In that spirit, as you look to pivot to home delivery or expand the products you offer or your delivery radius, there is no better time to evaluate your level of service, how you can differentiate yourself from any competitors, and become more efficient. Here are four ways — all areas that Delivery Biz Pro specializes in — to help you do just that. 

1. Know Your Customers

Most businesses keep track of customer information, but how many of them use it to know and understand them? In order to provide the best experience and maintain customer loyalty, you have to find a system that will allow you to track as many details as possible and let you review and evaluate that information in order to get a better understanding of their wants and needs. 

Tracking things like subscription startup dates, order history, and special requests allow you to create a profile for each customer so you can create personalized offers and up-sell suggestions. From a business perspective, enhanced order tracking also gives you the information you need to better forecast inventory and identify potential growth opportunities for new items or product categories. 

2. Communicate Before, During, And After Delivery 

We’re in the age where people have multiple methods for communicating right at their fingertips. They have a phone, access to email and social media, instant messaging, and more. All of this means they are receiving a constant stream of communication throughout the day. People have come to expect that there will be ongoing interactions with the places they do business with — from the time they place their order, through delivery, and follow-up. 

If you aren’t in touch with your customers at every stage of their buying journey, then you’re missing out. Frequent communication builds a relationship, identifies opportunities to improve service, lets your customers know that their business is important to you, and provides opportunities to increase sales.   

3. Nurture the Relationship

The most successful businesses are the ones who have nurtured relationships and created a following to establish the brand loyalty that insulates them from the ups and downs, which has been crucial as we endure a recession. Nurturing the relationship means communicating with your customers consistently with information relevant to them and their buying habits. With Delivery Biz Pro, you can send alerts and reminders easily, welcome emails, or even notifications to customers who haven’t ordered recently. Whether you’re reminding them that it might be time to place their weekly order for produce or you’re rewarding them with a coupon for referring your business to a friend, it’s more important than ever before to build a connection with your customers. 

Keep in mind that you should also provide convenient ways for your customers to communicate with you as well, with a very clear contact email, phone number, and feedback form on your website. Good communication is a two-way street.

4. Provide Excellent Service

You can do all of the right things to get to know your customers and build their trust, but in the end, it’s all about delivering on your promise. Businesses that falter even one time by showing up late or forgetting to include an item that was ordered can easily be replaced by a competitor. That’s why it’s crucial to make sure you’re doing everything you can to meet and even exceed the high expectations that have been put upon you.

With an all-in-one eCommerce and delivery software like Delivery Biz Pro, you can enhance the buying experience with the use of our customer management tools that allow orders to be placed, tracked, and edited easily while maintaining communication between you, the customer, and the driver. Not only will you be able to ensure accurate orders every time, but you’ll also be able to achieve another key component of excellent service — on-time delivery. Our smart route management features tell your drivers what needs to be dropped off and gives them turn by turn directions to help them get to their destination. Have a last-minute change? Drivers can modify orders on the road or reposition stops to account for unexpected changes such as a canceled order or a new priority.    

Get All the Tools You Need To Grow With Delivery Biz Pro

If you’re looking for the right subscription management software to help your business build customer relationships, streamline operations, and come out on top, Delivery Biz Pro is here to help. To learn more about the features, contact a member of our team today to schedule a free demonstration.

Photo: Gustavo Fring via Pexels

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How It Happened

The post Despite a Pandemic, Arizona Dairy Farm Launches Home Delivery and Adds 4,000 Subscribers appeared first on Delivery Biz Pro - The Premier Home Delivery Software for Your Business Needs.

The way to enhance customer service is to evaluate the things that are most important to your customers. So, what are the key elements of providing excellent service when you’re in the subscription delivery business? Here are just a few.

 On-Time Delivery

When you promise to deliver something at a specific time or on a particular date, your customer trusts that it will be there. Avoid late deliveries whenever possible, but delivering early may not be seen as a good thing either. If your customer isn’t home, isn’t available, or just isn’t ready to receive their goods, arriving early may be perceived as a negative for your business.

