Not entirely without reason, but in 2010 the term “outsourcing” comes with some potent emotional baggage. It’s not a term most people think of in an entirely complementary light, if they’re objective about the practice at all. The term has in many ways become synonymous with the sending of jobs overseas, one of the least popular practices of our time.
But outsourcing to an American fulfillment service company can save your ecommerce business countless dollars, and allow you to grow your business at a pace and with a stability not otherwise possible.
Why Outsourcing Makes Sense
By assigning your logistics management and order fulfillment responsibilities to a third-party, independent fulfillment center, you can focus on growing the front end of your business, working to improve its SEO footprint and to revise and massage your website’s many different pages. By concentrating your attention on those important goals, you’ll be able to develop and enhance not just your business size but also its market profile and reputation.
Fulfillment service companies are experts in warehousing, inventory delivery and acceptance, climate control storage, processing, shipment, and order tracking. Fulfillment service companies act on behalf of their client businesses to make sure that the clients’ inventory is shipped and safely delivered with a maximum of attention to preservation and a minimum of spoilage and waste.
When It’s Time To Outsource
Signs indicating the need for outsourcing are often apparent, even while ecommerce business owners are sometimes not aware of their presence. Rising warehousing and staffing costs, a slowdown in order fulfillment, and problems arranging for sufficient logistics transportation are only a few indicators.
When expressed as a graph, you can look at a downturn in repeat conversion as a definite sign that you need to reorganize your order fulfillment processes. Repeat conversion, another term for repeat business, is a de facto index of customer satisfaction, and a big part of that satisfaction comes from the speed and reliability of the product delivery. No one who has to wait long for a package to arrive is pleased with the business that sent it; for better or worse, the business is held accountable.
But perhaps the most telling sign is the amount of time management you are requires to give your fulfillment operations. If simply keeping your warehouse and shipping areas running efficiently is costing you time you could spend on front end duties – effectively making you run to keep your business standing still – you need the help that a fulfillment service company provides.