How to Use Warehouse Management Systems for Increase Customer Loyalty

In the e-commerce ecosystem, where consumers can access thousands of products with a few clicks, all actors compete fiercely to stand out various methods ranging from digital marketing to discount campaigns. It is important to ensure that customers are satisfied and choose your brand repeatedly for their needs.

Having a good Warehouse Management System (WMS) on your business's supply and warehouse management side impacts customer loyalty.

In this article, we will focus on what you need to do to increase customer loyalty with a good WMS system.

Here are the key points that will be covered:

• Always ship correct and trouble-free products to your customers
• Ship your products to your customers in the fastest way and on time
• Offer order tracking and communication
• Do not keep your customers waiting in return processes
• Make your favorite products always available
• Be prepared for campaign periods
• Offers advantages to your customer with bundle products
• Customize your customer services
• Create resources to invest in customer experience

Always ship correct and trouble-free products to your customers

With Warehouse Management Systems (WMS), products are assigned a SKU code when they enter the warehouse.

SKU code includes information such as the product's storage method, exact storage location, expiration date, special storage conditions, and special packaging requirements.

This code minimizes the disruptions caused by human error and lack of knowledge in the storage process.

For example, if a cosmetic product or pet food needs to be stored in a dark place, it enables planning accordingly. This planning, therefore, makes it possible to prevent product deterioration.

As a result, problems such as sending incorrect, damaged, expired products to your customers will be eliminated.

Ship your products to your customers in the fastest way and on time

In today's world, consumers' expectation of speed is increasing more than ever.

While this expectation grows, your inability to offer options such as same-day shipping or next-day delivery, or even worse, delivering your product late beyond the promised time, can be synonymous with poor customer satisfaction.

First, warehouse management systems allow you to gain speed by automating your processes. Once an order is placed, it is promptly prepared and integrated with the Cargo Management Systems. The system considers the delivery address, package dimensions, and other relevant variables to determine the best shipping company for the job. This process only takes seconds, ensuring optimal time and cost efficiency for the shipment.

After the package is prepared, it will be sent to the appropriate cargo company. This will ensure that your customers receive their orders promptly and give you a chance to allocate the shipping funds saved towards improving customer satisfaction.

In addition, you can improve your marketplace rating and have an advantage over your competitors by receiving a "fast delivery" badge on marketplaces and positive feedback from customers who got their products delivered on time.

Integration with the shipping companies through our OPLOG Cargo Alarm System (CAS), we are able to provide instant information flow to our customers about shipments that exceed the average delivery times.

The result?

Never delayed deliveries and happy customers.

Offer order tracking and communication

Providing instant answers to questions such as "Is the order processed?", "Is it out of the warehouse?", "Is it delivered to the cargo?", "Is it in distribution?" builds up trust and confidence in your business.

Waiting can be quite annoying for customers if you don’t provide order tracking info. It also may raise question marks about the transparency of your brand.

Warehouse tracking systems usually integrate with other tracking and customer satisfaction infrastructures, allowing you to proactively share this information with your customers, building trust and loyalty.

Do not keep your customers waiting in return processes

Warehouse Management Systems (WMS) play a crucial role in ensuring a smooth customer journey. It facilitates the swift return of products to stock, keeps customers informed about the acceptance of their returns, and enables them to receive their refunds promptly.

All of these factors contribute to a seamless customer experience.

Another advantage of the warehouse management system in return management is that stock mixing can be prevented.

If a returned product is damaged, it is important to separate the product; if it is a product that can be resold, it is important to take it back into stock without wasting time. Thus, you can not only ensure a regular supply of products to your customers, but also prevent a problematic product from going back to another customer.

Furthermore, by minimizing returns, you can avoid unnecessary shipping costs and prevent loss of revenue from stagnant products that can still be sold.

Would you like to learn more about reverse logistics? Learn about this concept and how OPLOG handles reverse logistics processes.

Make your favorite products always available

Warehouse management systems provide data flow to inventory management software allowing a company to view its stock status in real time.

You can see when those who are constantly in demand for your products need to be resupplied and restock items that are running low to prevent them from going out of stock.

To prevent customers from receiving an unpleasant "out of stock" warning after placing an order, it's important to ensure that the product is available. This way, you can retain customers who need the product urgently and avoid losing them to competitors.

Warehouse management systems also eliminate the risk of over-stocking and support you to always get a return on your investment.

Think about how much easier it would be to have centralized control over your inventory for all your orders across various sales channels. That's where OPLOG-One comes in! Regardless of whether it's marketplaces or your own website, OPLOG-One enables you to effortlessly manage and analyze your stocks, orders, returns, and more. It provides end-to-end control in the procurement processes. So, ensuring your customers have always access your product at all sales points.

Be prepared for campaign periods

Warehouse management systems allow you to have complete control over your inventory. This means that during high demand, such as shopping and promotional periods, you can still provide customers with the products they want without problems.

You can continue carrying out your warehouse processes without errors during the intensive order flow and prevent the cargo and delivery phase from being interrupted due to density.

Offer deals to your customer with bundle products

While on the topic of campaigns, we can't overlook the significance of bundle products. A bundle combines multiple products into a single set and offers them at discounted prices. This allows companies to divest their stock and increase interest in the brand by providing promotional products to customers.

However, there are specific techniques and requirements for creating bundle products.

To ensure customer satisfaction and optimal inventory management, the set should be tailored to meet both customer needs and the available stock of the brand. This requires real-time monitoring and analysis of inventory levels and demand.

In addition, details such as correctly barcoding the products so they do not get mixed up, and the product saved as a bundle can be seen in stock. To do all of this, a good warehouse management system is needed.

Customize your customer services

By synchronizing with CRM, WMS systems can offer companies valuable insights into customer preferences and behaviors. This is achieved by tracking customer data and order histories.

This makes it possible to offer customized services, special recommendations and targeted discounts. Offering such solutions for personalized needs also helps you build long-lasting customer relationships.

Create resources to invest in customer experience

With WMS systems, you can increase your efficiency while reducing your costs. You can create resources and time to make new investments in customer experience and your brand.

For example, you can offer faster shipping and better packaging options, create loyalty programs, improve after-sales support, and make enhancements to improve the customer experience in your sales channels.

Wrapping up...

An effective warehouse management system enables you to provide your customers with their purchased products in a seamless and prompt manner, minimize your return rates, efficiently handle potential return processes, and allocate your time and resources toward building your brand.

Executing each of these stages seamlessly will also cause your buy box score to increase in marketplaces. In other words, it allows your brand to rank higher and algorithms to recommend you as a priority to customers.

Every investment in customer satisfaction and loyalty is an opportunity to expand your pool of new and loyal customers.

At OPLOG, we effectively manage our partner's inventory through the best warehouse management software, which meets all these criteria. While we ensure the satisfaction of more than 150 partners, we empower them to concentrate on boosting loyalty among their customer bases.

If you want to learn how you can gain competitive advantage in e-commerce with OPLOG cooperation, contact us now!