How to Simplify Parcel Shipping with ShipStation
Published on December 13, 2023
For e-commerce businesses, optimizing your shipping process could be an absolutely daunting task. Why? Well, making it work effectively is one thing. But ensuring that it’s efficient, time-saving, and error-free, is another!
Are you familiar with the popular saying “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”? Do you believe in it? Is it always true?
If you ask me — I don’t believe that it’s always true. Just because something already works just fine, doesn’t mean that it can no longer be improved! You know, just like how you can always optimize your shipping process to be more effective and efficient.
To give you more context, let’s take a look at my personal experience with my parents’ online business.
How I Stumbled Upon ShipStation: An Unexpected Gem
Shipping has become an enormous part of our daily life at home. In case you didn’t know, my father and mother started their own online store in 2007 which is called HomeoAnimo.
My parents’ company sells natural products for animals and its target market is pet lovers from France. Since the company is based in Canada, my father had to go through the tedious process of overseas shipping.
Day in and day out, I’ve witnessed how my father dedicates himself to handling the shipping process of his business!
And you know what? I personally experienced this firsthand when my parents needed to go on a vacation so badly. They needed someone to help handle and process all the incoming orders on their behalf. So of course, they called me.
I was indeed happy to help! But hey, to tell you the truth, I was definitely exhausted after just one day of following my father’s shipping process.
To give you an idea of how it works, it goes like this — He’ll receive an order from Shopify and proceed to open his Canada Post account to create the shipping labels.
Then, he’ll manually copy and paste all of the customers’ information such as the name, address, province, and postal code. And if it’s an order abroad, he’ll provide all the necessary information as well.
Next, he’ll take a sheet of paper and print the shipping label, glue a small plastic envelope to his box, and slip the shipping label inside the plastic envelope.
Ta-da! What a slow and time-consuming process, right? Prone to lots of errors as well. And mind you — he does this for EACH ORDER he receives!
But hey, my father wasn’t alone in that struggle, a lot of businesses experience it too! With manual order management, businesses can face error rates between 10% to 30%.
Right there and then, I thought to myself that there had to be a better way than this. Something that’s faster, more efficient, and more reliable.
So I immediately went to the web and searched for a possible solution, and guess what? I FOUND IT — ShipStation. Believe me, up until this day, it was one of the best discoveries in my life!
And for today’s blog, we’re going to explore every single amazing thing about ShipStation. So, are you ready? Let’s go!
Discovering the Game-Changer: What Is ShipStation?
ShipStation is a centralized one-stop shop for everything you need to streamline your entire shipping process!
It’s like a smart home system that you can connect to all your gadgets such as smartphones, tablets, or laptops. And allows you to control everything inside your house like adjusting the temperature, unlocking the doors, checking the cameras, and much more.
In other words, when it comes to your shipping process, it makes life much easier. Oh, and you know what? It easily integrates with several e-commerce platforms be it on Shopify, Etsy, Amazon, eBay, and more!
ShipStation gathers all of your orders from these platforms and puts them all in one place where you can conveniently start your shipping process.
Oh, and here’s the best part — ShipStation also connects you to multiple shipping carriers and generates shipping labels automatically. Yes, you can now say goodbye to spending hours manually copying and pasting customer information all the time!
But wait, there’s more! ShipStation also offers discounts of up to 84% off from leading carriers such as UPS, DHL Express, and USPS.
Everything I’ve told you up until now was just a glimpse of what ShipStation can offer. We’ll dive deeper into detail as we go on with the blog. Trust me, there’s a whole lot more to explore!
See? That’s why it’s absolutely not surprising why over 130,000 businesses have chosen ShipStation to save money, accelerate their label printing, and reduce their overall shipping time.
7 Points that Make ShipStation Every Online Seller's Dream
So, why is utilizing ShipStation a must for every e-commerce business and online seller out there?
Is it really a dream tool for streamlining your shipping process? Let’s find out!
1. Streamlined Orders
Yes, ShipStation has the ability to gather all of your orders from different e-commerce platforms into one dashboard. This allows you to manage and organize your shipments much easier!
Just take a look at how Ruroc, a pioneer in snow sports helmets, was able to increase their fulfilled orders per day by a staggering 3900%!
And you know what? This is all thanks to ShipStation’s brilliant Batch Printing and Split Ship features.
It allowed Ruroc to efficiently organize orders according to categories like product purchased, size, weight, and destination country.
2. Multiple Carrier Options
One crucial part of every business’s shipping process is choosing the best shipping option available.
And guess what? That’s no longer a problem because ShipStation allows you to connect to various carriers such as Canada Post, FedEx, UPS, and Purolator.
The more flexible you are in choosing the right carriers, the better!
3. Automation Rules
Ah, now this one’s a game-changing feature for every e-commerce business out there — Remember the long, tiring, and manual shipping process that my father used to do?
