Customers have almost endless options to shop online and in their local neighborhoods. With this expanded availability of products, they expect more of businesses: faster delivery times and better product availability. Learn how to rise to the new demand created by changing customer expectations for retail delivery! Your business may not be able to solve for product availability in the short term due to supply chain issues, however you can evolve and improve your delivery service options as the “at home” economy grows.
How to evolve and Improve delivery in 2022
Sometimes we all need a little retail therapy. More and more, customers are looking at brands and shopping to create joy in their lives. This may be adding a new couch to create a cozy feeling in living rooms or adding a much needed desk to a new home office. No matter the product, there are huge benefits if your brand can tap into this need and desire. One way to enhance the shopping process is to have exceptional delivery options. Here are a few ways to put some excitement and joy into your retail customers and their buying experience.
What types of Deliveries to offer
- Direct to home delivery: In today’s environment with DIY surging, we’re finding customers want a little extra help with the “IY” part. Offering white glove or assembly services great increases customer satisfaction and helps build your business’s reputability. In the midst of backorders and low supply, customers are not left hanging when it comes to delivery and assembly.
- On demand/same day delivery: Play into the desire for instant gratification. If your product is in stock, deliver it ASAP to stand out among the sea of manufacturing delays.
- Buy online, pick up in store (BOPIS): The pandemic has made this commonplace. Make sure your processes are streamlined!
- Hard to reach and hard to deliver service areas: Whether this is business to business (B2B) or in rural areas, it’s important to make your product accessible. LTLS may not be the best choice here. Can you outsource?
- Full service returns: Picking up from a customer home and delivery back to your store or warehouse can be a headache. Again, consider outsourcing here to ease pain point and deliver quality customer service.
Why delivery options are important
Who does this matter to?
Not only are customers looking for simplicity and fast service, so are employees. In order to reduce turnover and improve customer service it is vital to simplify processes for your staff. The current workforce climate is changing; now, more than ever, your employees want to work for a business that cares about them. Straightforward delivery processes and options simply your employee’s life and chances are that will trickle down to your customers too.
Planning for Uncertainty
The uncertainty of the supply chain and the world of Covid will persist well into 2022. While we are making tremendous strikes, it’s tough to know what is around the corner. Plan for uncertainty. Don’t take your processes for granted. This may mean setting expectations for longer delivery times and then beating these expectations, thus delighting your customers. Or it can mean having real people readily available for customer support – your customers will appreciate this personal touch.
Subscribe to the Bungii Business Newsletter.
How to Implement Delivery
Many business stumble over simple issues when it comes to last mile delivery. Gas prices are rising and LTLs, while already troublesome, are more expensive. The customer experience isn’t great: waiting weeks for their delivery to arrive then when it does the customer still has to figure out how to get it into their house, as curbside is standard.
A virtual fleet alleviates this friction. Recently, a national freight LTL service partnered with Bungii to handle tricky deliveries that involve hard-to-get-to places, white glove or bulky items. Instead of having to build and manage 300+ individual business relationships to contract out across the U.S., they looked to Bungii.
Bungii Pros across the U.S. completed those deliveries promptly; product was placed at the dwellings’ first thresholds or in the preferred room when authorized. Whatsmore, when this leading transport company fell behind in reverse logistics deliveries, they used Bungii to get the job done same day.
Similar to 2021, customers expect better product availability and faster delivery. They are looking evolve experiences in their homes with better furniture, larger TVs, improved appliances, and other large-item choices. Customers are becoming more often influenced by delivery than any other type of retail interaction, so make sure you have your processes down to surprise and delight.
Bungii’s platform is custom built to meet your unique delivery needs.
Top brands, including major national retailers, trust Bungii to deliver an industry-leading experience across multiple industries. Custom delivery options give your business a major advantage when it comes to giving your customers a positive experience, but we know there is no one-size-fits-all last mile delivery strategy out there. That’s why Bungii is the ideal delivery partner if using or interested in using a virtual fleet model. We are a big and bulky, last mile service with a commitment to delighting our partners and their customers by offering a custom delivery plan for each one of our partners.
We build a custom experience by taking time to understand your business, creating features around your delivery needs on our tech-enabled platform, and bringing it all together with a virtual fleet of delivery professionals.
Learn how Bungii can bring an excellent delivery experience to your customers and supercharge your logistics strategy. Get your free delivery analysis by filling out this one minute form:
