eCommerce Fulfillment 

The competitive nature of today’s eCommerce market is such that an online store owner must always be looking for ways to satisfy changing consumer demand and increase brand value. But how do you find the time for creative innovation when there’s so much work to do? Marketing, customer service, order fulfillment, and everything in between… running an eCommerce store is much more than a one-person job. 

Your time is valuable. So one way to allocate some attention for brand differentiation is categorize your work as “core” tasks and “context” tasks—and to outsource the context tasks wherever possible. 

What Are Core and Context Tasks? 

According to organizational theorist and management consultant, Geoffrey Moore, all tasks in any given company can be categorized into “core” tasks and “context” tasks. 

Core tasks involve any work that will increase the value of your company (Moore equates value to stock price, but this might not apply to small businesses). Everything else is considered “context” (or “hygiene”) and should be standardized to the highest level of efficiency. To put it simply, if you want to grow your business and increase brand value, you shouldn’t be investing your attention and resources in tasks that aren’t differentiating your business from your competitors. 

But note that what is “core” for one business might be “context” for another. 

For example, an online retailer selling bespoke, handmade jewelry might consider jewelry-making a core task and shipping orders a “context” task. Meanwhile, shipping packages would be considered a “core” task for a mail carrier like Canada Post. 

The prioritization of core vs context tasks may differ for each business, but the key point is that the best, most high-performing companies (often in technology-driven industries) use a “context-outsourcing” strategy so they can focus on core tasks that will bring value to their business. 

Ecommerce Fulfillment is “Context” in Today’s Market 

In today’s technology-driven eCommerce landscape, every online store should view ecommerce fulfillment as a “context” task that contributes to good business hygiene. Ecommerce fulfillment involves everything from order receiving, picking, packing, shipping, and returns processing, and can be a logistics headache for growing businesses. 

To make matters more complicated, eCommerce giants like Amazon have upped the standards that consumers now have for fulfillment-related services. Once seen as special perks, fulfilment offerings like free shipping and easy returns processing have now become the baseline standard and will not differentiate your business. But finding ways to incorporate these offerings can be costly for small businesses. 

Benefits of Outsourcing eCommerce Fulfillment 

Core tasks that once required human resources (like credit card purchase processing, customer support, etc.) are now relegated to automated software, making the work infinitely less time- and resource-consuming. Outsourcing ecommerce fulfillment follows the same idea. 

Here are 4 additional benefits of outsourcing ecommerce fulfillment: 

1. Reduce operating costs 

Managing ecommerce fulfilment in-house means you have to rent extra storage and office space, especially as your business grows. Outsourcing fulfillment tasks would help you not only eliminate the hefty cost of rent, but it would also lower labour and shipping costs. 

2. Avoid the logistics headache 

From managing inventory, shipping, returns processing, and more, managing ecommerce fulfillment is a full-time job. that would distract from the core task of running and growing your business. outsourcing these tasks would remove the burden and free you to 

3. Improve the customer’s experience 

Customers expect efficient delivery and fulfillment-related services, especially from online grocery and health and beauty retailers. If you partner with a customer-oriented fulfillment partner like Transaction Heroes, we can help you delight your customers with excellent customer service and timely deliveries, ensuring a positive shopping experience from the moment they place an order with you to the moment their package arrives at their door. 

4. Scale your business 



Some ecommerce fulfillment centers have warehouses across the country. Storing your products in these warehouses can bring your business closer to customers in different demographics and ensure timely deliveries. At Transaction Heroes, we can help our clients with Canada to US and US to Canada shipping, thanks to our warehouse in Vancouver and referrals in referral network in the US. 

Managing order fulfillment in-house would eat up too much valuable time, talent, and attention that could otherwise be directed at growing your business and differentiating your brand. Outsource this task to fulfillment companies like Transaction Heroes. Helping online store owners manage ecommerce fulfillment is our core task. Let us help you reduce costs, delight your customers, and save you the logistics headache. 

Need help with online order fulfillment? Our Heroes have you covered. Contact us here.