We don’t have to do that anymore. We’re now in the digital age, where almost everything is automatic!
In fact, did you know that by 2025, 95% of interactions between customers and retailers will be handled by automated systems, including phone calls and live chats?
Just with this statistic, you can clearly see that the future is leaning heavily towards automation, and guess what? ShipStation is already ahead of the curve!
With ShipStation’s Automation Rules, you can set up rules to automatically select the best shipping options based on your personal preferences in order value, destination, and other factors.
Let’s say you have a free shipping promo for a minimum spend of $80. The Automation Rule allows you to set up a process that automatically chooses a certain service of a specific carrier to use!
The best part? You can create and set up as many automation rules as possible to speed up your order processing!
See? Very convenient, right? This mind-blowing feature proved to be beneficial for lots of businesses.
Let’s take Welcome to Country as an example, a leading online store of handmade products. They saw their efficiency boost by 50% after implementing ShipStation!
4. Simplified International Shipping
Ah, this is personally one of my favorite features of ShipStation — One-Click Label Generation!
Did your company receive 20, 50, or even hundreds of orders for today? No worries! With just one click, you can already generate and print all the shipping labels seamlessly.
And with the right kind of printer and paper to use, it’s much easier to prepare your packages! You can simply get the shipping label, peel off the paper, and stick it to the box. Done!
No need to glue a plastic envelope to the box and slip the shipping label inside anymore. It’s definitely a time-saving feature and hey, a satisfying one as well!
5. One-Click Label Generation
Ah, this is personally one of my favorite features of ShipStation — One-Click Label Generation!
Did your company receive 20, 50, or even hundreds of orders for today? No worries! With just one click, you can already generate and print all the shipping labels seamlessly.
And with the right kind of printer and paper to use, it’s much easier to prepare your packages! You can simply get the shipping label, peel off the paper, and stick it to the box. Done!
No need to glue a plastic envelope to the box and slip the shipping label inside anymore. It’s definitely a time-saving feature and hey, a satisfying one as well!
6. Error Minimization
Sometimes, one simple mistake can already cause a lot of problems.
Well, with the Barcode Scanning Feature of the ShipStation App, it’s now easier to avoid these costly mistakes!
Let’s say, Teresa, who by the way loves candles, placed an order in your online store. She ordered three different candles — a peach, eucalyptus, and rose candle each.
So, what do you do? You prepare the order, generate the shipping label, and head to the stockroom. Then, you proceed to scan the barcodes of each of the candles.
Now, if you’ve scanned the wrong kind of candle or forgot to include one in the orders, the ShipStation App will tell you. See? Absolutely amazing!
7. Pricing and Trial
ShipStation remains to be an affordable and risk-free solution to streamline your shipping and ordering process.
It offers a 30-day free trial, and pricing starts at around $10 monthly for fifty packages or less.
So, what are you waiting for? Revolutionize your shipping process now!
Ensuring Every Package is Perfect: The ShipStation Assurance
ShipStation takes the power of automation to the next level!
And not only that, they do it by assuring that every user will enjoy the convenience, efficiency, and accuracy of their product.
In fact, automated warehouses, like the ones ShipStation can integrate with, are 40% more likely to ship orders within one day of the order being made.
And guess what? As the Robotics Business Review points out, this efficiency also significantly reduces labor costs.
It's like having a second pair of eyes, double-checking everything for you, ensuring precision and speed in every step of the shipping process all the time.
Ready to Revolutionize Your Shipping?
And of course, fast, precise, and efficient shipping must come with it. So don’t let your business miss out!
With ShipStation, you're not just investing in an ordinary tool, you're also investing in your business’s future. Trust me, it would be one of the best decisions you’ll ever make.
But hey, if revolutionizing your company’s shipping process is what we’re talking about, then I have an even better solution for you. That’s right — Buster Fetcher®!
We’ve helped thousands of businesses across Canada and the US not only optimize their shipping but save tens of thousands of dollars worth of shipping costs.
How? By claiming refunds from late-delivered packages, canceling unused shipping labels, and providing a comprehensive report that’s specially tailored for your business to optimize shipping. So you, our future customer, can Win the Shipping Game™.
What are you waiting for? Subscribe to Buster Fetcher® now or give us a call at 1-844-311-3088 to watch your shipping experience level up!
References
- 10 Common Mistakes in Order Fulfillment - AirisX
- ShipStation
- https://www.shipstation.com/
- How Ruroc Increased Fulfilment by 3900% with ShipStation
- AI Will Power 95% Of Customer Interactions By 2025
- How Welcome to Country Improved Efficiency, Increased Dispatch Speed by 80% with ShipStation
- Full Warehouse Automation Is the Goal and the Opportunity for both Providers and Investors - Robotics Business Review
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