That period of time, when the main advantage of Internet shops was the price of goods, is slowly passing away. Customers’ desire to get not just cheap goods but also good service – on-time delivery, various methods of payment, notifications, polite couriers, etc – is coming to the fore. Methods of organizing these processes are well-known. They include own delivery service or outsourcing of a delivery function. Let’s consider all cons and pros of each option:

It has become clear even out of this brief comparison that an Internet-shop needs significant investments, highly professional staff, strong nerves and time expenditures. All these aspects are not the most evident things at our market. The only way out is to cooperate with reliable and qualified contractors. According to our poll the Ukrainian Internet-shops are expecting from contractors the following things:

Dmitriy Lappo, Managing Partner, Kniga.Biz.ua

• adequacy of declared services and real work (real everyday interaction)
• understanding of Internet-shop needs
• reasonable price
• coverage of cities
• possibility to take cash proceeds from clients
• meeting delivery terms
• Speed (promptness) of delivery – a client does not want to wait, he wants “here and now” (in particular it concerns the group of goods subject to irregular impulse choice)
• Security of delivery and its promptness – a client should receive his order without time extensions and delays right in time promised before.
• Delivery service should work seven days a week as well as through the holidays, delivery should be performed not only in day-time but also in the evenings.
• Quality of delivery – it is always pleasant to receive your order from a tidy, polite and smiling courier.
• Self-cost of delivery, scalability and possibility to cope with any quantity of orders should be taken into consideration, in particular if it concerns a really high-quality service.

Yulia Shilova, Marketing Director, www.modnakasta.ua

When selecting a courier service the most important thing for modnaKasta is geographical coverage (we guarantee out clients the delivery to any point of Ukraine) and terms of delivery. It stands to reason that partner’s flexibility, possibilities of software integration, as well as possibilities of prompt response to our business tasks are of paramount importance.

What does the Ukrainian market of delivery offer? Unlike its Russian colleagues with their courier services which have been specializing only on cooperation with Internet-shops for many years, our delivery services still thoroughly investigate the nuances of e-commerce business. Though the great interest to the branch of Internet-shops is regularly declared everywhere we have tried to get information if there is a real readiness to transform it in compliance with the needs of potential clients by means of polling key players of the delivery market according to their key services and their cost for Internet-shops*.

The author also conducted a full-fledged global Researches of the Ukrainian market of courier and delivery services. The table contains information (from the date a company tothe list of services and costs) of all the leading players in the industry:

Comparative characteristics of cost and range of services for Internet-shops of courier service companies of Ukraine.