Accurate Orders

Although order accuracy is clearly one of the top things you’ll be evaluated on, it can be difficult to achieve with an increasing demand for more choices, more variety, and special order requests. That’s where delivery software can help. Using technology can help make sure that you’re delivering 100% of your orders, 100% of the time. Do this, and you’ll see customer loyalty increase.

Product Meets Food Safety Requirements

When you’re in the business of delivering perishable products, you have to make sure that you’re able to deliver them quickly while keeping them at the proper temperature. Raw meat, milk, and refrigerated or frozen meal kits have to stay cold. Hot, cooked meals from a restaurant need to stay hot. If you’re delivering a combination of items, things can get complicated, quickly. It’s vital to have a way to manage everything so you can keep hot and cold foods separate and then be able to marry up all elements of an order once you arrive at the destination.  

Special Requests Are Met

Nowadays, customers have come to expect that they’ll be able to customize their orders. Whether they are making these requests to meet dietary restrictions or to just suit their preferences, managing these exceptions can be difficult. However, it’s something that subscription delivery businesses should strive to do. Being able to meet the desires of your customers is the easiest way to gain long-term loyalty.

Product Is Properly Packed 

Product packaging is incredibly important for ensuring a successful delivery. Not only do you need to make sure that your products are being held at the proper temperatures, but when you’re dealing with liquid products like soups, sauces, and beverages, for example, you have to take into account the challenges of keeping these items contained. 

You can do this by buying the right kind of packaging that will hold your goods securely. Or, you may want to perform some test runs to see for yourself how everything arrives after traveling down a bumpy road or getting jolted from a quick stop at a traffic light. Better yet, you should also be requesting — and reviewing — your customer feedback. If an order arrives with only half of it in the container because the rest has spilled in the bag, you’re likely to hear about it. 

Manage Exceptions

No one is perfect. Things happen. There will be times where an unforeseen traffic jam will delay a delivery. When those out-of-the-ordinary occurrences happen, the best thing you can do is to manage those exceptions by communicating with your customers as quickly as possible. Most people will understand circumstances that are out of your control — as long as you don’t forget to tell them about it. Showing up three hours late and then explaining that you got caught behind an accident on the highway will likely make your customer think twice before they order from you again. 

Enhance Customer Service and Exceed Expectations with Delivery Biz Pro

If you’re looking for ways to better manage all of the moving parts of a successful subscription delivery business and enhance your customer service, Delivery Biz Pro can help. 

Our comprehensive delivery software has dozens of tools to help you manage orders, track customer information, solicit feedback, and manage exceptions. To learn more about all the ways Delivery Biz Pro can help your business, contact a member of our team today to schedule a free demo. 

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There are many reasons for this, including inaccurate orders and delivery delays. Let’s discuss how you can squash food waste and increase your margins—all with tools included with Delivery Biz Pro’s eCommerce subscription delivery platform.    

Real-Time Inventory Management

The stock of one of your products can change quickly and frequently, depending on the season, weather, economic conditions, a promotion and more. Trying to manage all of these variables is next to impossible without a robust software solution to help you see what’s going on. 

Delivery Biz Pro can help you track inventory in real-time, so you aren’t caught off guard if an unexpected boost in sales depletes your stock. It can also be used to create purchase orders, or you can give your suppliers the power to manage their own inventory and create purchase orders — taking one more task off of your plate. 

Ultimate Order Accuracy

If a customer makes an order but it’s not fulfilled properly or if there’s a communication breakdown somewhere between the customer and the supplier, it can lead to an inaccurate order and wasted food. Failing to send written confirmation of the order placed, not notifying customers of the estimated time of delivery, and not confirming order address are all things that can contribute to failed deliveries. Here’s how to keep customers updated, accurately: 

Order Change Alerts

Consumers who are ordering their food online want to be able to experience the same kind of flexibility they have when ordering in person. Therefore, you need to be prepared and ready to make last-minute changes. Even if your kitchen can make the requested modification, don’t forget to alert your driver. With our convenient mobile app, you can send driver text messages, modify delivery routes, and even schedule a new pickup location with the click of a button. 

