If your company relies on shipping to turn a profit, then a major part of your business is the packaging you use to get your orders out. Nonetheless, like many companies in the same boat, there’s probably a good chance you’re not taking your packaging seriously enough. Below are some easy tips you can use to get more from your packaging than you’re currently seeing right now.
Know the Law
First of all, before you go investing time or money into redesigning your company’s packaging, be sure you understand any legislation involved. If you’ve used a third party to handle your packaging up until this point, you may be surprised by the laws out there regarding how you ship your products. Plus, if you’re sending items out of the country, you’ll need to be mindful of the laws that exist in the countries they’re going to.
Understand Your Customer
Many consumers may not expect a lot from their packaging. They just want the item they ordered to show up on time and in one piece. If that’s the case, you don’t have much to think about here.
But this might not apply to your customers. Maybe they appreciate a back panel that tells them about what they’ll find inside. Perhaps, they’d like packaging that comes with little handles. Depending on the industry you’re in, they may appreciate discreet packaging that doesn’t let on what’s inside.
Keep It Uniform
Except for that last situation, your packaging should fall in line with the rest of your brand’s identity. Colors, logos, wording, etc. should all match with whatever you use with the rest of your company’s marketing and appearance.
You can also think of your packaging as marketing to some degree. Although a lot of people may not necessarily see it on its way to your customer, anyone who does should know instantly what company is behind the product inside. This instant brand recognition could help influence more customers to visit and/or purchase from your store.
Keep It Simple
At the same time, appreciate that your packaging falls squarely into the world of utility. More likely than not, your customer will remove their purchase from it, toss it away and that will be the end of it. So invest just enough in it that you know your customers will be happy and then call it a day.
Know Your Products
This might sound like silly advice, but it’s essential to your company’s success as far as packaging is concerned. Obviously, if your products aren’t reaching customers in one piece, they will not be happy. So all of the above advice isn’t worth a lot if you can’t produce packaging that will safeguard your product during its journey. This always needs to be a priority.
However, think about your whole product line too. Ideally, you want to be using as little material as possible in creating any package, but that also goes for your whole line of packaging. Try to create packaging that can be used for different sized items, perhaps by filling any leftover space with packing peanuts. The fewer package designs you need to produce, the less you’ll have to spend.
Combine Packaging with Back Office Software
Finally, to get the MOST® out of your packaging, be sure to use back office software. Using it with the last piece of advice, for example, will make it easy to pick the packaging to use for any combination of items. There are countless other ways this type of software will help you save time and money on your shipping though.
Although it may not take center stage for your company, don’t forget how important packaging is to your bottom line. The above tips will help you get more from this essential component.
Source:
https://packagingsense.com/?p=380
