Retailers urged to learn lessons from summer sales season

A failure to master the omnichannel experience may have dented the success of summer sales, a new report suggests. nShift argues that retailers must learn lessons from the summer and apply these lessons to Black Friday and Christmas preparations. To do this well, they need a paradigm shift in how they think about deliveries.

nShift is the global leader in delivery and experience management (DMXM). It leads the way in post-purchase experience management and multi-carrier shipping software. In a new report, “Learning from summer sales” nShift explores how retailers would like to do better at:

1. Mastering the omnichannel experience – by facilitating ways for online and instore to work together, retailers can compete for a bigger slice of the bargain-hunting pie during major sales events
2. Focus on customer loyalty – many retailers believe they missed opportunities to build stronger connections with customers. Anything that retailers can do to create a positive experience with first-time customers opens the door to a longer-term relationship
3. Learning from data – part of the problem is that a great deal of relevant data from the delivery process sits in different systems and sometimes, different organizations
4. Delivering scale and capacity – some 85% of online shoppers claim that a poor delivery experience would prevent them from ordering from that retailer again.[1] But during periods of high demand, some retailers struggle to deliver
5. International shipping - online shoppers increasingly expect to buy from retailers located anywhere in the world. It’s crucial that warehouses can easily ship beyond borders and keep shoppers up to date with the status of their delivery

Sean Sherwin-Smith, post-purchase product director at nShift, said: “By reflecting on what did and didn’t work well during the summer sales season, retailers can make changes ahead of the all-important ‘peak season’ toward the end of the year. The final months of 2024, which include Singles’ Day, Black Friday and the Christmas shopping season represent a huge sales opportunity for retailers. It’s often where they make the majority of their profits.

“Too often, retailers ignore how the delivery experience can help them boost their performance. Deliveries are typically dismissed as a solely logistical consideration – a world of boxes and parcels. In reality, deliveries hold the keys to unlocking customer loyalty, increasing revenue and improving operations. Creating the right delivery experience will be essential to reaching peak performance.”

The report shows how delivery & experience management (DMXM) with nShift should be central to learning the lessons from summer sales and applying them to peak-season strategies. It combines the core components of delivery management, such as a library of 1000+ carrier connections, with customer-facing applications that manage checkout and returns interfaces and customer communications. This makes it possible for retailers to create a connected delivery experience from checkout to doorstep.

Read the full report “Learning from summer sales: how delivery & experience management (DMXM) can help retailers perfect their peak-season offer by applying lessons from June discounts”

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[1] https://www.ipsos.com/en/ecommerce-marketplaces-delivery-experience