We live in the age of technology. Shopping from a smartphone or laptop has never been so easy, and it’s now becoming faster than ever. Deliveries can show up in less than a today without you even needing to leave your house. For many shoppers, delivery speed and ease are becoming critical factors in selecting where to buy from. Since we can now order personal items like prescriptions, customers want them to be delivered as safely as possible. Customers also want to know where parcels are in the process through real-time delivery tracking, something most delivery providers don’t offer.
In an era of online shopping, live parcel tracking is essential in offering satisfactory delivery services. Since the pandemic, more online buyers have expected live tracking options and real-time updates throughout the delivery process. Offering exactly what customers are looking for is the best way to increase retention and customer loyalty.
This article will walk you through what real-time delivery tracking looks like for customers, why it’s important, and how it can benefit your business. Although live tracking options can have a direct impact on the customers, they can also indirectly impact your business outputs. Live tracking might be able to offer more than you think.
What is Real-Time Delivery Tracking?
Real-time delivery tracking refers to a delivery system that gives complete visibility to the customer. This is often done by allowing customers to see the live location of their parcel rather than just an expected delivery window. Live tracking will enable customers to see what part of the delivery process their parcels are in. It also provides a clear window on when they’ll arrive, as well as update them with issues along the way.
This type of delivery system keeps everyone informed and is the key to success in a technology-focused world. Live tracking can significantly increase your customer return rate and help you deliver faster with fewer issues.
How Delivery Tracking Impacts Deliveries
Real-time delivery tracking is crucial to operating successful deliveries. Without it, problems arise that can’t be solved with the ambiguity of regular delivery providers.
What can real-time tracking provide your business?
Real-time tracking lets your business communicate and plan better beforehand, improving outcomes afterward. Live tracking enhances the communication between you and your customer, allowing everyone to see the same information. As a merchant, this limits how many customer concerns you must deal with and saves you the time you would otherwise spend offering delivery support. Customers who aren’t updated with delivery windows often inquire about them, putting more on your plate.
Moreover, live tracking improves your ratio of successful first delivery attempts. First delivery attempts refer to the first time the parcel was attempted to be dropped off to the customer. Sometimes the first attempt will fail if the customer is not home, the drop-off information is incorrect, or the driver can’t find the correct location. All these issues require either the driver or merchant to contact the customer to fix them, which is where live tracking can help.
Live tracking and notifications allow customers to be informed of any delivery barriers. If a driver realizes the door code is not working, they can quickly send a message to the customer, allowing the delivery to be made regardless. Plus, customers can see in real time when a driver will be arriving, so they are more likely to be home to receive it. This is especially important for deliveries that require ID verifications or signatures to complete.
In all, live delivery tracking can significantly improve your delivery success rate and help you meet customer demands on the front end.
How Can Delivery Tracking Improve Your Business?
On top of smoother operations, a delivery tracking system can impact your business’s outcome. Since more than 80% of customers want live delivery update options, offering this to them can change more than just their satisfaction levels.
Offering the best delivery tracking services to your customers can attract them to buy from you, entice them to come back more than once, and even convince them to place larger orders.
More Orders
Better delivery protocols directly impact how well your business is able to complete orders. When deliveries are faster, more can be made in a single hour or day. Deliveries are time-consuming when there’s little communication ensuring they’re correct the first time around.
Hence, it’s essential that your deliveries are running as smoothly as possible. Late or failed deliveries slow down the process and cause long delays, affecting the delivery times of other orders in the meantime. Live tracking can help you avoid these issues by communicating with customers about their delivery time windows and possible delays before they cause problems. These protocols help ensure your deliveries don’t need to be redone, saving you time and money in the long run.
Higher Customer Satisfaction
Improved delivery tracking can also have an effect on the overall satisfaction of your customers. Research shows that customers are much happier when deliveries are fast and affordable in comparison to the items they’ve purchased. For example, most customers want their deliveries within a day or two. But, they still don’t want to pay three times the price of what they’ve already bought.
Live tracking can improve customer satisfaction and allow customers to be more involved in the delivery process. Customers who feel involved are more likely to be happy with their orders since they weren’t left wondering when they would arrive.
