eCommerce Unscripted: Mastering WooCommerce

We’re talking all about order fulfillment, which we define as everything involved in getting an order to a customer (plus handling returns, too). Host Sam Greenspan is joined by Tabitha Turton, a GoDaddy Product Manager specializing in WooCommerce, and Nik McLaughlin, a GoDaddy Technical Account Manager who helps customers with WooCommerce, to discuss how to improve order fulfillment for WooCommerce stores. 

The panel shares statistics and anecdotes on customers’ expectations for order speeds, order status emails, and major shipping problems. 

From there, they cover several strategies to help with order fulfillment: setting up order status update emails in WooCommerce, how to offer multiple shipping speeds, live versus flat rate shipping, streamlining the picking and shipping process, keeping orders better organized internally, handling stockouts, and integrating a third-party email service provider to send better transactional emails. 

Finally, in the Q&A, the panel addresses whether it makes sense to add WooCommerce to an existing WordPress website or to start clean. 

We also reference the ship blocking the Suez Canal, which was a big thing as we were recording (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-56505413) 

Check out GoDaddy’s Managed WordPress Ecommerce hosting which includes many of the premium extensions discussed in this episode for free! https://www.godaddy.com/hosting/ecommerce-hosting  

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Extensions and services referenced (* - included in the GoDaddy Managed WordPress Ecommerce bundle) 

USPS Shipping Method* - https://woocommerce.com/products/usps-shipping-method/ 

UPS Shipping Method* - https://woocommerce.com/products/ups-shipping-method/ 

FedEx Shipping Method* - https://woocommerce.com/products/fedex-shipping-module/ 

Purolator Shipping Method - https://woocommerce.com/products/purolator-shipping-method/ 

WooCommerce Print Invoices & Packing Lists* - https://woocommerce.com/products/print-invoices-packing-lists/ 

WooCommerce Order Status Manager* - https://woocommerce.com/products/woocommerce-order-status-manager/ 

AutomateWoo* - https://automatewoo.com/  

Metorik - https://metorik.com/  

MailChimp - https://mailchimp.com/  

Klaviyo - https://www.klaviyo.com/  

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Submit questions for future episodes 

https://forms.office.com/r/SFk0b9Xjg5 

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Sources for statistics 

https://www.efulfillmentservice.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/State-of-Ecommerce-Order-Fulfillment-Shipping.pdf 

Only 42% think 3-4 days counts as "fast" delivery 

70% will choose least expensive shipping option 

25% will pay more for same day delivery—but only up to $3 

Average cost to fulfill an order is 70% of the AOV (labor costs, overhead, splits, returns, etc.) 

94% of shoppers have taken an action to qualify for free shipping (e.g., bought more stuff, chose slowest shipping, hunted for promo code) 

https://www.stitchlabs.com/blog/what-is-the-most-frequent-cause-of-inventory-fulfillment-issues/ 

One in four of businesses spending between 6-30% of revenue on fixing fulfillment issues 

Human error by far number one cause of fulfillment issues, at 62% 

https://blog.theshoppad.com/22-order-fulfillment-statistics-for-2020-shopify-stores/ 

Customers look up order tracking page 3.5 times per order 

51% want real-time visibility into order status 

https://econsultancy.com/55-of-shoppers-abandon-carts-due-to-shipping-costs-infographic/ 

Cart abandonment based on delivery estimates: 38% abandon at 8+ days, 24% abandon with no estimated delivery date, 16% abandon at 6-7 days 

https://www.websitemagazine.com/blog/the-impact-of-late-and-inaccurate-deliveries-on-customer-loyalty 

16% will abandon retailer if receive even one incorrect delivery 

14% will abandon retailer if receive even one late delivery 

Majority expect delivery in 3-6 days with free shipping 

More than half of eCommerce transactions are now done on mobile so, clearly, mobile shopping can’t be ignored. Host Sam Greenspan is joined by two WooCommerce experts and GoDaddy Technical Account Managers, Christine Phu and Ryan Frizzell, to discuss mobile readiness and techniques for WooCommerce stores. 

The panel shares statistics and anecdotes on shopping on the phone versus the desktop, mobile shopping’s convenience versus its flaws, and what makes customers hesitate to purchase on their phones. 

From there, they cover several strategies to help with making a site mobile-friendly and convert better on mobile: responsive design, security indicators and improvements, smart use of payment gateways, improving product displays on small screens, streamlining checkout, cross-platform cart regeneration, abandoned cart retargeting ads, and the pros and cons of creating a mobile app. 

Finally, in the Q&A, the panel addresses what to do if you love a WordPress theme but it doesn’t have WooCommerce features built in, and whether it’s better to invest in SEO or advertising. 

Check out GoDaddy’s Managed WordPress Ecommerce hosting which includes many of the premium extensions discussed in this episode for free! https://www.godaddy.com/hosting/ecommerce-hosting  

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Extensions and services referenced (* - included in the GoDaddy Managed WordPress Ecommerce bundle) 

PayPal Checkout - https://woocommerce.com/products/woocommerce-gateway-paypal-checkout/  

Amazon Pay - https://woocommerce.com/products/pay-with-amazon/ 

Apple Pay - https://woocommerce.com/apple-pay/ 

Stripe - https://woocommerce.com/products/stripe/ 

WooCommerce Additional Variation Images* - https://woocommerce.com/products/woocommerce-additional-variation-images/ 

WooCommerce Tab Manager* - https://woocommerce.com/products/woocommerce-tab-manager/ 

Vertical & Accordion Product Detail Tabs - https://woocommerce.com/products/vertical-accordion-product-detail-tabs/ 

Product Slider - https://wordpress.org/plugins/woo-product-slider/ 

Nested Category Layout* - https://woocommerce.com/products/woocommerce-nested-category-layout/ 

WooCommerce Social Login* - https://woocommerce.com/products/woocommerce-social-login/ 

Klaviyo - https://www.klaviyo.com/ 

Mailchimp - https://mailchimp.com/ 

Metorik - https://metorik.com/ 

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Submit questions for future episodes 

https://forms.office.com/r/SFk0b9Xjg5 

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Sources for statistics 

https://www.simicart.com/blog/m-commerce-statistics/ 

Mobile projected to make up 54% of eCommerce sales this year 

67% of shoppers have downloaded a retailer app 

https://www.dynamicyield.com/blog/dynamic-yield-mobile-solution/ 

Only 12% think mobile shopping is the most convenient 

Only 19% think mobile shopping is more convenient than on desktop 

https://www.statista.com/statistics/201680/retail-site-device-visit-order-share-usa/ 

Smartphone website traffic: 71% orders, 56% 

Desktop website traffic: 27%, orders 42% 

https://baymard.com/lists/cart-abandonment-rate 

Desktop cart abandonment rate is ~70% 

https://www.barilliance.com/cart-abandonment-rate-statistics/ 

Mobile cart abandonment rate is ~81% 

https://www.smartinsights.com/ecommerce/ecommerce-analytics/ecommerce-conversion-rates/ 

Why people hesitate to buy on mobile 

Security concerns 20.2% 

Cannot see product detail 19.6%. 

Can't browse multiple screens/compare 19.6% 

Navigation is difficult 19.3% 

Too difficult to input details 18.6% 

https://www.statista.com/statistics/298401/us-retail-app-usage-frequency/ 

Four out of five smartphone shoppers use apps multiple times a week or more frequently 

https://www.usebutton.com/resources/button-2019-mobile-commerce-report-h1-analysis 

Mobile apps convert at a higher rate