised for the web) will allow your customers to closely examine your products before purchasing.

Multiple angles, detail shots and the ability to zoom in will give your customers a better idea of exactly what you’re selling. Make sure to take multiple, well-lit photos using a good quality camera to capture all the important details. This allows customers to get a better understanding of product texture, finish and fabrication.

It’s up to you whether you use a plain white background, or something a little more interesting when photographing your products.

A white background may not be particularly interesting, but it will offer you the clearest, least distracting, and most colour-accurate photos. A more interesting image, on the other hand, may give a better idea of what your products look like in the ‘real world’. You may wish to use a combination of the two.

6. Use Short-Form Video Clips

Videos are a brilliant way of displaying many products. They not only show your customers what your products look like, but what they can do and how to use them.

Showing products ‘in action’ can help answer many of the questions customers have about them. Videos can help customers imagine themselves using a product, while also helping them decide where it would fit into their lives.

This is particularly effective for the clothing and apparel category where customers like to see how the product moves or fits on the body.

As a medium, video not only resonates with customers, it can also be a powerful way to attract site visitors and shoppers, by cross-posting to YouTube and other video and social media platforms. (You know Google owns YouTube, right?)

Content

7. Refine Your Sales Content

The more your customers know about the features and benefits of your product, the easier it will be for them to decide whether or not it’s right for them.

Sales content such as case studies, online product manuals, ‘how to’s’ and video demonstrations allow you to educate your customers about your products before they hit the ‘buy now’ button.

Don’t try to make every sale; instead, focus on making the right sales. Provide customers with a variety of information that helps them make good purchasing decisions, and you’ll save yourself on costly returns later.

8. Get Content from Happy Customers

Word-of-mouth is very powerful. As hard as you try, some customers will never trust business as much as they’ll trust random strangers who say they like your products.

User-generated content isn’t just free marketing for your business, it’s a valuable tool to help people make good buying decisions.

Encourage your customers to write testimonials and reviews, post pictures and make videos of themselves using your products. External reviews offer an excellent, non-biased opinion that will help potential customers work through the pros and cons of your products.

The more unbiased material about your product there is out in the marketplace, the clearer the picture your customers will have of whether your products will suit their needs.

Customer Interaction

9. Be (Extra) Responsive

Your customers will have questions about your products. Answering these questions will not only help you make a sale, they’ll also help you weed out people who aren’t the right fit.

Answer emails. Respond to queries and chats. Reply on social media. To help prevent leaving customer queries lingering, set up autoresponders to let them know when they can expect a response or the best method to get in touch.

10. Seek Out Customer Feedback

Customer feedback is a valuable resource for improving your product range and acts as a powerful fault-finding tool.

Reviews, testimonials and surveys are all great ways of collecting feedback from your customers to help you pinpoint potential issues with your products.

Your customers can also help you recognise any inaccuracies in your product descriptions or in your advertising that may have been misleading to them when they made the purchase.

Delivery

11. Use Appropriate Packaging

Damaged goods are a common cause of product returns. The better you can protect your products in the delivery process, the lower the chances of your customers having to return them.

When it comes to your bottom line, damaged goods are a financial ‘double-whammy’, as you not only lose the money on shipping, but the chances of being able to resell the item are next to none. It’s important to avoid the situation entirely by using appropriate packaging.

Review your current product packaging to determine if you are over-packaging or under-packaging your products. Under-packaging increases the chances of damaged goods arriving at your customer’s door, while over-packaging can negatively impact a customer’s view of your brand and can artificially inflate your shipping costs.

Protecting your products in transit should be your first priority, but being reasonable about how you package them is almost as important. Always check the packaging requirements for your product type.

For fragile or breakable items, you should label your packaging accordingly. Labels like ‘fragile’, ‘handle with care’, ‘this way up’ or ‘live plant’ can ensure that courier companies take extra care when handling your items.

