The thriving growth of e-commerce delivers a huge source of revenue for sellers, but with it comes challenging shipping issues. It’s time for online retailers to find an effective solution to optimize the shipping process, increase customer experience, and save investment costs.
The rise of e-commerce and the challenge of shipping management
The online selling industry has experienced explosive growth in recent years as consumers are increasingly turning to online platforms for their shopping needs, which leads to the demand for faster delivery times and a wider selection of products. While this presents a golden opportunity for e-commerce businesses, it also creates a significant challenge, which is to manage the complexities of shipping, requiring them to have a multi-carrier management platform/system.
For businesses that use multiple delivery companies, juggling different rates, services, and tracking systems can be a logistical nightmare. It takes a lot of time to compare rates, manually enter shipping information, and deal with customer inquiries about deliveries, leading to increased costs, frustrated customers, and a tarnished brand reputation. As a result, a centralized multi-carrier management system was born to tackle all those challenges.
What is a multi-carrier management platform/system?
A multi-carrier management platform/system acts as a central hub for all your shipping needs, in which businesses can manage various carriers, update order status in real-time, select the most appropriate option, and automate the entire shipping process from a single interface. Thereby, sellers streamline the shipping process, reduce costs, and provide a seamless shopping experience for customers.
Benefits of using a multi-carrier management platform
Benefits of using a multi-carrier management platform
Streamlined management and transparency
First and foremost, a multi-carrier management platform/system provides a centralized view of all businesses’ shipping activities across various delivery channels, from shipment tracking, and delays to COD management. This allows merchants to maintain greater control over the supply chain, ensure timely shipping, enhance efficiency, and improve transparency among business units.
Reduced shipping costs
One of the most significant advantages of using a multi-carrier management system is that it can help businesses reduce shipping costs drastically. Sellers may compare rates from multiple delivery partners and select the most cost-effective option for each shipment. Additionally, a good system provides discounted rates from carriers based on businesses’ overall shipping volume, leading to further savings.
Enhanced customer experience
These days, sellers do anything to win the race for fast delivery as customers expect within-day and reliable shipping with real-time tracking capabilities. By offering a variety of shipping options at checkout and providing customers with transparent tracking information, multi-carrier management software can turn those expectations into reality. It has been proved that customers are satisfied and often order goods again from stores that provide quick shipping services.
Scalability for growing businesses
As the business grows, shipping needs should also be inevitably involved to accommodate increasing order volume and expanding product range. Therefore, many delivery management systems offer integrations with a large number of shipping companies to ensure streamlined ecommerce operations.
What to look for in a multi-carrier management platform
How to choose a multi-carrier management system
Multi-carrier management
The first factor to consider is the ability to integrate multiple domestic and international shipping service providers, and centrally manage them in one platform. The entire visibility of all carriers allows businesses to compare rates and service options, then choose the best one depending on their specific needs.
Real-time tracking and visibility
Customers these days expect to see their order status in real-time, so sellers need to update it continuously across a bunch of carriers they are partnering with. Fortunately, a multi-carrier management platform can help them gather this tracking information around, allowing buyers to monitor shipment progress easily.
Returns management
Managing returns can be a complex and time-consuming process. A great shipping software would reduce the burden on businesses’ customer service teams by automatically generating pre-paid return labels with tracking numbers. The software then can update the inventory levels as soon as a return is initiated so that sellers can plan accordingly. A smooth and efficient returns process can lead to happier customers, who are more likely to return for future purchases.
Integration with third-party systems (OMS, WMS)
In a software ecosystem of logistics & e-commerce, it is necessary for retailing businesses to connect their management platforms together for a seamless workflow. Therefore, when it comes to choosing a well-fit shipping management system, sellers need to ensure it is able to integrate with other existing platforms such as Order Management System (OMS) and Warehouse Management System (WMS). This will eliminate the need for manual data entry and streamline your entire fulfillment process.
Reporting and analytics
Data analytics is a game-changer for shipping management software, offering a treasure trove of insights to optimize operations, cut costs, and improve efficiency. Hence, just choose a shipping management software that offers comprehensive reporting and analytics functionalities, which allows businesses to track key metrics like shipping costs, carrier performance, and delivery times. By analyzing this data, retailers can identify which points to concentrate on, which to improve, leading to a more efficient, cost-effective, and safer shipping operation.
Ship4P – A rising star among multi-carrier management platforms/systems
Ship4P – Global shipping software for e-commerce
Ship4P is a global shipping software for e-commerce that connects businesses to domestic and international delivery companies and manages them in one dashboard only. It stands out as a robust, all-in-one shipping solution designed for retailers of all sizes, from small to medium or large.
With a series of outstanding features like COD (Cash on Delivery) management, accurate and fast reconciliation, real-time data synchronization, and complete shipping-API integration, Ship4P should get every feature that merchants expect in a multi-carrier management platform/system and be the ideal option for sellers to enhance the journey from expedite shipments to returns – and all touch points in between.
If you are looking for a delivery solution that gets rid of all the headaches of over-managing carriers quickly, try Ship4P for free today and see the difference!