Molly, a mother of five from Any Town, USA, has spent months looking for the perfect Christmas gift for her youngest son, Evan. She has gone to every brick and mortar store in her area and the gift is nowhere to be found - it is either completely sold out or in the wrong color. Molly turns to the internet to see if she can locate it for a decent price.
You, a polished and seasoned eCommerce company with a knack for marketing, pop up on Molly’s searches for the perfect gift and Molly is ecstatic - the price is right, it is in the right color and there is still time to order! Molly orders the gift and pays extra for expedited shipping because she is running out of shopping days before Christmas. Molly knows that she is going to make her little boy’s Christmas because it is the only thing he has been talking about for months. She knows this will be the last year that Evan will believe in Santa and she wants to make sure this Christmas is his most special childhood memory yet. She is so happy she found your site and is telling everyone how great you are.
Fast forward to a few days before Christmas when the gift finally arrives. Molly excitedly strips the tape off of the package, moves the bubble wrap packaging out of the way, and…..it’s the wrong gift. It’s not the gift that Evan so desperately sat on Santa’s lap and begged for, the perfect gift that Evan just had to have, the gift that will make her child’s Christmas. Your company shipped the wrong item because the proper QC checks aren’t in place. Just like that, you ruined Molly and her family’s Christmas.
Molly is fuming. She’s angry and disappointed, stressed out because Christmas is too close for her to have the item replaced. Molly’s emotions start to take over and she calls your Customer Service line mad and screaming, making threats to notify the Better Business Bureau. She leaves nasty reviews on Facebook slamming your customer service and your company’s inability to deliver on their promises. She leaves negative Google reviews saying she will never order from you again and neither should anyone else.
She tells all of her friends not to order from you and they, in turn, tell four more of their friends about Molly’s negative experience with your company. You offer to replace the product and ship out a new one which costs you four times as much as the product itself along with the costs you lost with the first shipment, the postage and it’s packaging. Worst of all, Molly leaves bad reviews on Amazon which negatively affected your Seller Performance Rating and you are on pins and needles with Amazon already. Molly does whatever she can to make sure you know she’s mad and the rest of the world knows it, too. All because your company doesn’t have a solid Quality Control plan in place.
You get where we are going here. We’ve all had upset and angry customers and most of us would go to any length to make sure they get the product they ordered on time, error-free. We also know that mistakes are made during the fulfillment process, and that these mistakes cost us thousands of dollars, affect our bottom line and, quite frankly, can negatively affect the future of our companies.
You can take the steps now to make sure you have a smooth Holiday shopping season with up to 85% fewer errors by implementing Quality Control into your warehouse processes this Peak Season.
Need more reasons than an angry Molly to upgrade your Quality Control processes this Peak Season? Check these out:
1 | Lower Shipping Costs
This one is a bit of a no-brainer but definitely takes our number one spot. Simply put, ship the right product the first time and avoid sending out the same order all over again. Utilize a warehouse management system like SkuVault to make sure your pickers are picking the right products off of the shelves the first time. Mis-shipments cost you more than you think and during a time as busy as Peak, this could mean thousands upon thousands of dollars for your growing business in shipping alone. Last year, our system caught over 14,000 Quality Control human error mistakes during Peak Season alone. Just think about all of the money saved!
2 | Minimize Labor Costs
We're going to be blunt with this one - do you have the Customer Service staff to deal with an entire army of angry customers? You'll need a hefty phone staff to deal with mistakes and angry customers like Molly, not to mention the extra staff you will need in the warehouse to pick the orders and ship them the second time around because of the mistakes. Think of the savings you could have if you just did it right the first time. On average, you could save approximately 30% on labor savings by optimizing your warehouse and implementing Quality Control measures into your warehouse processes.
3 | Build Customer Loyalty
Without a sound Quality Control method, you're taking the chance of hurting your feedback scores, jeopardizing your future sales and the odds that someone like Molly will never buy from your company again.
According to psychologists, people remember negative experiences more vividly than positive ones and for longer. In other words, people hold nasty grudges. Businesses like yours can protect their name and keep customers coming back by implementing quality control measures and preventing the reasons for angry customers to leave negative reviews in the first place. It really is that simple.
Peak Season is right around the corner. Make sure to implement and practice Quality Control this season to make sure all of the Molly's of the world are prepared for Christmas this year and aren't leaving Santa empty-handed. The good news is, if you act fast, you have still time to get your warehouse operations in shape before the holiday rush, but you have to do it NOW.
After all, you don't want your company to be the Grinch that stole a kid's Christmas, do you?