Crowdfunding is certainly not an easy or simple task. You have to work on from designing the product to manufacturing it and, of course, raising the funds needed to have your product get started. But once all these steps are completed, you are faced with the final task: shipping the products to your customers and backers. This is where fulfillment services enter.
What is Fulfillment?
Before that, let us talk about what fulfillment really means in e-commerce.
Basically, fulfillment are services that essentially covers everything you need to ship your products to your customers – from warehousing to shipping and, finally, last-mile delivery. Fulfillment services also covers the in-between of these processes such as customs clearance, real-time tracking and even integration of the fulfillment services to major e-commerce platforms.
Needless to say, each of these processes is not simple. Therefore, working with a fulfillment center will be of great help to your business!
How Can Fulfillment Services Help Crowdfunding Campaigns?
Now, you have a basic understanding of what fulfillment is. By this point, it’s quite easier now to see how fulfillment can play a role in crowdfunding campaigns.
While crowdfunding campaign’s model is different from regular e-commerce model, fulfillment services can still play a role in crowdfunding campaigns by helping the campaign ship its products to its customers and backers.
In crowdfunding campaigns, this is basically how fulfillment works: once you have designed your product and raised enough funds to produce your products and create an inventory for them, you can ship your product to your fulfillment center. From there, your fulfillment center will take care of the shipping – from customs clearance and real-time tracking to last-mile delivery and even product returns if the situation calls for it. Now, let us break that one by one.
1) Warehousing
The first thing you must before you ship your products is to have a warehouse to temporarily keep them. This is why warehousing is an essential basic part of a fulfillment service.
Once you delivered your products to your fulfillment center, they will take care of them – from regular sanitation to proper inspection – until orders have been received. Once the orders were received, they will dispatch your products to the shipping lines.
Now, while warehousing seemed to be a basic process, it is still crucial: mistakes such as dispatching your product to the wrong shipping line or even a lack of care for the products in the warehouse would hurt your business. Therefore, make sure that you are working with a fulfillment center that has proper work ethic when it comes to warehousing and, of course, for the overall service.
2) Documentation
Documentation is the part where many e-commerce entrepreneurs have a hard time dealing with – and with very understandable reasons. The need of processing different paperworks is in itself already confusing. Then, there’s the different charges and fees that you need to settle down so that you can ship your products to another country.
A good fulfillment center will not only help you process the necessary documents, but they will also help you lessen your charges and fees whenever and wherever it is possible.
3) Shipping options
Fulfillment centers are usually partnered with different shipping lines. Hence, you’ll have some options on which lines to ship your product with. Keep in mind that different shipping lines and couriers have their specific features, so be sure to choose the shipping line and courier that will work best for your crowdfunding campaign.
4) Tracking
Of course, shipping will not go without tracking. Needless to say, it is very important that you track your packages in real-time. A good fulfillment center will allow you to track your products right from the warehouse (so you can see how your products are doing while they are stored) all the way down to last-mile delivery.
5) Integration
Finally, a good fulfillment center understands that many of their customers work with major platforms. For instance, in e-commerce, many entrepreneurs work with platforms such as Shopify and WooCommerce. But how about for crowdfunding campaigns?
Mostly, fulfillment centers that offer crowdfunding fulfillment would integrate with platforms such as Kickstarter and Indiegogo because most of their customers are simply using them. And if you’re wondering, Fulfillmen does integrate with Kickstarter and Indiegogo!
Let Fulfillmen Help You With Your Crowdfunding Campaign!
Here at Fulfillmen, we are dedicated to help our customers grow their businesses – be it a regular e-commerce business or a crowdfunding campaign.
If you have any questions regarding crowdfunding fulfillment, we would love to hear your questions and inquiries. To do so, you may contact us by clicking here
+86 752-2313067
