For e-commerce businesses, the holidays often bring a rush of last-minute orders that leave business owners struggling to get them all fulfilled. Since most customers want to receive their packages in plenty of time to get them wrapped and delivered to the recipients, it becomes even more important to nail down an efficient fulfillment strategy. To achieve this, follow these tips:

Bring On More Staff

Sometimes, the best way to increase your fulfillment speed is to bring on more people to help you meet the demand. Recruit friends, family members, former associates, and anyone else who might be willing to label packages and stuff boxes. If you can’t find volunteer help, consider looking for extra help on marketplaces like Fiverr, Upwork or Freelancer.

Adding more staff during the holidays allows you to process more orders, and ensure that order arrive on time, which generates good review and more return business.

Create an Organized Workflow

Don’t let the holidays steamroll over your e-commerce business. Instead, prepare for the flood of orders and get your workflow organized for maximum time savings. Store packing materials and supplies together so they’re within easy reach and label your products clearly so you don’t have to hunt them down to fulfill an order.

Organization will not only speed up your workflow, but it’ll also make it more accurate. The holiday rush can lead to mistakes if you’re not careful, and the only thing worse than sending a package late is sending the wrong thing to your customer.

Put Technology to Work

Modern e-commerce tools allow you to automate certain steps in the fulfillment process, such as email confirmations and shipping address organization. When you automate part of the fulfillment process, you eliminate a manual step that would otherwise cost you time.

Experiment with different tools to see which work best for your e-commerce ventures. It’s best to do this a couple months before the holiday season so you’re fully prepared as the rush orders start flooding in.

Turn to a Third Party

If you know you can’t manage the fulfillment arm of your e-commerce business during the holidays, outsource the work. Services like Fulfillment by Amazon take the shipping and receiving tasks out of your hands. You don’t have to worry about loading boxes or generating shipping labels because the third party handles it for you.

Additionally, if you partner with a retail giant like Amazon, your business earns instant clout. You get access to perks that only fulfillment customers receive and you’ll gain exposure to markets you might not yet have tapped.

While the holiday season almost always introduces stress to e-commerce business owners’ lives, it’s important to prepare for it and to minimize it as much as possible. It’s also a good idea to nail down an effective cross-border payment strategy. Need fast, low-cost payments from international marketplaces like Amazon, Lazada, or Wish? Sign up for Payoneer – it’s free!

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