5 Proven Tips for Selecting a Reputable Fulfillment & Shipping Service

After considering the many benefits of outsourcing fulfillment and shipping, you have decided to hand over the responsibility of moving your products to another company. Outsourcing fulfillment and shipping frees up more time for you and the team to handle other tasks. You also benefit from lower costs, as well as fewer fulfillment and shipping errors. The question is not whether your business should outsource fulfillment and shipping. Instead, the question is how does your business select the best company to move your products?

Here are five proven tips for selecting a reputable fulfillment and shipping service.

Shipping Speed

Early in the shipping war, Federal Express guaranteed some product orders could reach customers as fast as overnight. Amazon Prime has perfected its fulfillment and shipping system to make two-day delivery speeds the norm. Because of the new standards set for delivery speed, customers expect their orders to reach them as soon as the day after placing an order. At Complete Mailing and Printing, our team of fulfillment and shipping professionals has set one of the fastest delivery speeds in the industry.

Warehouse Location

One of the most important criteria that establishes delivery speeds for fulfillment and shipping orders concerns the location of the nearest warehouse to your business. To achieve super-fast delivery speed, you want to work with a company that has built a centrally located warehouse, preferably near major roads and highways. Centrally located warehouses translate into shorter shipping routes, which is a huge factor in getting customers the product they ordered on time.

Types of Features

The best fulfillment and shipping companies offer features that give them a competitive advantage. Advanced order fulfillment software should be highly organized and easy to learn. You want to confirm that the fulfillment and shipping company that you choose uses software that never encounters a glitch, as well as calculates accurate arrival times. A fulfillment and shipping company that offers digital printing services and customer mail services allows your company to take care of many of the logistical tasks in one convenient location.

Responsive Communication

You have several fulfillment companies to choose from when searching for the right partner. The search process might come down to a factor such as responsive communication. Your fulfillment and shipping partner should respond promptly to emails, as well as text and phone messages. This is an especially important factor when you receive word from an unsatisfied customer that a product order has not arrived in a timely manner. Responsive communication also is an indication of a fulfillment and shipping company’s commitment to transparency and visibility.

Cost

You have heard the timeless adage, “You get what you paid for.” The adage means that if you cut costs too much, you might end up with an inferior product or service. Cutting cost corners when selecting a fulfillment and shipping company can lead to delayed orders that upset customers. Cost is a factor when selecting a fulfillment and shipping company, but it should not be the only factor. Treat cost as a make-or-break factor after considering the other factors on our list.

What are the 6 Typical Steps Involved in Fulfillment & Shipping?

Customers expect their orders to arrive on time and in mint condition. To exceed customer expectations, the best fulfillment and shipping companies typically follow a series of the same steps. Although the steps remain the same, the level of execution among fulfillment and shipping companies is not the same. Issues such as weather, equipment malfunctions, and logistical errors committed by drivers differentiate performance. At Complete Mailing and Printing, we ensure the completion of the following six steps involved in Fulfillment and Shipping in a timely manner.

Receive Inventory

After a customer places an order, the fulfillment and shipping company receives the inventory from the manufacturer or a third-party vendor. Receiving inventory requires a shipping and fulfillment company to verify the condition of the inventory, as well as the quantity of the products shipped. The key is to confirm all of the products have arrived in a condition that exceeds customer expectations. For especially large orders, a fulfillment and shipping company lets the manufacturer or third-party vendor know about the reception of the orders.

Store Order

After sorting, labeling, and organizing inventory, the next step in the process involves moving products to short or long-term storage. Most fulfillment and shipping companies that move products to short-term storage hold the products for existing orders. They often conduct another inspection before the processing step for each order. For bulk orders, fulfillment and shipping companies ensure a large number of products are in stock to prevent shipping delays.

Process Order

This is the step in which advanced technology plays an important role in ensuring the accurate transfer of products. Automated technology used for an order processing management system works seamlessly with shopping cart features to select the right products for imminent shipment. A packing slip created by digital printing services or custom mailing services presents the details of an order that include product features and specifications,

Pick Products

The processing steps get products ready to be picked manually or by operating an automated system that scans barcodes. Some large fulfillment companies such as Amazon use warehouse robots in conjunction with employees to select and retrieve the products required for shipping. Members of picking teams are assigned specific roles during the picking step to choose the correct products. Workers must be aware of amounts, colors, and sizes when picking products.

Packing Products

The same group of workers used for packing products also completes the packing products step. Automated robots also play a role during the packing step to improve speed and efficiency. The types of packing materials used depend on the weight of the cargo, as well as how fragile the products are while in transit. For example, products constructed with at least some glass require packing materials that provide sufficient cushion.

Ship Order

Fulfillment and shipping companies either ship orders directly to customers or involve third-party vendors to handle larger orders. They send orders to customers via an airline, freight line, or postal carrier. One of the most important criteria for successfully completing the last step is to keep customers aware of the status of their orders. Another important shipping criterion is to follow the shipping requirements established by third-party carriers.

Free Up Office Resources By Using a Qualified Fulfillment & Shipping Service

As the owner or manager of a business, one of your most important goals is to get the most out of your resources. Optimizing what you have increases productivity, which typically fattens the bottom line of a business. However, devising ways to optimize resources can be difficult to do, especially for small business owners and operators who operate on razor-thin budgets. What if we told you that your business can free up resources by using a qualified fulfillment and shipping service?

At Complete Mailing and Printing, we offer fulfillment and shipping services that allow our partners to devote tight financial resources to other business objectives. Instead of using valuable labor resources on fulfillment and shipping, you can assign workers to other projects. You also do not have to invest in the materials required to complete fulfillment and shipping orders. If your business devotes warehouse space to fulfillment and shipping orders, you can free up the valuable dock space for other reasons.

Free Up Office Resources

Handling fulfillment and shipping orders requires a substantial investment in back-office resources. Just the investment required in logistical software can set a small business back tens of thousands of dollars. By outsourcing fulfillment and shipping, your business can reallocate the tight resources used for back-office technology to other areas of your operation. You no longer need to install computer programs that track inventory in real-time. Your business also does not have to install communication tools to stay in touch with customers concerning the status of their orders.

What Are the Other Benefits of Outsourcing Fulfillment and Shipping?

Freeing up office resources is just one of many benefits of outsourcing fulfillment and shipping. As a business owner or operator, you also free up more of your time to concentrate on other business matters. You get much more time to focus on increasing sales, such as attracting new customers and motivating loyal customers to buy more of your products and services. More time also allows business owners and operators to discover strategies to reduce costs, which includes doing a better job of monitoring the supply chain and carefully vetting potential distributors of your products.

Outside of freeing up office resources, no other benefit of outsourcing fulfillment and shipping is more valuable than building trust with your customers. A company that provides superior fulfillment and shipping services such as Complete Mailing and Printing ensures your customers receive the right products at the times designated on their orders. A fulfillment and shipping service also offers the transparency required to build trust with your customers. According to several studies, more than 50 percent of consumers do not buy again from a business that does not deliver fulfillment and shipping transparency.

How to Choose the Right Fulfillment and Shipping Partner

Now that you know why you should outsource fulfillment and shipping, how do you find the right partner to help you reap the many benefits? Start by looking for an experienced partner, preferably one that specializes in fulfilling and shipping orders of the products you have in stock. Reading online reviews is helpful as well. Tour the facilities of potential partners on your shortlist to confirm they meet technological and physical space criteria. The fulfillment and shipping company that you hire must have installed the most advanced logistical technology, as well as have enough space to store your products.