5 Strategies for Order Fulfillment

Written by June Campbell


Fulfillment is simple at a brick and mortar store. The customer pays forrepparttar merchandise and carries it away. However, fulfillment is more complicated for a mail order business or a business that is selling viarepparttar 108999 Internet.

Fulfillment includes takingrepparttar 109000 order, packing, shipping and processingrepparttar 109001 financial transaction. It could also include customer service, technical support, inventory management, and processing refunds, returns and warranty claims.

Fulfillment is a vital but costly aspect of operating a business. Your situation determines which approach works best for you.

1. Drop Shipping Drop shipping is an arrangement in which a wholesaler or manufacturer agrees to fulfil orders from items in their warehouse. You makerepparttar 109002 sale, conductrepparttar 109003 financial transaction, and send relevant data torepparttar 109004 company to process. Sincerepparttar 109005 company shipsrepparttar 109006 merchandise, you do not have to arrange warehousing or inventory management.

Many businesses will not agree to drop shipping, as they find it more profitable to process large orders instead of individual orders. However, there are exceptions. Find a company that produces merchandise that you would like to sell then contact them and see if they will negotiate.

Alternatively, look for a company that promotes drop shipping. Run a Net search or a Yahoo search for "drop shipping." Before signing a drop shipping agreement, ask for references from satisfied merchants.

2. Set Up Your Own Mail Room Micro businesses might set up a "mailroom" inrepparttar 109007 basement. It's cost effective, but labor intensive.

You will need a means of processing payment (i.e. credit card capabilities) and a means of keeping track of inventory, orders, refunds, etc. Yahoo's Small Business category lists numerous companies selling software for small business management.

Larger small businesses might opt to set up a mailroom inrepparttar 109008 workplace and assign employees to handle order fulfillment. This allowsrepparttar 109009 most control over fulfillment as everything is done on site. You can ensure that knowledgeable people handle customer service, that packaging is appropriate, and that refunds, warranties and are processed in a timely manner.

3. Integrated Fulfillment forrepparttar 109010 Web

Businesses that are adding online sales to their regular operations require software that integrates withrepparttar 109011 existing system, manages inventory, facilitates customer service and generally handles all aspects of fulfillment.

If you're too large forrepparttar 109012 basement mailroom and too small to outsource, you might consider using one ofrepparttar 109013 companies that are catering to small business. Check out Yantra, Manugistics and EXE Technologies.

Is Your Online Storefront Open For Business?

Written by Chee Wee


Keeping your website online 24/7 is one ofrepparttar keys to ecommerce success!

When you advertise online, what isrepparttar 108998 next worst thing that can happen besides getting little response?

Imagine spending $5,000 on a permission-based email marketing campaign that generated an excellent 10% response - sending you an avalanche of targeted prospects. But your website goes down exactly at that very moment!

This is a scenario that most online marketers experience at least once in their marketing career. I went through it a few times in recent months due to bad service from my previous web hosting provider.

What exactly does your business lose when your website goes down?

Loss #1: Sales

Take your total annual sales and divide it by 8,760 hours in a year and you will arrive atrepparttar 108999 sales volume lost per hour of downtime.

For example, if your business generated sales of $100,000 online last year and your website goes down for 18 hours, you would have lost sales worth at least $205.48!

This figure will be even larger if you exclude non-working days.

Loss #2: Advertising Dollars

If your website goes down after a major marketing campaign, it is almost certain that you will lose every dollar invested. When your potential customers cannot access your website immediately after they click to it, don't expect them to try 24 hours later.

Loss #3: Goodwill

If your website is down often or your visitors frequently have trouble accessing it, they lose faith in your business credibility. In this highly competitive online market, your customers can easily become your competitors' customers!

What can you do to prevent your website from failing you? Here are some practical tips.

Tip #1: You Get What You Pay For

If you pay $9.95 monthly for your web hosting package, you're not likely to get first-class technical support. Don't expect your hosting provider to have support staff available to take your call after office hours.

They will probably take 12-48 hours to restore your site - if you manage to get through their online support system - which probably would be down too.

Tip #2: You Need Live Phone Support

Use a hosting provider who have real support staff available 24/7 to take your phone call anytime.

Don't be fooled by some hosting companies who say they have phone support when it is actually just a "Leave a message afterrepparttar 109000 beep tone" voicemail option.

Before I switched to my existing hosting provider, I didn't get much of a support from my previous hosting company.

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