E-Commerce fulfillment is essentially the series of actions taken by an e-commerce business to receive, process and deliver orders of the customers. This is a general definition and may apply to a number of orders ranging from business to business orders which are large in scale to direct-to-customer orders.
The above mentioned expectations out of an online store are what necessitate an e-commerce chain to be flexible, low cost and fast. The most challenging part of e-commerce fulfillment is that the set of things that attract the customers is what makes the operations more difficult to execute.
Let us delve more into two important trends that will enable you a better understanding of issues pertaining to e-commerce fulfillment:
1. Third Party Logistics
One of the major lifelines of online businesses is efficiency. Business process cannot afford to lag behind in an age where technology improves and devices become better day by day. Such a situation demands specialization and thus there is a necessity of outsourcing e-commerce logistics to dedicated service providers.
Logistics providers are available everywhere. They not only deliver your products efficiently and accurately but also cut costs to such a point where in-house logistics management starts appearing illogical.
Another reason for outsourcing logistics is that most of the ecommerce businesses do not operate on a scale where they can afford cutting edge enterprise resource planning software. With computing going mobile, the investment in technology is certainly going to increase which makes outsourcing logistics all the more necessary.
2. Reverse Logistics
E-Commerce fulfillment is not complete till the need for reverse logistics is completely eliminated. E-Commerce businesses have to deal with goods that start moving in opposite direction i.e from customer to the manufacturer.
Such reverse logistics is driven by a number of factors such as undelivered goods, damaged goods or returned goods. However, not all reverse logistics is an error or accident. In cases such as exchange offers, reverse logistics become desirable.
Effective Ecommerce Fulfillment
To carry out effective e-commerce fulfillment, a business owner must pay attention to the following:
1. Speed
The goods not only need to reach the customer but also reach in time always.
2. Accuracy
The goods must reach the customer and be the exact ones that were ordered. There cannot be the slightest of variations in the specifications or else reverse logistics may kick in.
3. Scalability
In the present scale of business, you may have started to manage delivery of goods but will you be able to sustain such accuracy and speed as you grow?
4. Surge
To ensure e-commerce fulfillment, you will have to cater to occasional surges in traffic on your website. While your website may require only enhanced bandwidth to cater for the traffic, fulfillment will require something more than that. After all, Santa cannot deliver Christmas gifts on New Year!