Three easy-to-set-up shipping options for retail businesses going online
Shipping is one of the most variable settings for any retail business that sells online due to different destination options, fees, and carriers. In Lightspeed eCom, you can choose one carrier to ship in your town, another carrier to ship across country or abroad, add your own delivery service, set up different rates for different items, and more.
While having versatile options is a good thing, it can be confusing when you're just starting to sell online.
In this guide, you will find three most easy shipping options that fit most businesses:
You can choose one or a combination of these options as your starting point in online sales. Once you get used to fulfilling and shipping online orders, you can add more specific delivery options to your online store.
In-store pickup for your Lightspeed eCom
With Buy Online Pickup In Store (BOPIS), you don’t actually ship items. Instead, you allow customers to visit your store at their convenience to pick up their order.
Study shows that most customers prefer in-store pickup to delivery. So you improve the shopping experience, while saving on shipping costs since you don’t have to buy special wrapping, shipping labels, or spend any additional money.
In-store pickup is the easiest option to set up that works almost for every type of business, and it’s especially useful if:
- You don’t know where to begin and have no experience with online orders fulfillment.
- You’re not ready to spend on shipping costs or calculating logistics.
- You don’t offer local delivery.
- You have a lot of local customers.
In Lightspeed eCom, you can be very specific about your BOPIS settings.
When you’ve connected several Lightspeed Retail POS (X-Series) outlets with your eCom, you can allow people to pick up items from all locations, or from specific ones. What is more, you can restrict customers from choosing a location with insufficient items as a pickup option.
You can turn on the date and time picker for in-store pickup to let people choose a preferred pickup time at checkout. This way, you’ll know when to expect customers and can prepare their orders accordingly. In addition, you can specify your store’s business hours to suit your schedule. For example, exclude Saturday and Sunday from available pickup days:
If you need time to prepare an order, such as baking a cake, you can set a fulfillment time so customers can only select the next day as the earliest pickup option. You can specify a few hours, a full day, or even offer immediate pickups, depending on your needs.
If you offer a curbside pickup, you can provide short instructions on how to visit your store by car, where to park a vehicle, and so on. Shoppers will see your instructions at checkout.
Learn how to set up in-store pickup →
Local delivery for your Lightspeed eCom
Local delivery helps you provide fast, convenient service to nearby customers. It’s especially useful if:
- You already have a team who delivers your retail orders.
- You sell fresh meals and groceries.
- You run a flower or a gift shop.
- You run a bakery and specialty shop.
- You have a lot of local customers.
In Lightspeed eCom, you can offer local delivery either with your own staff or by using a third-party service.
For each of your connected outlets, you can specify the area of delivery. People living outside the area won’t see the local delivery method at checkout:
When you have several outlets connected to Lightspeed eCom, you can create a local delivery option for each of the outlets. To ensure fast delivery, you can restrict local delivery options associated with outlets with insufficient stock from appearing at checkout.
To build a clear delivery schedule, enable the date and time picker to let people choose a preferred pickup time at checkout. This way, you’ll know when to deliver the next order and can prepare items accordingly.
To avoid overloading delivery people and deliver everything on time, you can specify a few hours or a full day as your fulfillment time. That way, customers can only select the earliest delivery time in the next hour, or next day, and your team has time to deliver orders on time. In addition, you can specify your store’s business hours to suit your schedule. For example, exclude Saturday and Sunday from available delivery days.
Learn how to set up local delivery →
Live rates for shipping across the country and abroad for your Lightspeed eCom
If you deliver across the country or worldwide, you can use shipping post services like UPS or Canada Post and offer live-rates shipping:
Live-rates shipping is a system where shipping costs are calculated in real time based on the rates from shipping carriers and delivery address. When a customer places an order, the system retrieves live shipping rates from a carrier and provides the most accurate price at checkout.
WIth such automated rates, customers get transparent prices with zero additional costs, while you don’t have to calculate shipping fees manually for different types of items.
Using live rates makes sense when:
- You sell unique or niche products that are in high demand across the country or worldwide.
- You offer wholesale distributors and ship large quantities of goods to different locations.
- You want to provide accurate shipping costs to customers.
- You offer subscription boxes and send shipments regularly across various regions.
- You sell heavy or bulky items such as furniture or appliances that require specific shipping logistics.
In Lightspeed eCom, live shipping rates are available for:
You can specify the delivery zone for live rates. For example, offer it only for international shipping, or to shipping outside cities where you have shops.
For multi-outlet stores, you can either limit shipping availability based on actual inventory, or allow shoppers to choose any shipping method as long as at least one outlet connected to eCom has items in stock.
Learn how to set up live rates shipping →
What other shipping options to offer in Lightspeed eCom
In Lightspeed eCom, you can set up various shipping methods depending on what types of items you sell, your customers geography, and your operational capabilities.
These guides will help you wrap your head around shipping and choose right shipping methods: