The Indian eCommerce market is witnessing substantial growth over the period. Fuelled by the COVID-19 pandemic, extended lockdowns, the growing “Work from Home” culture, and disrupting demands of the customers, the shopping culture in India has experienced a significant change in the past few years. According to research by Inc42, the Indian eCommerce market is projected to reach $300 billion by the end of 2030 with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 19% during the forecast period of 2022-2030.
However, with the growing order volumes for the brands, on-time quality deliveries and post-purchase customer experience have become a significant challenge for online businesses. Moreover, selecting the best courier partners for completing their deliveries is also a considerable concern that every online business has to deal with.
Challenges Faced by Brands while Selecting Courier Partners
Let’s look at the challenges a brand faces while selecting a courier partner for its business:
Lack of Actionable Insights
The secret behind successful deliveries is choosing the right courier partner for a particular zone. However, the brand may lack or have insufficient data to create these insights. As a result, the businesses are unable to determine which delivery partner has the optimal performance in the targeted zone. Consequently, the brands have to face heavy backlashes from the customers in terms of deliveries.
Last Mile Logistics
Courier partners act as the face of the brands as they are the ones who visit and interact with the customers in the first place. The better last-mile logistics a brand can provide to the customer, the better the post-purchase experience. However, delivering the product on time to the customer can be quite challenging for the courier partners as the last-mile courier delivery team can be over-occupied with the orders. This, as a result, can impact the overall performance of the brand’s business.
Unpredictable Order Demands
The Indian eCommerce market is highly influenced by the seasons and festivals. Shoppers tend to buy more products during festivals than on any other day. According to a report by Your Story, the eCommerce market has registered 5.4X growth in 2022 through various sales.
However, the demand surge can be quite challenging for businesses as they have to cater to large order volumes. Their courier partners might not be able to complete the pick-ups and deliveries on time resulting in a poor business image and, eventually, loss of customers.
Fluctuating Shipping Costs
Shipping cost is the most crucial aspect determining the profitability of any online business. However, the courier partners constantly change their shipping costs, affecting the company’s profit margin.
What to Look for in an Optimum Courier Partner
Selecting the best courier partner can be difficult for businesses looking at the challenges. Let’s look at certain qualities brands should look for while choosing the best courier partner for their business.
Optimal Routing
The prime agenda of a courier service provider is to deliver the product on time to the customers. To do this, the delivery partner must know all the city’s routes. The courier company must know how to reach the customer on time irrespective of the traffic or road conditions.
Efficiency
Although, it might not be easy for the courier companies to move the product from one location to another. However, the company must have the efficiency to complete the difficult task swiftly and effectively. The logistics partner must be punctual and well-informed about the location to ensure the product is delivered on time to the customers.
Flexibility
An optimum courier partner must provide flexibility regarding pick-ups and deliveries to the brand and customers. They must be able to cater to the timeline the sellers and shoppers provide to ensure post purchase experience.
Tech-enabled Solutions
The delivery partner must use technology-powered solutions to provide the required information to brands and customers. The technology allows the courier partners to provide transparent visibility to the sellers, which can be relayed to the customers improving their post-purchase experience.
Why Should Brands opt for Smart Courier Allocation for their Business?
Today brands have to consider multiple factors before they select a logistics partner. They have to monitor which courier partner performs well in a particular location, which products the courier company specializes in delivering, and most importantly, what will be the best possible cost for delivering a product to the customer.
Pickrr Advantage -a smart courier partner allocation service that provides first-attempt delivery within the zone specified TAT for better results. It allows businesses to cut down their efforts to analyze the courier partner’s performance and select a suitable company. The ease of courier selection is followed by the rule-based dashboard, which further enhances the profit margin for the brands.
Let’s look at the benefits of smart courier partner allocation for businesses:
Improved TAT
Pickrr Advantage allocates the third-party logistics for end-to-end pick-up and delivery tasks based on the analytics. The algorithm used by Pickrr Advantage uses the data such as the zone of pick up and delivery, segment of the seller, and mode of preferred transportation for allocating the courier for the sellers. The smart courier allocation by Pickrr Advantage assures a 95% improvement in the TAT performance across all orders.
Unified Shipping Rates
Pickrr Advantage offers a unified rate card to the brands. Irrespective of the courier partner’s cost, the smart courier allocation platform offers a standard rate card to offer the best possible shipping rates to the brands. With Pickrr Advantage’s unified rate card, the brands can avail better profit margins by reducing the billing hassle for online businesses.
Better RTO and NDR Management
If an order is not delivered to the end customer, the seller has to bear both forward and return freight charges. This is one of the crucial and daunting challenges for any eCommerce seller today. Using Pickrr Advantage, sellers can identify areas with higher potential for non-delivery.
Conclusion
Delivery partners are the face of online businesses as they represent the brand while delivering the products. Selecting the best courier partner for the business can be challenging for the brands as they have to consider shipping rates, their performance in a particular zone, and the mode of transport that a courier partner selects to deliver the product.
Pickrr Advantage is a tech-enabled smart courier allocation tool that eliminates the hassles mentioned above for the brands. The tool uses advanced technologies and data analytics to analyze the delivery partner’s performance in a particular zone. This analytics is then further used to allocate the best courier partner for the business to improve their TAT. Connect with us, to know more about Pickrr Advantage.
