E–Commerce Logistics & Fulfillment: Delivering the Goods

Description

Backcover Copy

The first e–commerce book that tells you how to get product orders from the Buy button to the doorstep–quickly, cost effectively, and hassle free!

The first complete e–commerce guide to e–logistics and fulfillment!

Almost 40% of the cost of selling online takes place after the customer presses the Buy button. At that moment–when the visitor becomes a customer–the most crucial part of the relationship begins. Payment processing, order fulfillment, product delivery, and product returns handling are the largest gaps in electronic commerce today. These essential but unglamorous, messy, and often expensive functions are not optional in true e–business. They can make or break your customer relationships, profitability, and future business.

Identifying and managing these functions, termed e–commerce logistics and e–fulfillment, are the subjects of this book.

Inside, find helpful advice on how to:

• Assure your customers receive the products that they order from your Internet site in a timely, efficient, traceable way
• Set up a rock–solid e–commerce infrastructure and calculate the return on investment
• Evaluate shippers and online shipping tools
• Tackle payment processing, online fraud, and U.S. and global taxation issues
• Provide superior customer service
• Evaluate third–party logistics providers and select outsource fulfillment partners
• Handle the inevitable product returns (reverse logistics)

Useful tools such as planning templates, checklists, and spreadsheets are included throughout the book and at www.bayles.com. Whether you‘re an electronic commerce or logistics practitioner or provider, this book will be an extremely useful addition to the "How To" books of your library.

Author Bios

DEBORAH L. BAYLES has been in the software industry since 1979 in marketing and technical management consulting roles for Fortune 500 companies. She is the Founder and CEO of BridgeCommerce.com, Inc., an online and off–line venture designed to assist companies with the essential backend/logistics of e–commerce. She also founded NETouch Communications, Inc., in 1994, a company that builds commerce–enabled extranets.

Bayles also teaches e–commerce courses at the UC–Irvine and the Singapore Institute of Management. Her first book, Extranets: Building the Business–to–Business Web, was published by Prentice Hall PTR in 1998.