Making sure your products arrive in one piece is vital to reducing product returns.

12. Verify the Outgoing Product

Double, triple and quadruple check that you’re sending the right product to the right person. Sending the wrong colour, the wrong size, or the wrong item entirely is a sure way to increase your product return rate.

Implement a cross-checking system at the order fulfillment and shipping label stage. You can waste a lot of money fixing mistakes that could have easily been avoided. Mixups can also have a very serious impact on your brand’s image, and reduce the chances of customers coming back to you in the future.

As they say, ‘measure twice, cut once’.

A Bit of Extra Care Reduces Product Returns

Product returns are a part of doing business for retailers, but they can be particularly expensive to ecommerce brands. The cost of shipping and reshipping can really add up for a business, while negative reviews and unhappy customers can impact your brand’s public perception and dampen sales.

While you may never be 100% free of product returns, you can significantly reduce their number by focusing on clear communication, accurate information, and extra care when packaging and shipping your items.

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But while many businesses work hard to establish their brand identity through social media, emails and web copy, there’s one place that’s often overlooked …. Product descriptions!

Every product description is an opportunity to offer your customers a little taste of your brand, so here’s how you can write descriptions that better reflect your brand identity.

Step 1: Define Your Brand Identity

The first thing you need to do is get a clear idea of your brand identity. Is your brand serious? Funny? Cheeky? Thoughtful? Free Spirited?

You may have already established your brand’s identity, but even if you haven’t, read through your social media, web content and emails to see if you’ve already got a voice that customers associate with your brand.

Reading through old content and previous interactions with customers will help you adopt this voice in your writing.

The notoriously ironic humour of the Old Spice ads is still going strong in their product descriptions

Step 2: What Do Your Customers Need to Know?

Next, you need to work out what information your customers need to know.

While clever descriptions may be amusing, they’re not much use if they don’t tell your customers anything about the product.

Start by listing the essential information:

• Features
• Benefits
• Materials
• Dimensions
• Weight

Step 3: How Will You Reflect Your Brand Identity in Your Product Descriptions?

The next step is to work out how you can reflect your brand’s identity in your writing.

For inspiration, try looking to the people in your life. A conversation with your mother or a grandparent, for example, may be an excellent resource for working out how a ‘motherly’ brand would speak.

Or perhaps your brand sounds a lot like the class clown you remember from high school.

If you want to establish yourself as a ‘fun’ brand, pop culture references, a hint of irony, tongue-in-cheek humour, and a casual tone are options for representing this persona.

Dollar Shave Club often sneak some ‘cheeky’ humour into their product descriptions

Step 4: Find the Balance

Now it’s time to tie it all together. You need to find the balance between providing the information your customers need, and using language that reflects your brand identity.

You may wish to build a list of the key information that needs to be included in your description before you start to write it. Once you know what you need to say, you can start working out how your brand’s persona would convey that information.

Cards Against Humanity’s product descriptions perfectly reflect the risqué nature of their game and their brand

Step 5: Be Honest About Your Abilities

You need to be honest with yourself about your writing abilities. It could come apart here.

Are you a good writer? An excellent writer, even?

Do you have the time to be writing your own descriptions?

Perhaps someone amongst your marketing staff is better equipped to capture the tone that you’re trying to convey. Or maybe your customer service team leaders can inject some levity into the copy on your site (as they hopefully do in chats, calls and emails)?

Otherwise, you might consider outsourcing the job to an external copywriter who specialises in shifting a brand’s voice to lighter tones. You don’t want to gloss over getting this right.

Bite-sized packages of personality

With every description having the power to delight, amuse, reassure or inform your customers, product descriptions are an oft-overlooked opportunity to reflect a bit of personality.

By developing a consistent brand identity that extends all the way to your product descriptions, you can attract more customers, while establishing a relationship with them that keeps them loyal to your brand.

Your brand brings customers to your door, and our couriers get your products to theirs

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