Report highlights need for e-retailers to communicate with customers

This article is brought to you by Retail Technology Review: Report highlights need for e-retailers to communicate with customers.

The latest Snow Valley report highlights the need for improved real-time communication between e-retailers, their delivery companies and the recipients of goods ordered online, to allay consumer fears around home deliveries.
 
The report, Home Delivery in the UK The Doorstep Experience, sponsored by Blackbay, a provider of real-time enterprise mobility solutions enabling service and productivity improvements to postal, field service and supply chain operations, shows that consumers still have cause for concern about whether goods will be delivered 1st time, on time and to the right place. Of specific concern is what happens to a parcel if no-one is at home to receive it.

 
"The last mile and doorstep experience is the most critical part of the online shopping experience and is often the only part of the process where there is any human interaction," explained Nigel Doust, Blackbay's CEO. "The performance of the delivery company during this vital stage is inextricably linked to the e-retailer and can play a key role in the consumer's decision to purchase online again."
 
"To ensure that the consumer receives a first class experience, e-retailers and their delivery companies must improve the level of communication with consumers," commented Sarah Clelland, Marketing Manager, Snow Valley. "Individual parcels need to be tracked through every part of the collection and delivery process. The data captured can be communicated in real-time to the e-retailer, the delivery company and most importantly the consumer."
 
Surprisingly, the Home Delivery report shows that only 57% of e-retailers gave their customers access to their delivery company's tracking information.
 
"A customer who has purchased online goods from an e-retailer deploying an enterprise mobility solution, can at any given time check the delivery or collection, status of their goods. They always know where their parcel is," added Doust.
 
A further 95% of retailers did not provide any kind of pre-delivery text alert to customers giving an expected time delivery slot.   
 
"This simple communication with customers helps to improve their perception of the service they are receiving. Blackbay's enterprise mobility solutions can be tailored to deliver this option and also allows the delivery agent to offer the option to change the delivery time," commented Doust.
 
The Home Delivery report highlights the lack of predictability that consumers are experiencing if they are not at home to accept delivery. There is a lack of uniformity around 'carded' deliveries and delivery agents need to understand exactly what they should do in this scenario and how their actions can be communicated to the consumer.
 
"We placed extra orders during our delivery research this year so we could see what happened when the customer was not at home to receive them. We were really surprised that the experience was so different on each delivery for a customer it feels as if there is no way of knowing what the driver will do if you aren't at home," said Clelland.
 
Again, Blackbay's enterprise mobility solutions can be tailored to meet best practice requirements for failed delivery for example, the delivery agent can check if the customer has designated a 'safe place' for the goods to be left, and if this is the case the delivery agent can SMS the customer confirming this action has been carried out.
 
"In order to keep pace with the growing demand for online deliveries, e-retailers must be thinking about how best to retain their existing customers and win new ones. Being able to tell customers that they will always know where their parcels are and when and where they will be delivered is a key differentiator. It's all about communication. Enterprise mobility solutions enable that communication," concluded Doust.