Automatic Order Confirmations

Communicate with your customers automatically during the entire order process and send them an estimated time of arrival. Sometimes customers make mistakes when placing a food order, but now both you and your customer will be on the same page when you use our software to send instant notices of order confirmation. 

Delivery Reminder Emails

Go one step beyond just sending an order confirmation and send delivery reminders to individual customers. This will reconfirm the items they will be receiving and the time or day they can expect their delivery to arrive. When it comes to successful deliveries, communication is key and Delivery Biz Pro has multiple tools to help you do just that. 

Product Management

Sometimes you can deliver the requested items but the way in which the products are received can result in a poor customer experience. For instance, packing hot and cold items together can make for an unpleasant meal. With Delivery Biz Pro, our software allows you to designate certain items to be packed separately from others so salads stay crisp and soups stay hot. 

Improve Delivery Times

When you’re in the business of delivering perishable products, time is of the essence. Whether you’re trying to get chilled meal kits or hot dinners to their destination quickly, improving delivery times is a common KPI for many delivery businesses. One of the easiest ways to do this is to focus on route optimization and enhance communication with your drivers. 

Delivery Biz Pro gives you a simple, organized way to show what needs to be dropped off, to whom, and at what location. Drivers are given the most efficient route for their deliveries including maps with turn by turn directions. Need to override the system to make a priority delivery? No problem — simply use the manual feature to rearrange stops. 

Improve Margin and Grow Your Business With Delivery Biz Pro

Food waste can eat away at a restaurant’s profit margin, and for those in the business of food delivery, it’s no different. Don’t let inaccurate orders, late deliveries, and miscommunication contribute to food waste and a negative margin — enlist the help of customer-focused eCommerce delivery software. Delivery Biz Pro accomplishes all of this, plus so much more. Give us a call or fill out our online form to request your free demo today. 

Photo by Maarten van den Heuvel from Pexels

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Provide Personalized Service

Whether your business is booming or you’re trying to find new ways to grow or outpace the competition, more customers than ever have high expectations for personalized and customizable service. This means you should be communicating with your customers regularly in a way that is relevant to them. Delivery Biz Pro allows you to automatically send custom order confirmations, delivery reminders, and invoices. It can also help you reach out to customers that you haven’t heard from in a while and entice them with announcements about new product offerings or coupons.   

Shoppers have not only come to expect frequent communication from the places they do business with, but they also want to be able to customize orders and make last-minute changes. This can create additional complexity for a CSA if they don’t have an effective way to manage it all. Fortunately, our CSA software makes it easy to keep track of every last detail so you can deliver on customer expectations without skipping a beat.     

Create Additional Sales Opportunities

One of the easiest ways to grow your business is to increase your average basket size. One way to do that is by cross-selling items related to the ones your shoppers are already looking for. With DBP, you can set up cross-selling opportunities based on your customers’ previous order history — and even offer them at a promotional discount, if you wish. 

Software Made Specifically For CSAs

One of the biggest reasons to choose Delivery Biz Pro is because it was designed to meet the unique needs and challenges of the produce delivery business. Because the goods you are selling are seasonal, we’ve designed our software with features that support that seasonality. For instance, you can set date ranges for product availability and items will only show on your website during those dates specified. You can also set up pre-orders so you can gather real data on how much you’ll need when it comes time for delivery. 

Speed Up Delivery Time

One challenge of growing a CSA business that delivers is trying to figure out how to optimize logistics.  Timeliness is particularly important when it comes to perishable products, and of course, an increase in efficiency leads to an increase in profit. With Delivery Biz Pro, your drivers will not only have the most efficient route at their fingertips, but with our mobile app, you can also quickly communicate order changes, take payments, text customers, and more. 

