How to build a last-mile delivery service for e-com growth

How people shop has been irrevocably changed since the pandemic. The period of lockdowns has driven a lasting boom in e-commerce while simultaneously driving retailers to innovate around service, delivery and returns. What that means today is that consumers have developed certain expectations from the e-commerce experience.

Three in five shoppers, for instance, prefer to buy from retailers that offer delivery options that meet their needs – convenience, speed, or a mixture of the two.¹ Communication is vital, too. 93% of customers reported that they want to stay informed and receive proactive updates from retailers about their shipments.

It’s important that retailers can meet such expectations at every stage of the customer experience: from increasing efficiency and flexibility to offering a greater choice of delivery and returns options and growing internationally with sophisticated, multi-carrier relationships.

They require a delivery experience partner that will evolve as they do. One that can provide an automated delivery and returns process, access to a wide range of carriers across the globe and, of course, the technology that makes all this possible.

Smaller e-commerce operations can find it overwhelming to choose the right shipping label for a particular product. The challenge is further exacerbated by the fact that different carriers often require different package sizes.

Automating the book and print process can significantly improve efficiency. The ability to generate booking and documentation as soon as an order is complete and identify the optimum transportation solution for every order, no matter its size or shape, will not only meet customer expectations, but it can also save considerable time and money.

It’s s situation perfectly demonstrated by British clothing company, QUIZ. It expects to deliver over two million packages by the end of 2023 with the help of nShift.

“We wanted something dynamic and can be tracked all the way through the delivery and returns process”, said Haroun Saleemi, head of e-commerce QUIZ.

“The systems we have at the moment are dated and are not designed for the volume or velocity of orders going through our system - especially when you consider the level of service quality our customers expect.”

The combination of both using nShift Ship and nShift Returns is expected to realize huge improvements to QUIZ. It anticipates staff time savings of 25-30% alone due to expected reductions in time handling both ‘where is my order’ and ‘where is my return’ queries from customers. This will enable its customer service teams to dedicate more time to customer care and be more proactive in spotting and mitigating any issues, helping to improve the customer experience as a result.

The addition of nShift Returns will provide notifications to each customer on precisely where their return is in the process, while dynamic tracking numbers mean QUIZ will have visibility of every step of the delivery and returns process - something it has not previously been able to do.

An academic study found that grocery customers were willing to wait almost 11 hours longer for delivery if the delivery window was one hour shorter. They would hold off for 7.5 hours if they could specify a preferred delivery day.⁵ In fact, almost a third of consumers said that the ability to specify an exact delivery slot could mean the difference between shopping with one retailer and another.⁶

Online shopping doesn’t end with a product’s delivery, of course. When one in five purchases are sent back, it’s important for retailers to ensure they also have a quick and easy returns process in place.⁷

It is easy to see returns as a “nice to have” capability which can erode margins. In fact, the reverse is true: returns drive long-term customer retention. Research from Klarna has found that more than four in five consumers would abandon retailers who lack a smooth returns experience. By making returns easy to initiate, offering a choice of options (including repurchase), and streamlining internal processes, retailers can make returns into a key part of their growth engine, converting up to 30% of returns to repurchases.

And clear communication matters, too. Customers want to know where their order is at every stage of its journey. Tracking is vital; using SMS, email, or in-app notifications allows customers to follow their orders from the moment they’re packed to the moment they arrive at their front door.

Ensuring this entire end-to-end experience is essential. After all, it’s what consumers have come to expect.

There comes a point in many businesses’ growth when they will want to expand internationally. To continue offering their customers the seamless delivery experience to which they’ve become accustomed, these retailers will need relationships with a far greater selection of carriers than before.

Quickly and easily connecting their webshop to hundreds of international and regional carriers will allow retailers to give their customers the best shipping options for every parcel, regardless of where it’s being dispatched from or delivered to.

The successful growth of an online retailer is largely dependent on its ability to meet the growing expectations of its customers. As we’ve seen, for instance, shoppers today want a choice of delivery options that meet their lifestyle. Retailers themselves require greater flexibility and efficiency, particularly smaller businesses without the necessary time or resources. Most importantly, whether it’s greater delivery and return options, automating the book and print process, or access to a wider choice of carriers, they need a partner that will support them as they grow.