Inside cyber sales season for SME logistics providers

While for many direct-to-consumer brands, the cyber sales season accounts for the majority of their yearly sales — for logistics operators, the online shopping frenzy often means increased demand, warehouse capacity concerns, and accelerated last-mile dispatch expectations. 

In Canada and the United States, small-medium-sized businesses make up 93% of the warehouse and transport sector. These are warehousing services, order pick and pack, long-haul transport, and last-mile delivery.

Many of these SME logistics businesses provide tailored third-party logistics services to brands who wish to outsource the logistics of their businesses. 

With the right scalability of your operations and strength of online integrations — this can be a time of increased business and profit for 3PLs. Especially those who have diversified revenue streams to offer more to customers. 

According to Shopify’s recent report, the Future of Commerce, 60% of global consumers expect same, next, or two-day delivery — and with online sales across Black Friday and Cyber Monday expected to soar for another year, this trend means logistics providers will be handling their highest volume of the year, with greater demand than ever for faster delivery timeframes.

In response, many brands have released early sales, alleviating some of the pressure from the thanksgiving sales weekend. 

“What we’re expecting to see, is stock backlogs ahead of the sales season as warehouse customers prepare for the sales boom,” CartonCloud CEO Vincent Fletcher said. With over 23,000 active daily CartonCloud users from warehouse and transport companies across the globe, we can expect to see major spikes in order fulfillment over the next two months as cyber sales season leads into holiday shopping. 

“Over the past few years, we've seen a significant shift in the sales season approach, responding to supply chain bottlenecks, shipping delays, and stock shortages experienced in previous years. These days, brands are beginning their sales ahead of the Thanksgiving weekend, to try and lengthen the activity, giving distribution channels a better chance at keeping up. 

“Once the sales season ends, we’ll see stock being cleared from warehouses, but the need for warehousing won't stop. The impacts of the global pandemic really changed the game. It showed the importance of data transparency and forecasting, especially in terms of what 3PL providers can offer to their customers, to help navigate the complexities of the logistics industry.”

Businesses need the ability to accept integrated online orders, track orders and stock movement with accuracy, train their team easily, and optimize their processes for faster order fulfilment.

Easy-to-use software for smoother team training

With a warehouse system that is both powerful and easy to use, you can easily train new employees. This way, seasonal workers can come on board for peak demand seasons, and pick up processes with ease. They can begin fulfilling orders faster, with higher accuracy — allowing the warehouse to be reactive in taking on new business.

WMS integrations for online ordering 

Online ordering is integrated from your customer’s Shopify or other online stores, directly to your CartonCloud WMS, allowing instant order updates and accurate order placement without middle handling. 

Seamless tracking and data flow between systems

Finally, having seamless and secure order tracking and system integrations with your other software systems and transport partners is essential to ensure seamless dispatch and delivery.

“At CartonCloud, we’re making this a reality for logistics companies of all sizes and operations," Fletcher said. 

"We’ve always provided secure and seamless software integrations to allow data flow for our customers, but now we’re also providing more opportunity for our customers to use their data to provide reporting to their customers, to plan for the future, and to show end to end transparency with absolute ease.

“It’s about equipping our customers to have the ability to offer more, with lower overheads, less time, and with the resources they have on hand. Our system simplifies complex logistics, doing the heavy lifting with data and workflow automation, to make their lives easier.

“Our user-friendly mobile app is so intuitive, they can bring on new staff and train them in minutes, with ensured accuracy through barcode scanning, and order tracking transparency delivered directly to their customer’s portal. It removes tedious admin, reporting and data entry, and literally gives them the ability to increase what they offer, without any headaches.”

With the rise in e-commerce continuing, and more brands looking to outsource logistics, a gap in the market is opening for 3PLs who can offer more to customers. With greater digital adoption, software integrations between retail and logistics providers is essential.

Want to know more about CartonCloud's features? 

Our software is built by logistics people, for logistics people, with features like Wave Pick designed specifically for our industry. Get in touch with our team today for a FREE Demo and see how you can use CartonCloud's intuitive features to optimize your warehouse.