Ever wondered that a small virus invisible to naked eyes could wreath havoc beyond bounds? Yupp, you guessed it right – the Novel Coronavirus a.k.a. COVID-19. At first sight, anyone would only say this – the virus has disrupted lives. And nobody can deny that! Though this pandemic has positive sides too – improved air quality, reduced noise pollution, healing environment, one can’t ignore its widespread impact.
Online businesses too are facing the brunt. Nevertheless, as Einstein said – “In the midst of every crisis, lies great opportunity.”, online business owners also have the opportunity to innovate their business operations. Wondering how?
Read on to know how you can prevent problems from arising in your business operations – especially the problems with delivery services and keep your business operations streamlined amid COVID-19.
Tips to Manage Deliveries Efficiently
✔️ Zero-contact delivery
In the times of this pandemic, everyone is concerned about the possibility of infection from Corona. Several ecommerce companies like Amazon, BigBasket, etc. have already started offering zero-contact deliveries. It is high time you also offered the option of Zero-Contact or contactless delivery to your customers to:
– Mitigate the chances of Corona spread.
– Win their trust and instill a sense of safety in their minds.
You can display this option for customers to opt-in on your product page or checkout page. You can also view the list of orders with the condition of contactless delivery along with specific instructions from customers from your backend for more efficient management.
A feature-rich plugin like Delivery Date Scheduler that integrates with your estore can help you step up to the occasion. Also, make sure that you take proper steps to ensure that the zero-contact delivery is seamless.
Coming soon: Our team of developers is working to add this functionality to our Magento 2 Delivery Date Scheduler. To explore more, click here.
✔️Let customers select delivery date and time slot
With the lockdown scenario prevailing across various areas of a country, customers know better about their regions. And they have a better idea about when the lockdown would probably be over or relaxed and deliveries would resume – especially if they are in red zone areas. Even in other areas with mild lockdowns, they would know the fixed hours during which the administration might allow outsiders including delivery men to enter. You can let them use this knowledge to choose a suitable delivery date and time slot with a delivery date picker to reduce the chances of delivery issues like delivery returns to a minimum.
✔️Personalize customers’ shopping experience
By letting your customers add delivery comments regarding the packaging style specifications or the ‘Call before Delivery’ option, etc. This way, you can engage them better.
✔️Stay on top of order management
With a summarized view of orders and delivery statuses, stay on top of your customers’ orders. Keep your customers in tune with order statuses through email notifications or text messages using a feature-rich plugin.
✔️Display non-working days and non-operative hours
To ensure full transparency, specify working and non-working days and display them on the checkout page so that customers not only get a clear idea of them but also place orders accordingly. You can also define operative and non-operative time-slots to make the checkout process even more transparent through a Delivery Date Scheduler. This will help customers choose the most suitable time slot from operative slots in accordance with the lockdown guidelines in their regions.
This will help reduce the chances of delivery issues like delivery delays, order returns, confusion, and miscommunication, or poor delivery experiences, or other grievances to a minimum.
✔️Offer Zip Code Validation
Zip Code Validation is a great way to ensure clarity and transparency for both the parties. When customers choose a delivery date of their choice from the delivery date scheduler and proceed to checkout, they would be able to check whether the delivery of that particular product is available at their address or not simply by entering zip codes.
Further, they can also find out whether one-day delivery of a particular product is available at their address or not. Accordingly, they can decide whether to order the product(s).
Thus, zip code validation helps avoid any miscommunication or issues like late deliveries, product non-availability, etc. and keep customers’ trust in your brand intact.
✔️Manage grace period, cut-off time, and daily quota per customer
To streamline your delivery operations and mitigate the possibility of delivery problems or grievances, you can:
– Specify the min. count of days it takes to process several particular orders (grace period)
– Mention the point of time beyond which any order placed would count in the orders as the next-day (cut-off time)
– Add the maximum number of items a customer can order daily(daily quota per customer)
etc. on your store.
It won’t only help you add more transparency but also manage orders more efficiently and seamlessly.
How Can AppJetty Help You?
We, at AppJetty, understand our customers’ concerns and have some plugins to help e-store owners like you in streamlining their delivery operations.
Magento 2 Delivery Date Extension
This delivery date scheduler extension lets customers choose delivery date and time of their choice which creates a seamless delivery experience by reducing non-availability issues to a minimum. At the same time, it is also highly helpful for e-store admins as they get to control working and non-working days, customize the delivery date scheduler for better engagement, define the maximum number of deliverable days, etc.
Magento 2 Zip Code Validator
This extension enables the customers to check for the availability of a particular product(s) at their addresses by entering the zip codes of their regions. As an admin, you also can blacklist/whitelist zip codes from the backend, customize product availability/non-availability messages, zip code check label and button to enhance customers’ shopping experience. As it is compatible with Magento 2 Delivery Date Scheduler, you can also use it along with that and take delivery transparency to the next level.
Are You Ready for Streamlined Delivery Operations?
Now that you know that one of the important steps towards sustaining your e-business amid the Novel Coronavirus pandemic is streamlining your delivery operations, it is high time you followed the above-mentioned tips and retained your business productivity right away.
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