Market, Manage, and Communicate With One User-Friendly Platform

Managing a business is challenging enough without having to worry about multiple costly software programs to help keep track of it all. Delivery Biz Pro has all the tools you need so you can see and do everything in one place. Need a professionally designed website? No problem. Need help with CRM so you can track orders, send emails to your customers, and manage account changes? Delivery Biz Pro does that too. In fact, DBP offers solutions to help you manage and excel at just about every step in the process, including:

• Customer management
• Order management
• Route optimization
• Communication with customers
• Reporting and data management 
• Communication with your drivers
• And more

With Delivery Biz Pro, you’ll get everything you need — whether you’re a small farm with just a dozen customers or a large produce delivery business with hundreds of customers, our software is built to help your business grow. Contact a member of our team to schedule a free demo today.

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To fill the gap, restaurants dealing with dine-in restrictions have discovered how to reach customers in a new way by meeting the needs of bored families stuck at home. From fast food to gourmet, from fully-prepared to portioned ingredients, meal kits can give your customers a welcome break from the usual and offer them something to look forward to at dinner time. 

Three Different Approaches To Meal Kits

There are almost as many types of meal kits as there are restaurants offering them, but most of them have one thing in common — portioned and packaged ingredients or whole meals made in advance and ready for delivery or for the customer to pick up. How a restaurant chooses to execute their meal kit service, however, can vary widely.

Meal Bundles

Many restaurants are looking at meal kits as more of a family pack or bundle intended to feed a group (usually targeted toward a family of four). They usually consist of an entree choice as well as sides and even beverages to make a complete meal. Many QSRs will simply cook and assemble your meal kit at the time of order, while others offer pre-cooked and chilled or frozen meals that are ready for reheating upon reaching their final destination. In both scenarios, this type of meal kit is intended for the customer who still wants to enjoy the foods they love at home, with minimal preparation. You can read more about restaurants that are offering these types of bundles in this article.       

“Cook Your Own” Meal Kits

   Other restaurants are betting that customers who are spending the majority of their time at home may enjoy a dining experience where they have a hand in the cooking process. Meal kits that include pre-portioned ingredients and a step-by-step recipe allow cooking enthusiasts and amateur chefs a fun and interactive way to learn how to make meals from their favorite restaurants.

“Assemble Your Own” Meal Kits

Somewhat of a hybrid between a meal kit that offers fully prepared food and one that has you doing most of the work yourself, assembly kits are proving to be some of the most popular. In this article from Nation’s Restaurant News, check out how some restaurants are preparing build-your-own meal kits for everything from tacos and burgers to pizzas and ice cream sundaes. This approach seems to hit all the marks for simplicity, customizability, and entertainment. 

Find Your Own Success With Meal Kits

Restaurants are expanding and finding new ways to reach their customers. If you’re considering adding meal kits to your list of current offerings, there are a few things to consider that will help ensure your success. 

First, consider the type of meal kit you want to offer — whether it be a type of family meal bundle, a cook your own kit, or an entirely different kind of hybrid. 

Second, consider the types of food you’ll be offering in your meal kit. For a DIY kit that the customer will have to cook themselves, you’ll want to keep cooking techniques fairly simple and the number of steps involved to a minimum in order to appeal to a wide range of cooking abilities. For hot meal bundles, whether your customer is picking up their order or you’re delivering it to them, keep in mind that some foods travel better than others. Items like baked fish, steaks, and ice cream can prove to be quite a challenge. 

Finally, if you’re offering home delivery for your meal kits, you’ll want to focus on the delivery experience as well as the quality of the meal being delivered. Customers expect their orders to be delivered correctly, on time, and at the right temperature, at the very minimum. However, you can excel in the meal kit delivery category by going a step further and personalizing communications, sending email and text alerts, and offering your customers a user- and mobile-friendly interface to place their orders. It’s easy to do all of this and more, with delivery software from Delivery Biz Pro. 

Are you interested in learning how we can help you find success with take-home meal kits? Contact a member of our team to find out more.

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If your business is struggling to meet high customer expectations, Delivery Biz Pro is here to help. In today’s post, we’re going to discuss some of the features and tools that can be found in our delivery management software. It can help you keep track of all of the details so you can do more and offer more to your customers. Here are just a few of the things that Delivery Biz Pro can do for you.