Higher Customer Retention
On top of completing more orders, customers are happier when real-time delivery tracking is available. Satisfied customers will often return to buy more in the future, resulting in better loyalty over time. Although customer loyalty is rare within most industries because there are so many options to pick from, studies do show that customers are more likely to come back to a company they felt they could trust.
Happy customers are also more likely to refer their friends and family to you. All customers share their experiences with their friends, so we want them to spread the good word. Real-time delivery tracking is a major benefit shoppers share with their peers.
Features of A Tracking System
Before you can implement the best delivery tracking system, you need to know what types of features you should be looking for. These are some of the most sought-after features offered in real-time delivery tracking programs, on top of what was previously mentioned.
Full Visibility
The best real-time delivery solutions offer complete visibility. This means customers, merchants, and drivers all have access to the estimated delivery window, and the expectations are clear for all. In most cases, merchants and customers will be able to see the exact delivery updates, so everyone knows where packages are.
Complete visibility allows customers to get live delivery updates, be notified of delivery delays, and be completely aware of when their package is going to arrive. Full visibility keeps you, the merchant, and your customer from losing sight of a parcel. This helps you to avoid questions or concerns from upset customers who are trying to locate their parcel or get a narrower window of delivery.
Map Tracking
Live tracking refers to a live map view of a driver completing a delivery. This type of delivery feature is essential for successfully completing deliveries on the first attempt. Without live tracking, customers are likely to miss the drop-off when large delivery windows are provided.
Live tracking is also helpful because customers should be aware of unexpected delays that can arise throughout the delivery process. With the ability to view the driver on a map, customers can easily be updated. Any issues that might cause a delay are noted on both ends. Traffic, road closures, and weather can all unexpectedly delay a driver, but allowing customers to track this themselves increases delivery success rates.
Notifications
Live delivery notifications are the best way to keep customers informed of the delivery process. For customers who choose not to watch the driver on the live map, notifications can still keep them updated with their parcel’s movement.
No matter what a customer is doing, a live notification updating them on their delivery will always catch their attention. By offering both SMS and email notifications, you’re more likely to include the preference of all your customers.
Digital Proof of Delivery
Proof of delivery refers to a photograph that proves the parcel was dropped off where it was instructed to be. Real-time delivery tracking systems allow proof of delivery photos to be shared directly with the customer so everyone knows the parcel location. For customers who might not be home at the time of drop-off, proof of delivery lets everyone see how and where the delivery was completed.
Exclusive Features of FlashBox’s Tracking Experience
The FlashBox Tracking Experience is a unique solution that offers a complete overview to everyone involved in the delivery process. These features allow customers to view the driver on a map and receive updates as parcels move through the process.
In addition to the most desired features, FlashBox offers other unique aspects to make the process even smoother.
Branded Logo Tracking
The FlashBox tracking experience allows merchants to customize the tracking experience for a unique customer experience.
Through the FlashBox dashboard, merchants can upload their logo, which will then be used to update the location of the driver. This additional option increases brand awareness and customer retention after a successful delivery.
Update Delivery Information
FlashBox real-time delivery tracking also gives customers the option to update their drop-off information before the delivery is completed.
With live updates, customers are shown the drop-off address before the driver makes their way towards their location. If this information is incorrect, customers can update all of it themselves to increase the chance of a successful delivery. All this information can be edited from the tracking page, an ideal solution to typos and other incorrect delivery information.
Driver Information
For even more clarity, FlashBox includes driver information for the comfort of customers. The driver’s name, photo, and phone number are available through the tracking link and give transparency to the customer.
If there is an issue during the delivery, both the driver and customer can choose to call each other to clarify information. This significantly helps avoid incorrect or failed deliveries.
Offering A Tracking Experience
With all of this in mind, deliveries can be more accessible than ever before. Everyone can have clear access to all delivery updates, and the improved delivery solution will help your company save time and earn more.
FlashBox offers an unbeatable live tracking experience complete with all the desired features. With full visibility, deliveries are successful the first time. This means no failed deliveries that cost you more money and time to redeliver.
Real-time delivery tracking is the future of last-mile deliveries. Full transparency is your step towards more satisfied customers.
Contact us today to see how you offer live tracking to your customers!
