Much has been said and will be said about the consequences of an unprecedented situation in the world economy such as that created by Covid19. The coronavirus has arrived to shake the foundations of an economic system that had already been questioned for a few years. Many theories are being developed, especially regarding times of economic recovery, so I would not like to go into this too much, because like all the economic theories that are presented, another one usually comes out that supports the opposite point and I prefer to focus on on how to take advantage of this unusual situation and talk about the opportunities that can be created in a situation like this and especially in terms of technology and logistics or parcels.
The digitalization of business
If these months of confinement of the population have shown anything, it has been the capacity to adapt of a good part of the productive actors of the economy, the importance of technology as a flexibility in business operations and the fundamental role played by logistics and parcel shipping for a good number of branches of economic activity . Let us not forget that couriers and transport companies have experienced unprecedented demand for their services and that many of them have been critical in absorbing part of the unemployment created by other sectors.
In these months in which many sectors have seen how their main sales channel was closed overnight, many have turned their gaze to a new channel: online or digitalized sales as an alternative to the physical service they offered prior to the pandemic. Online sales, according to data provided by Adobe, have grown 55% more in recent months . Although the change has been forced in many cases and surely many will return to their previous activity, there is an undeniable opportunity for many companies to fully or partially digitize their services and explore the online sales route that, in many cases, can become disruptive (how you like this word!) among your most immediate competitors or even within your market.
How to turn this challenge into an opportunity?
If we already have the opportunity detected, the next step is how to convert an exceptional circumstance into an opportunity for our businesses. One of the first steps we have to take is to design a well-structured service , focused on the needs of our clients and easy to use. Another is to define what operational needs we are going to require and what partners can help us, as well as how we are going to integrate them into our internal operations. Another important point is the associated costs and what impact it will have on the human structure we have.
In this case, companies like ours, EnvĂaYa , can help in a fundamental part of the process such as the management of shipments associated with new services, offering advantages in two different and fundamental aspects. On the business side, we offer a “ready-to-use” tool that simplifies shipping-related management. This helps, on the one hand, to alleviate the organizational stress caused by the development of a new service, while at the same time making its integration simpler and more immediate. We also offer a full range of shipping services in the national and international territory that is difficult to achieve through direct agreements with parcel companies , as well as significant cost savings as EnvĂaYa is a company that works in volume. On the other hand, we save on human resources because we offer savings in shipping management time that can avoid having to hire more staff, which in turbulent times like these, can result in a very important advantage.
On the user side, and taking into account the importance of user experience in current product and service development strategies, we offer a technological system that is very easy to use and that offers consumers the freedom to choose how and who It will be the courier that delivers your purchase . We know the importance that immediacy and automated information has and will have in online purchases at this time and that is why we have worked very hard to develop a system that allows us a seamless process for the buyer while offering information transparent and immediate information about the status of your order, as well as multiple secure payment options.
I want to emphasize here, for those companies that see the future as uncertain or for SMEs that have entered the market or are going to do so, that times like these can become great opportunities , as long as we have a medium and long-term vision. and we know how to interpret the possible changes that will come in the behavioral patterns of our target audience. We have already seen how customers can change their purchasing method to e-commerce in the course of a few weeks, so companies must be just as quick in transforming. We at EnvĂaYa , for example, are making a great effort to interpret these signals and continue working to improve and expand the services we offer our clients today and in the future.