Why You Should Include Return Labels with Your Orders

By Rob Zaleski
Oct 21, 2016

Returns are a hot topic in the e-commerce world lately, and for good reason. Consumers are only satisfied with the returns process of an online store 53% of the time, and have growing expectations for what they want to see in a company’s return policy. In addition, 91% of consumers say that a company’s return policy will affect their purchase.

Luckily, through the use of shipping software, sellers of any size can have return policies that rival the major eCommerce players. One of the trendiest, and in my opinion, best ways to boost the return policy for your e-commerce store is to take advantage of scan-based return labels. This allows you to include a return label along with the order you send a customer.

What is a scan-based return label?

A scan-based return label is a shipping label online sellers can include with orders that customers can use to make returns without printing a label or requesting one from the store. The customer simply places the label on the package they received and sends it back.

The benefit of a scan-based return label is that you, the seller, are not charged for the label until it’s in the mail stream. This means you can potentially print hundreds of scan-based return labels and will only get charged for the ones that actually get used.

Positive Customer Experience = Increase in Customer Lifetime Value

There are many ways to improve the customer experience when they shop your online store. Things such as fast and easy checkout, inexpensive or free shipping, quick order processing time, and good communication with customers on the package status are just a few.

According to the UPS Pulse of the Online Shopper report, 34% of consumers want to see a return label right in the box. This could be a great advantage to any online seller to give a first-time customer a great experience, increasing the likelihood of gaining repeat business.

Will including a return label risk increasing returns from customers?

Based on internal data, most of our sellers only deal with returns 1 or fewer times a month. Including a return label with your order is a very low-risk way to increase customer confidence in your online store and help them become a repeat shopper.

Logically you could argue having a return label inside every order could drastically increase returns, however, giving customers more convenient options doesn’t guarantee they will utilize them. Also, giving customers a longer time to return items is correlated with a reduction in returns.

How to start using scan-based return labels

According to internal data of our shippers, very few sellers are currently utilizing scan-based return labels, but anyone selling online today can start using them immediately.

ShippingEasy gives sellers the ability to create scan based return labels and gives instructions on how to automate and optimize the creation of scan-based return labels.

Conclusion

If you’re not utilizing scan-based return labels, I suggest starting to use them as soon as possible. It’s not difficult to start including them with every order, and the benefits are numerous. Schedule a quick chat with one of our shipping specialists to learn more.

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