Shipping can easily be overlooked by new merchants that come to the Magento eCommerce world. You become so focused on products configurations, website designs, content updates/changes, hosting, inventory migrations, and every other aspect of your new Magento store, that shipping gets put on the back burner for a rainy day. Then, just as you’re about to finish, you realize that you have to configure your shipping as well.
Whether it was the first or last item on your pre-launch list, the Magento shipping configuration is one of the most critical parts of your website as it affects:
- The overall logistics of your business
- How and when customers will receive their purchases
- How you handle items that are not in stock
- Any handling fees, such as the shipping cost and packaging, that you may institute
- Whether or not you will include free shipping when the customer’s cart reaches a certain price
- Any special requirements for large or heavy products
- Any specifications regarding destinations such as: shipping from different warehouses or locations
- Abandon Shopping Carts and Lost Profits
Shipping Costs Affecting Your Profits
According to a 2011 study conducted by the Baymard Institute, one of the most common causes of cart abandonment is the shipping cost (https://baymard.com/blog/cart-abandonment). Due to the increased popularity of major eCommerce hubs, like Amazon.com, customers have higher expectations for their shipping fees. Customers expect merchants to be upfront with shipping costs and expect their order to arrive quickly for a very low cost, which is not always realistic for smaller business, or businesses with larger sized products. Make sure you plan ahead and think about the options that work best for your business, your customers, and your overall profit. The more options that you can provide your customers, the most satisfied they will feel at the end of the checkout process.
There are eight common Magento shipping methods that you can choose from. Understanding which methods work for you can help you estimate the cost of shipping for each product you sell, and how to balance that with your profit margin. While you are choosing your shipping options, keep in mind that your developer will need a set amount of time to work on it. Shipping configurations can be relatively easy, or they can be fairly complex depending on the specifications that need to go into your project. Because of this, different methods take longer to configure and implement appropriately. Make sure that you have a thorough understanding as to what your business needs, and that you convey those needs to your Magento partner with enough time for them to finish the configurations on time. If at all possible, don’t let your shipping configurations be put off until the end of your project. Get it done sooner rather than later to allow for any complications that arise.
1. Live shipping Rates from Different Carriers like UPS, FedEx and USPS
You can easily connect to these carriers through the Magento admin under the System Configurations. UPS is probably the easiest to configure. FedEx and USPS are a little more complicated as they require an API connection to receive the correct rates from your shipping account.
Estimated Configuration Timeline: 1-2 days
2. Freight Shipping for Larger Products
Freight has always been very popular, and it is becoming more important as larger items are shipped with greater frequency. Freight shipping saves the customer money, and helps you ship more products at the same time as it is based on a pallet vs. weight scale. Most freight configuration can be configured to show up based on a weight limitation. If you have 150 lbs in the cart the customer would be presented with discounted freight shipping weights. This saves the customer money! https://www.webshopapps.com/us/shipping/freight-shipping.html
Estimated Configuration Timeline: 1-2 days
3. In Store Pick Up
It has become very important for brick and mortar stores to offer this feature. In Store Pick Up helps give the customer a discount and draws the customer into the store to potentially purchase more goods. Making the experience convenient for the customer is the most important part of customer service! https://www.webshopapps.com/us/store-pickup.html
Estimated Configuration Timeline: 1-2 days
4. Free Shipping for Promotions
This can easily be set up in Magento without an extension, but if you have specific rules you may want to utilize the Shipping Override stated below for more control over Free Shipping.
Estimated Configuration Timeline: 1-2 days
5. Override Live Rates
At Shero we do a lot of override configurations to regular rates using the WebShopApps Extension. (https://www.webshopapps.com/shipping/shipping-override-matrix.html) Using a CSV you can configure and mange all of your shipping based on different rules. Some good examples of how you can use this is if you want to limit shipping to certain areas and charge extra for other areas like Alaska and Hawaii. You can also include surcharges which can be useful to configure for heavier items or based on quantity. It can also limit certain shipping options based on location. For example, if you want to offer store pick and flat rate shipping to certain regions, but have live UPS rates for areas outside of that region, this would allow you maximum control and flexibility. There is a little bit of a learning curve to the CSV configuration but WebShopApps has a great wiki and once you get the hang of it you will be making shipping miracles in no time!
Estimated Configuration Timeline: 3-7 days – Could be more based on complexity
6. Custom Rates
This can be very important for unique products or if you work with a specific shipping that gives you major discounts based on certain parameters. The Product Matrix (https://www.webshopapps.com/us/productmatrix-shipping-extension.html) from WebShopApps is a must have for this scenario. We use this on multiple websites with great success. Product weights may not be necessary for this if you have a set of rules.
Estimated Configuration Timeline: 3-7 days + Could be more based on complexity
7. Drop Shipping
You may not have everything in stock or you may be shipping from multiple warehouses. Drop shipping will help you send the customer the product sooner, or it can allow them to pick their closest shipping location based on zip code. https://www.webshopapps.com/us/dropship.html or https://secure.unirgy.com//products/udropship/
Estimated Configuration Timeline: 7 days + Could be more based on complexity
8.Dimensional Shipping
The dimensions of the product or combinations of products can have a major effect on shipping price. For example, you may be able to combine five t-shirts in one USPS Priority shipping box. Why charge the customer for five priority boxes when you can combine it? Note, the configurations for this set up can be very complicated depending on the box dimensions you are working with! https://www.webshopapps.com/dimensional-shipping.html
Estimated Configuration Timeline: 3-7 days + Could be more based on complexity
Note: Most of these tend to work together and can be combined in multiple ways.
Great You Have a Plan! How Do You Implement These Complex Shipping Rules?
The more planning involved the better. We have learned that while most merchants have been shipping for years, they do not understand how it works, or what information is needed to configure this sort of functionality. The best thing to keep in mind is to discuss shipping configurations early in the project, ensuring that both you and your Magento partner understand exactly what you want, and how you want it. The more time you have set into your project to have your configurations completed, the better off you’ll be in the long run.
Work with People You Trust and Understand Your Goals to Achieve Results
In this blog post we mention WebShoppApps Magento shipping extensions because we have worked with their team time and again and they undoubtedly are the best in the industry when it comes to Magento shipping.
Concluding, is important to plan, understand your goals and work towards the most cost effective shipping from the merchant and customer side of the business. In the end, if the shipping is too high you will lose customers because of those shipping costs. Give the customer multiple shipping options, as it helps to reduce the amount of abandoned shopping carts your store receives. If you do not have an in house Magento developer to work with, make sure that whomever you hire for this job understands your shipping goals and can partner with you to see those goals met.
If you have any specific questions or want to discuss your shipping needs in more detail, feel free to contact us.
Co-founder & CEO
