This week, we have asked our partner, Parcelhub, to showcase what they can do to help you succeed with your international expansion! Check out how they can help and their top tips for 2018:
1.What does Parcelhub offer to e-commerce sellers?
Parcelhub is a flexible and scalable e-commerce delivery management and outsourced customer services solution. Distributing over 6 million parcels annually, Parcelhub grants multichannel retailers, wholesalers and global brands access to discounted shipping rates and proactive customer services.
It’s really an ‘e-commerce operations’ company; when you consider our sister company Mail Workshop provides eCommerce fulfilment, we offer everything needed to enhance your delivery performance and customer service, all while reducing your costs.
Parcelhub’s free multi-carrier shipping software integrates seamlessly with eBay, Amazon, WooCommerce, Shopify, Linnworks, Magento, and more, giving you access to specially reduced rates from DHL, UK Mail, Yodel, DX, Hermes and more.
2. What is the biggest myth surrounding shipping?
That only major wholesalers and global brands can achieve genuine economies of scale with their parcel and packet distribution. By utilising a multi-carrier consolidator, smaller single and multi-channel retailers can access discounted rates, enabling them to compete head-on with much larger competitors by deploying fully integrated software, enabling them to acquire shipping rates based on the shared, co-operative volumes of all other shippers using such a solution.
3. Looking forward to 2018, what are your top 5 tips to new and existing sellers?
ONE: Don’t rely on a single carrier; due to external influences such as torrential weather, strikes and in rarer cases carriers going bust, the parcel distribution sector is volatile. By utilising a multi-carrier solution you will be safeguarding yourself from being left without a service during the most mission-critical periods.
TWO: As an online retailer you will be handling sensitive customer information for shipping. Ensure you are GDPR compliant by making them aware of how you will store and handle their data.
THREE: Always prepare early for Christmas peak – According to MarTech Advisor a third of businesses who started preparing before September described theirs as a “very successful” peak season. Businesses who started later? Well, just 20% of them enjoyed a “very successful” holiday period.
FOUR: Review your back-end processes. How can you assist your warehouse staff to be more effective in their jobs in the intensity of a peak weekend, and how much time could be saved if you were able to automate some of the more laborious processes, such as label printing?
FIVE: Get up to speed with final posting and delivery dates – Ensure that the carrier(s) you have selected provide a service throughout the UK’s most emotive time of year.
4. What is coming up for Parcelhub in 2018?
Following 41% growth in Financial Year 2016/17, Parcelhub will be expanding into Scotland throughout 2018. Parcelhub’s new presence in Scotland will increase the reach of its current network which is headquartered in Nottingham, and has further distribution centres in South Yorkshire, the West Midlands and partners throughout East Anglia, the North West, South West and South East of England.
5. Tell us something awesome your company has done this year for a client!
Following a growing number enquiries from Shopify merchants, our in-house, UK-based software development team built a bespoke Shopify shipping integration purely for that client, which is now available publicly and is in use with a growing number of clients.
Holding your stock within a UK fulfilment centre? Holding stock within an EU country triggers an obligation to VAT register. Contact SimplyVAT.com today to see how we can help your business remain compliant!
