When it comes to big, heavy or bulky items, shipping can be a real pain point. Not only is searching for the best carrier time-consuming, but many courier services aren’t set-up to shipping bulky items and frustratingly don’t provide delivery status updates.
We get that bulky can be burdensome. Because our clients ship everything from buttons to bicycles, we’ve built a platform that gets your goods from the loading dock to the lounge room, no matter how big and heavy. By automatically calculating the best ways to get your goods from A to B, Shippit gives you flexibility over your freight and cuts out the manual margin of error.
Most online retailers will know how costly shipping mistakes can be. To help you ship big without eating into your margins, here are 5 of the biggest mistakes people make when shipping bulky items.
1. Making measurement mistakes
Sending big or heavy items obviously costs more, so the last thing you want is to be slogged with unexpected extra costs. That’s why you need to be spot on with the details of your items. If they’re even slightly over-weight or over-sized compared to your description, your courier could slap you with extra costs or return the item back to you. In an age when customers expect fast and fixed-rate shipping, passing on these extra costs can really hurt your customer experience.
2. Packing your product poorly
With large or heavy items, good packaging can make a world of difference when it comes to arriving safely. With consumers hitting social media to share their ‘unboxing’ experience, it pays to think about durability. You don’t want your package to collapse, tear or split open under pressure. Your customers won’t be impressed if their order arrives looking like it barely survived a hurricane, and neither will your bottom line. With the data and insights from Shippit, you can analyse carrier performance with ease, then view and compare to select a driver of customer happiness.
3. Not being able to track your goods
You’ve just splurged on a new couch and you’re super excited to see it in situ – but where is it? No one likes waiting, especially when they’ve forked out big bucks for something they haven’t seen in the flesh before. Many carriers fail to provide delivery updates for customers. Not only is this frustrating for consumers, but it’s also time-consuming for retailers too. Transparency is the key to smooth customer service and with Shippit, it’s all automated. Our transparent tracking keeps customers updated from the moment their order leaves your store right to the time it’s at their door.
4. Choosing the wrong courier
Chose the wrong courier and you might not even be able to send your large or heavy items. Some couriers have weight restrictions, others have destination restrictions for heavy items, and some couriers just charge exorbitant fees for anything outside of their usual deliveries. Do your research before you book your carrier.
5. Not comparing your options
This is where that research comes in. An ideal scenario will see you shopping around before you book anything, comparing prices, delivery speeds, and the best options for the size of the item you want to send. Your customer will be expecting fast and affordable shipping, but that can come at a great price to your business if you’re not careful.
The key to cost recovery is adding value, and a shipping cloud-based platform can help you do just that. Shippit can recommend the best way to pack your order and then find the best carrier for the job, with access to a variety of freight forwarders for local or interstate freight. Data and insights give you flexibility over your freight so you can see how much you’re spending in real time and identify what’s driving it.
Smarter insights mean smarter decisions and happier customers.
Take Shippit client Meubilair for example. By leveraging Shippit’s smarts, this furniture and homewares drop-shipper had an 80 per cent reduction in fulfilment time, a 40 per cent reduction in shipping costs, and a 90 per cent increase in customer satisfaction after switching to Shippit.
According to its founder, “I’m saving so much money that I stress less when things are returned to me. Because they’re bulky items, missed deliveries are often redirected back to me, but the reduction in shipping costs has taken a lot of pressure off my business.”
To find out how Shippit can take the pressure off shipping your heavy items, contact us for a free demo.