Send Personalized, Automated Emails

Using a system to send emails automatically isn’t anything new, but there are still some small companies that are still doing it the hard way. Even if you have email automation, are you making an effort to send out highly personalized emails, or are you just sending a one-size-fits-all note? 

Just because you’re using an automated system to send out emails, that doesn’t mean it has to look as if you are. Emails should be sent at specific times that are relevant to the customer — after signing up for emails, after making a purchase, after receiving their order, and so forth. Ideally, each email should also contain unique information that is specific to that customer including their name, order details, reminders about upcoming deliveries, and suggestions for future orders based on past buying preferences. This level of personalization can be difficult to achieve — unless you have the right tools to help you do it. 

Control Customer Accounts With Ease

Expanding your customer base while allowing for more customization means a significant increase in complexity. This requires a system that is robust enough to help you handle all of the moving parts. With Delivery Biz Pro, you can easily track orders, see past account activity, and make changes to profile data. Customers that want to pause their service while on vacation may do so, and you can manage it with ease by setting up a hold during the specified date range. Need to alert a driver about a specific customer request? It’s no problem — simply make a note in their account and the message will be relayed.  

Track Customer Notes and Conversations

Customer communication can happen in many ways — emails, text messages, phone conversations, and so forth. Every conversation and every interaction can offer useful information and an opportunity to improve the customer experience. Delivery Biz Pro can help you track all of your customer communications in one convenient location. With our delivery management software, you can set reminders, establish recurring notes, and even track all of your phone conversations. Never miss out on another opportunity because you forgot to follow-up. 

Send Automatic Order Reminders

Increase the frequency of repeat orders by sending automatic alerts to customers who have purchased before. Delivery Biz Pro makes it easy to track customer orders and then use that data to set up automatic messages reminding them that it might be time to order again. Your customers will appreciate having one less thing to remember and you’ll appreciate more order consistency. 

Offer Order Suggestions

Amazon is the master at increasing sales through product recommendations and now you can do the same with Delivery Biz Pro. When customers enter the shopping section of your website, they can see the full list of product offerings as well as suggestions for products they may like based on their browsing history. It’s like having their own personal shopping assistant, every time they visit the website.

Do It All With Delivery Biz Pro

Managing a subscription delivery business offers many challenges, but the experts at Delivery Biz Pro are here to provide solutions that can help you optimize your business, improve the customer experience, and just do more. Are you interested in learning about all of the ways Delivery Biz Pro can help? Contact a member of our team today.

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Challenges of Last-Mile Logistics

Last-mile delivery can be quite a challenge. Managing dozens of incoming orders, planning the resources you’ll need to get those orders to their destinations quickly — especially in the case of hot or cold food — and optimizing routes so you don’t spend all of your profits on fuel are just some of the difficulties faced when it comes to last-mile logistics. Fortunately, two of these challenges are minimized by offering delivery services in large cities where several stops can be made in just a few miles. But how do you expand beyond the big city and into less populated areas? 

Food Delivery in Rural Illinois

Here’s how one business owner found success with subscription delivery in the country. There may have been less demand for home delivery in small towns pre-COVID, but now social distancing rules and home quarantines have changed all of that. That’s why the owner of a sub shop in rural Illinois decided to take delivery into his own hands. Knowing that it wouldn’t be economically feasible to hire dedicated delivery drivers just for his shop, Andrew Carlson of Scoops Famous Subs in Oregon, Illinois recruited help from other fellow restaurant owners. Together, they were able to use one team of drivers to deliver food from multiple restaurants and spread the cost between them. This approach made delivery feasible and helped to boost sales during an otherwise difficult time. You can read the full story here.  

Small Town, Big Opportunity

According to an article posted on QSRWeb, food delivery is really starting to take hold in smaller communities. It’s a great option for people who want their local favorites but are unable to (or don’t wish to) drive in to get them. If you run a local business and are considering adding delivery to your list of offerings, the article mentions a few tips you may want to consider.

