5 Common Mistakes To Avoid In Same Day Delivery

Same-day delivery is one of the key growth factors for eCommerce in 2022. If you are doing it, you are already miles ahead of your competitors, in terms of customer delight, and possibly revenue. If you are yet to start same-day delivery, your customers might already be removing your products from the wishlist.

In today’s fast-paced lifestyle, consumers want lightning-fast deliveries even for non-food orders. Be it groceries, medicines, or even furniture, the demand for same-day delivery is at an all-time high in the post-Covid era.

A 2021 Global Consumer Survey by PWC revealed that 41% of consumers are willing to pay extra for same-day delivery. Meanwhile, over 27% of buyers tend to abandon cart if there is no same-day delivery.

So if your eCommerce business is considering same-day delivery to rev up your revenue, take a quick glance at some of the crucial mistakes you should avoid. Read on to find out the five most common same-day delivery mistakes and their solutions.

1. Maintaining Your Own Fleet

Perhaps the biggest mistake you can make as a startup owner is investing in your own fleet. Financial constraints aside, it is difficult to start same-day delivery with a limited fleet and small logistics team.

To meet superfast SLAs, you need to have an expansive fleet with highly efficient driver partners. The best way to do same-day delivery is thus to partner with a 3PL logistics provider with assured SLA fulfillment records.

2. Manual Dispatching and Routing

Even in 2022, many eCommerce companies are manually dispatching scheduled deliveries or making use of outdated dispatch software. The process might still execute 3-4 day deliveries but will never work for same-day delivery.

For on-demand same-day delivery, there is little time to check fleet availability, let alone manual dispatching. That’s why it is advisable to use an automated dispatching system to assign an order to the nearest delivery partner. This is proven to be faster and more accurate, with fewer chances of SLA breach.

In addition, you can also use advanced route optimization software like Onfleet, WorkWave, Road Warrior, or Blowhorn to map out the fastest routes for your same-day deliveries. At Blowhorn, we use AI-powered route optimization to fulfill same-day delivery for more than 80% of our orders.

3. Long Distance Deliveries

The longer the delivery distance, the more the delivery time — a simple but important factor to keep in mind. Doing same-day delivery is difficult if your inventory is stocked in a warehouse far away from the customer's location.

This is why most startups in 2022 are opting for micro-warehouses. These are small-sized storage facilities located in city centers closer to your customers. Products never stay here for more than a day and are delivered within hours to the customers’ doorstep.

Alternatively, you can also choose a logistics partner like Blowhorn who does pickups from your retail outlets as well.

Read this article to find out why more eCommerce startups are choosing micro-fulfillment.

4. Lack of visibility

If you have not activated real-time tracking for your same-day delivery orders, you have automatically increased the chances of rejection. In fact, nearly one in every three orders turn out to be RTOs, lack of visibility being a major reason.

Customers today expect end-to-end visibility on their orders. From pickup to delivery, it is best to provide frequent updates to the customer during transit. Live to track? Even better.

5. High Operational Costs

Many eCommerce startups back out from same-day delivery considering the high operational costs. In reality, you can optimize your same-day delivery costs with proper strategy.

A foolproof way to do same-day delivery on a budget is to club multiple pickups and deliveries together, a method often referred to as milk run. Additionally, you can also leverage the latest technology to iron out the inefficiencies in your existing operational process.

With efficient planning, use of technology and a reliable logistics partner by your side, your startup can nail same-day delivery. To learn more about how we do it at Blowhorn, talk to our experts today. You can also [sign up] (https://blowhorn.com/contact-us?utm_source=website&utm_medium=blogpost&utm_campaign=signup) with Blowhorn in minutes and give your business the edge over competitors.