Different Types of Warehouses and How to Choose the one for your Business
Imagine you’ve finally found the product you’ve been looking for at an online store. You place the order and find out the item is out of stock. This disappointing experience will make you less likely to visit that store again.
For any e-commerce business, every sale is crucial, and you don’t want to miss out on potential customers with a disorganized inventory. Think of your inventory as the backbone of your online store; without it, you won’t be able to maintain your business.
To avoid these hiccups, you must devise a foolproof inventory management strategy. Not sure where to begin? Read along to find helpful tips and tricks for mastering inventory management.
What Is Inventory Management?
Once you’ve set up your online store, you need to tackle inventory management. Having the right stock isn’t enough; you must implement specific strategies to meet customer demand.
E-commerce inventory management is crucial because it helps you track stock levels and the movement of products. Think of it as a vital building block upon which you will build and grow your business.
A solid inventory management strategy will help you maintain stock control, improve customer relations, and boost profits. You’ll have a streamlined supply chain with all your inventory in order. Without it, you risk shortages, disorganization, wastage, and so on.
Inventory management will also give you an edge over other ecommerce businesses. 43% of small businesses in the US don’t track their inventory, which means many stores aren’t taking advantage of inventory management resources.
Once you start with stock management software, you can build a solid foundation for your company’s growth. Modern inventory management tools offer integration with other tools such as POS (point of sale), shipping and online store management. With these functions, you can create an e-commerce store unique to your business needs.
What Are Inventory Management Techniques?: 5 ways to get started
There is no shortage of inventory management techniques, all with varying levels of success and disadvantages.
We’ve compiled a list of some of the best inventory management techniques to help you stay on track. These tips are quite easy to implement, and if you have an existing warehouse, you can get started in no time. Let’s dive in.
5 Ways To Build Your Inventory Management Plan
Now that you’re familiar with the 5 inventory management strategies, here are some best practices for mastering them.
Creating a stock management plan will help you organize your tasks and ensure the process moves smoothly. Here are some basics to help you get started.
1. Check Stock Trends
Before you start building a strategy, you need the right information. After all, you won’t know what strategy to use if you don’t know your stock levels and how much you sell.
Take a look at your stock trends to see which items have more demand and which are slow-moving. Check historical sales data and consumer trend reports to design a stock control strategy.
When you identify these products, you will also have information on the quantity to keep on hand. While this isn’t a foolproof tip, as numbers fluctuate over the years, you can make an educated guess as to how much product to keep.
Always give yourself space for demand to go up or down, and you’ll have mastered this strategy. You can create a forecast manually, but this can be time-consuming. Investing in a high-quality warehouse management system will give you all the necessary details for efficient stock control.
2. Decide Where To Store Your Inventory
Choosing the right location for your inventory is crucial. With the perfect location, you will have enough space to stock as many or as few of your products as you like.
Larger businesses will prefer having multiple warehouses to store their product, while small companies might choose a different location. Deciding the location is crucial because it affects the inventory management strategy you use.
For businesses struggling to find the right space, consider investing in a 3PL. Third-party logistics companies not only hold your stock but also help fulfill orders. This way, you can focus on other business activities, such as sales, marketing, building customer relationships and more.
3. Invest in an Inventory Management Software
You can take your stock management strategies to the next level by investing in intelligent inventory management software. This highly innovative tool is fundamental for any business looking to streamline its supply chain.
With inventory management software, you can access key insights that make forecasting customer demand easy.
For larger businesses, many sophisticated WMSs handle multi-warehouse inventory and shipping. If you’re looking to get started with one, consider Canary7.
Canary7 offers a fully responsive and robust warehouse management system that helps you take your business to the next level.
Our WMS provides accurate and comprehensive inventory data so you can make the right decisions for your stock. Despite these innovative features, we’ve designed our software to be as user-friendly and intuitive as possible, making it the ideal solution for any growing business.
4. Organize Your Inventory
This might seem like a simple tip, but if used effectively, it can help you in the long run. Unorganized products often lead to inventory management mishaps. Mislabelled products and items without proper identification can lead to expensive mishaps.
Consider using barcodes—an economical but highly effective way of organizing your stock. All you need to do is scan the code and get all the necessary information for your item. Do this process anytime you move, ship, or receive products.
With barcodes, you can avoid mistyped SKU numbers, human errors and bogus inventory. Additionally, you improve packing slips to reduce shipping errors. Try color-coding your packing slips according to the product category. This method allows you to visually distinguish between items and makes organization easier.
5. Set Clear Reorder Points
Setting accurate reorder points is a great way to make sure you never run out of stock and risk losing a customer. If you don’t set up a reorder point, you could cause a major disruption in your workflow.
If this happens multiple times, you risk losing long-time buyers and tarnishing your brand’s reputation. The great news is that you can avoid this problem by simply setting up a reorder point.
Check your historical inventory date and forecast demand for reordering. Once you have your insights, you’ll know how much to order and when.
Then, use the inventory management system to create an automatic reorder point notification so you can stay on top of your stock levels. Additionally, consider your lead times when setting up the point, as this will reduce time constraints.
Upgrade Your Inventory Management System With Canary7
Get started with Canary7 today to simplify inventory management. Our user-friendly WMS software is designed to improve organization and visibility.
You can automa te order processing, fulfillment, shipping, and more with Canary7. Our software is designed to give you a 360-degree view of your inventory with accurate insights to make informed decisions.
With all these tools, you can improve efficiency while cultivating your brand. So don’t wait; get started with Canary7 today!
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