• Increase awareness of delivery through in-store marketing
• Determine if there is a local delivery team already in place that you could partner with
• Investigate opportunities to market delivery through cross-promotional events

Keep in mind that success in the delivery business requires careful management of costs. You can easily spend more money to deliver your products than what you’re making in profit if you don’t monitor carefully how much you are spending on delivery. That’s where delivery management software from Delivery Biz Pro can help. We make it easy to monitor and track data so you can optimize your business and run more efficiently.

Route Optimization

One way to reduce delivery cost is through route optimization. Our software allows your drivers to find the most efficient route for their deliveries. This is particularly important for small-town delivery businesses where more of their costs are linked to the farther distances their drivers have to go. One wrong turn can mean several added miles (fuel cost) and time wasted (labor cost). Plus, when you’re dealing with perishable food, it’s even more critical to ensure you’re getting there as quickly as possible.

Customer Communication Tools

Being able to deliver to your customers quickly and efficiently is only one part of a successful delivery business. You also need to be able to communicate with your customers in real-time to send order confirmations, estimated delivery times, and more. The communication tools included with our delivery management software make it easy to track all of your customer information in one place and set up automated emails and texts for easy messaging. Even if you’re a small business, customers still have certain expectations, and the right software can help you meet them. 

Data Management

Delivery Biz Pro has all of the features you need to run a successful delivery business — including data management tools. We’ve designed our software to be easy to use, yet robust enough to grow with you. With it, you’ll have access to reports that will give you valuable insight into all areas of your business — orders, inventory, finances, customer feedback, and so much more. 

Conquer Last-Mile Logistics With Delivery Software From Delivery Biz Pro

Are you looking to venture into delivery, or expand your current delivery options? Our platform provides seamless integration and communication between your frontend marketplace and the backend day-to-day operation with tools that give you the ultimate view into real-time data. Find out how Delivery Biz Pro can help your business by scheduling a free demo today.

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Having an eCommerce store is the first step for most companies, but relying on a website alone and is not enough. If you’re ready to take your business to new heights, every delivery business should be taking full advantage of the opportunities provided by an eCommerce store by connecting it to customizable delivery management software like that from Delivery Biz Pro. Keep reading to learn more.

Increase Repeat Orders

One big advantage of having an eCommerce store is being able to track what your customers buy. This not only helps with inventory management, but also powers your marketing to current customers. Take order tracking a step further by analyzing customer buying habits and then offering suggestions based on those habits. For instance, when you connect Delivery Biz Pro to your eCommerce site, you can determine what products your customers buy and when they buy them and then use that information to send an alert reminding them that it’s time to buy.

A Store Set Up For Subscriptions 

We have been building eCommerce websites specifically for delivery businesses since 2007. As you may know, recurring home delivery businesses won’t work well with just any website store builder. If you went that route, with a generic website store builder, you’d have to integrate it with other new software and stitch these solutions together. In contrast, we provide you with one integrated, out-of-the-box solution for subscription delivery, eliminating any work or cost of patching separate solutions together, and informed by 13 years of experience creating customized subscription delivery eCommerce stores. 

Track Sales, Returns, and Deposits In Real-Time

With only a standalone eCommerce store, you may be able get detailed information related to sales and returns, but it takes time to process. A return can take days to show up in the system and this lag time can create big problems when you’re trying to manage inventory. But with a store synced with delivery software, your sales, returns, and bottle deposits are updated in real-time as your drivers make changes on the road. Our software can be accessed through a mobile app that allows your delivery drivers to manage transactions with the click of a button. Now if a driver has to correct an invoice, the change will be reflected online, immediately. 

 How To Make It Happen

We understand that setting up and running an online store is a big step for many small businesses, but it’s the only way to reach a bigger audience. If you really want your business to reach its full potential, pair it with the delivery software from Delivery Biz Pro. Getting started is easy. We’ll provide the support you need to integrate it with your current business processes and payments system so you can be up and running in no time. You’ll be able to create sales reports, inventory reports, and customer-specific reports that give you the data you need to analyze your business and make informed decisions.  

If you’re looking for tools that can help you grow your subscription delivery business, contact a member of our team. 

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