This year, a severe supply chain crisis is affecting the entire world. Numerous items that were ordered but never arrived from Asia cause stock values of businesses that rely on Chinese-produced goods to fall, and buyers see bare shelves in retailers. However, the shortages are far less severe now than they were earlier in the pandemic.
How can a firm survive a supply shortage?
If your company’s supply chain is having problems, there are a few things you may do to try to preserve your profits
- Emphasize gift cards
You might alter your strategy and push gift cards with lengthy validity periods rather than the Christmas-perfect gifts if you are aware that you are running low on items that are frequently bought as gifts. By providing gift cards, you provide your customers the option to let their loved ones select what they like from what is still on hand or to wait till the items they prefer are back in stock. Giving gift cards a greater nominal value can encourage people to buy them. For instance, you could run a campaign saying, “Buy a $100 gift card and get $105 value on the gift card.”
- Introduce preorders
Pre-orders are a different choice in addition to the “inform me once back in stock” button and gift cards. Allow clients to pay for a product they want, then if it becomes available once more, ship it to them. Ideally, you should be able to guarantee the arrival date of the product, but if that is not possible, leave the field empty. If you want people to place preorders at your store rather than looking for the identical item elsewhere, you might need to provide an incentive (promotion, discount code). Here are a few suggestions for encouraging preorders:
For each item that is preordered and may later be utilised in your store, give a $5 gift card.
Give all things that have been pre-ordered a 5% discount.
Pre-ordered items receive twice as many loyalty points as standard, in-stock purchases.
Offer free delivery on all preordered merchandise.
Check to see if pre-ordering is permitted in your nation and what restrictions are to be placed on the offer.
Supply chain problems may lower your anticipated profits and force you to completely alter your marketing plan. Even though maintaining or raising your prices may seem like a fantastic approach, do not rely only on it. There are further ways you may safeguard your earnings and guarantee you’ll still sell a lot throughout this pre-Christmas period. You can do a lot to increase sales despite the shortages, such offering pre-orders, gift cards, running deals on available substitutes, and investing in client retention initiatives.
Evolve is an API-first promotion and loyalty management system that can be swiftly incorporated into your current architecture if you need a promotion engine to launch discount coupons, promotions, loyalty or gift card campaigns.We have a tonne of pre-built integrations to let you run campaigns quickly and easily without spending a fortune.