Shipping charges are one of the major monthly expenses for ecommerce stores and small businesses. However, ingenious enterprises and business owners are always looking for ways and ideas to trim the shipping and delivery costs down with an intention to boost their revenues. As shipping rates and speed are also the vital things that effect buying decisions, here is how you can trim shipping costs and deliver the customer orders faster and cheaper.
Signing a Shipping Contract
If you deliver so many products or packages over a month, then negotiating a contract with a major and reliable shipping company would be a great idea as it will not only provide you with lower shipping rates but will also deliver your shipments on time. However, you should check for extra charges, packages handling charges, remote delivery costs, signatures requirements, heavy packages fee and so on before signing the shipping contract. Also make sure company is offering compensations if shipments are delivered late. If you offer your customers with discounts when their ordered products are delivered late, be sure to check with the company for late deliveries so you will never loss your profits in terms of late delivery discounts. Also check the shipping services provider for the policy changing conditions before you sign the contract as most of the shipping companies revise their rates and terms every year.
Negotiate with Different Shippers
Most of the shipping services provides schedule their rates based on the volume, which means the more products you deliver by using their services, the lower you will be charged. If you ship many products, goods or materials to your customers, you should compare price with other shippers and try to influence them for lower possible rates. Businesses like concrete contractors who need to ship raw materials or ecommerce stores who need to deliver ordered products or items to the customers’ doorsteps, should negotiate with multiple shippers to get best lower rates with fast shipment timeframe.
Use Packaging Provided by the Shipping Company
Whether you need small boxes for fragile products or large containers for bigger and heavier items or materials, always try to use the boxes or containers provided by the company in order to prevent any extra charges or dimensional fees. When using own packaging, your boxes or containers may exceed the size guidelines that can cause dimensional fees. That’s why, always ask the carrier to provide you with packaging so you can prevent additional charges or fee while delivering products or shipping materials to your customers.
Ask Suppliers to Use your Shipping Account Number
When it comes to get materials or products delivered by suppliers, remember to ask them for using your shipping account number for each shipment or delivery. By doing so, you will be able to increase your business’s shipping volume that can lead you to lower shipping costs in results. It also keeps suppliers from stuffing shipping costs. In simple words, asking the suppliers for using your business shipping account number helps you in multiple ways to cut the shipping costs down.
Opt for Regional Carrier
If you need to deliver products within a specific region, you should consider a regional carrier not only to save bucks but to provide your customers with speedy delivery. As delivery networks of regional carriers are limited, you can save more on shipping by spreading your shipping tasks among different regional carriers.
Pre-Pay Your Shipping Online
Just like other industries, shipping industry is also incentivizing the use of its automated options. Ordering shipping online and paying for it online is not only faster and easier but it also helps you save bucks in terms of special offers and discounts. Most of the shipping solutions also come with free pick-up, that saves your time and visit to the physical location of the carrier. Almost all online shippers offer handsome discount offers and incentives to save, time effort and money of their customers.
Buy Shipping Insurance from an Outsider Company
Getting your shipping materials, goods or products insured from the shipping provider can cost you much. That is the reason, you should opt for an outside insurance provider to save many bucks in terms of lower shipping insurance costs. A third-party insurance company usually charge 45 cents for every $100 insurance that helps you save almost 35 cents on every $100 insurance (as shipping companies charge almost 80 cents for $100).
Consider Hybrid Shippers
Hybrid shipping is a great development in the shipping industry. SurePost is the hybrid shipping powered by UPS that pick up the packages or products from your business location and take your shipments to the USPS office that is nearest to the designation location. Then they deliver the packages to the final drop-off with help of a local delivery service. It helps small businesses and giant enterprises trim shipping costs about 50%.
