For this Valentine’s, and the next, and the next…and the next. Be prepared for all the holidays to come with our Ecommerce Holiday Marketing Playbook.
Be prepared for all the Holiday's to come.
Essentials to guide you through the Seasonal Grind phase with D2C Holiday Ecommerce Essential tips. Our Pre-Valentine’s Gift to you!
Our Pre-Valentine’s Gift to you!
Invest in a service provider that vibes with your needs
- Three underlying technical elements to look for:
- How they provide data and analytics
- How their integration(s) will connect to your eCommerce store
- How the third party maintains consistency and precision across its network
- Specific to Target -
- Shipping options/methods
- Order accuracy for fulfilment
- Ability to integrate with various other applications/solutions/3PLs
- Real-time Customer communication (along with carrier partner integration for coordination for returns/NDR)
- Geospatial data -
Analysis on Distributing inventory
Comprehend shipping efficacy based on zones
Evaluate Historic market conditions in advance to predict demand with Ecommerce Holiday Forecasting
- What’s your SKU performance over time?
- How to distribute your inventory across your supply network?
- Where (what region) are your customers placing orders to/from?
- What are your shipping costs from one distribution center to another?
- How many days of inventory do you have left before going out of stock?
Simple Inventory Breakdown
- Forecast period - analysis of prior data to predict sales
- Trends based on seasonal or other sales spike
- Maximum stock level through the year
- Determine Reorder point to stock up
- Integrate inventory monitoring solutions
- What’s your average cart value?
- What’s your average storage cost per unit?
- What’s your average fulfilment cost per order?
- What’s your shipping cost - by shipping method and order?
- Best practises for forecasting
- Partner with various other teams/3PLs
- Keep an eye on stock levels in real-time
- Choose the right application/software/tech integration
- Collect data, compile them and revisit for future planning
- Determining Inventory count
- How are your sales across months?
- What’s your stock, currently on hand?
- When do you need to reorder for each product before depletion?
- Details on historical stock levels at any point in time & any location
- In case of a flash sale, will your available stock levels be sufficient?
- What are your best-selling products? And which are not generating sales?
- How does product demand compare to previous seasons/holiday patterns?
- Customise forecasting tools to your specs
- Fulfilment SLAs
- SKU performance
- Shipping performance
- Inventory reconciliation
- Regular inventory history
- Inventory planning - Maps & Distributions
- Accounting & billing breakdown/storage costs
Spread out stock for prompt & efficient delivery
- How should you distribute inventory across your network?
- Which products are currently not generating sales and incurring high eCommerce warehousing fees?
- What would you save on shipping if you change the location of your distribution centre (which contains your products) or switch inventory to a different distribution centre?
Acknowledge Seasonal delivery patterns
- Stock up
- How often is each product sold across channels?
- Organise ahead of time
- Expectations for various products in various regions etc.
- What’s the time taken to deliver during peak season? (regional data/shipping method data)
- Give your customers a heads up
- Team-up with an experienced Logistics solution provider
- Communicate in real-time with your suppliers
- Integrate latest supply chain technologies
- Order management
- Inventory management
- Warehouse management
- Automated order processing
- Automated returns management
- Employ multiple shipping carriers
- Establish a returns management process
- Automate customer service (or) be prepared with human agents
- Store products across multiple warehouses based on geoanalysis
Streamline Returns/Exchanges/Refunds Management
- Ways to effectively manage returns
- Be proactive - ensure customers are satisfied after delivery via the feedback
- Create a gift return policy
- Track returns for efficiency
- Increase your return window
- Perform regular quality testing
- Establish clear product descriptions
- Automate your entire return process
- Examine trends in commonly returned items
- Include a clear return policy on your e-commerce site
Improve ease through automation
- Automatically share the tracking number and tracking information with each customer
- Check order status as it moves from processing to shipping etc., in real-time
- Automatically identify/edit shipping details in situations where your customer made a mistake (like wrong Pincode, phone number, or address)
- Integrate Auto RTO & Fraud Detection
- Install Auto NDR Management and
- COD to Prepaid Conversion
Reduce Shipping costs
- Leverage 3PLs and other providers for discounted rates
- Reduce package dimensions to limit weight
- Switch from boxes to poly-based mailers or bubble mailers
- Limit shipping distance by splitting inventory across multiple distribution centres
Statistical Reports and Analytics (to improve strategy and operation performance)
- Factors impacting orders
- Analyse the region with the most orders
- Your expenditure on shipping method(s)
- ‘Orders not delivered yet’ and other statuses
- Shipping methods often chosen by customers
- The average number of Days taken for an order to be delivered
- Time taken for orders to be delivered based on carrier partner
- Average shipping cost per shipment for various shipping methods
- Calculate requests that can’t be fulfilled because of inadequate stock levels
- Compile orders that were met on time. And the breakdown of orders received, processed, and fulfilled with altercations.
End-to-end customer experience - Pre-Purchase to Post-Delivery
- Handle Abandoned Cart recovery like a pro
- Simplify your checkout process
- Offer affordable or free shipping
- Explicitly state everything - no hidden cost fees
- Emphasise the security aspect during a transaction
- Send notifications - Via timed WhatsApp messages/emails/SMS - Linking directly to their cart (Optimise for mobile)
- Create automated responses for over 70% of all customer enquiries/FAQs
- Set up automated order updates, order verification, delivery updates, return coordination, and more
- WhatsApp Promotions/Email/SMS - automate Broadcasts by choosing templates concerning festivities etc.
Talk to our experts for a customised solution that can maximise your sales funnel
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